the gospel

Joshua sat with his friends outside of the church on a day like any other. Enough clouds dotted the sky to block the sun every now and then. The wind seemed colder than normal this time of year but had a refreshing scent to it. They had been through a lot recently. To relax like this was a nice break from the previous weeks. There were unanswered questions and a lot of concern about what their future would be. By now, Joshua knew that his time with his friends would soon come to an end. There are some things that you just do not say to anyone, indiscriminately. But enough was enough, and each of the men felt that he would be denying what was truly important if he did not take extraordinary measures in order to do what he knew was right.
The church they had been going to recently used to be a place where all were welcome. It became a place that they would go just to hang out. They could always find a good conversation, whether between themselves or with strangers. Joshua saw men coming in to give their offering. They would kneel, light a candle, say a prayer, kiss their coins, and drop them in the box. A homeless lady, who had developed a reputation of being beyond help, came in to do what these men were doing. She simply walked up to the offering box and dropped her coins.
Joshua pointed out to his friends what a show these men make about giving when they know full well that they have plenty to spare. This woman, however, was giving all she had. She may have been expecting to get something out of it, some magical gift from above that would get her through the rest of the month, but in reality she had just given up. She saw no need to hold on to these things if she had nothing to look forward to. The church does good things for the community, why not give back – that was her thinking.
Joshua began to rant. “I don’t know why they think this building is so important. You know that some day this will be nothing but a pile of rocks. I bet God would want it that way too. Do you really think that the money these men give means anything other than supporting the maintenance of a place they can go to show how holy they are?”
His friends had been with him for long enough to know that Joshua was God. They clung to every word he spoke, and just like the mysterious god they grew up knowing, they assumed that everything he said had some hidden meaning to it. They began to ask him when the church would no longer be important.
“You’ll see. There will be signs.” He listed several things that would happen upon the irrelevance of the church, things that would be sure to point to the fact that the church as they knew it was already meaningless. “You know what I have taught you is just and good. You know that this world looks on the things we believe and views them as blasphemy because they contradict the institutions that have become acceptable to these evil men. And I will add to that, that because of what you know to be truth, you will be hated; because of me you will suffer.”