Historical setting: A dark age in Gaul

         At this waking I’m lying in the soaking hull, but now I can see a pale of light through strips of bandages.  That brings a promise of healing and an assurance of again having sight.

         “The hull is taking on water faster than men can pump the bilge, so you will have to move to the empty bench astern or you will be the first to drown. I will help you, Man.”

         He seems to be talking to me. I’m more surprised than anyone that I can be pulled up to standing and dropped again, seated on a rower’s bench.

         “Don’t mind the oar here. We won’t ask you to row today.”

         That assurance to me seems to draw a roar of laughter or maybe it’s just taunts from the others. Perhaps, in the eyes of the men at the oars I look so broken it would only be in jest that I could ever be useful to them.

         Seated on this bench I find resting my sore head on the ship’s hard rib-bone is nearly debilitating. And the dirge of the coxswain drum and the draw of the oars skews a sour dissidence with the pounding in my head. So I sit here upright and I choose to let the pounding head find the newer, better tempo. Possibly no one will notice if I should try dipping the oar that is here across my knees. Possibly I can help row. But in an instant the rage of river snatches the handle from my grip and it flies past, and snaps through the lock as another man has grabbed it fast and recaptured it, bringing it back in place before it would be torn away and lost in the river.  So much for my subtle attempt to help; all I can do now is apologize.

         “I’m sorry I tried the oar. I was hoping I could be useful.”

         I feel another next to me like a warm lion after a weasel kill shoulder-to-shoulder with me.

         “You want to row Lazarus, Man? Put your hands this way on the oar while it is flat inside.” He places my hands as though he were shaping the straw of a lifeless scarecrow in a field to make it appear alive and fool the crows. He seems surprised I actually have a grip on it. “Now, Man, when you are ready we can dip the oar, and immediately the instant it touches the froth, together we will draw it back with our full strength.” His hands are doing the work. My hands are pretending. It is indeed humiliating and…

(Continued Tomorrow)

Historical setting: A dark age in Gaul

         At this waking I hear the sounds of the oars and the groaning in effort against wind driven current. I can feel the pulse of the river rills moving under my shoulders, as I lay here on the boards of hull, spine to spine with ship. Fresh bandages cover my eyes so at least there is cause for the incessant darkness.

         A cold dampness is rising inside this ship’s hull as if it were the tide breaching onto dry beach. Two rowers are summoned from the stern-most bench to man the bilges and those left at the oars are heaving and drawing at peak tempo with the plan to reach Nantes before the leaking hull drowns us all.

         I hear the officer and his assistant deciding what to do with me as I am in such a useless state. “Sir, I’ve heard that at the next bend in the river, where the shelf of rock juts out near a vineyard is the place where the gardens of remedies grow. We could just leave him there in the care of the pagan hag.”

         “But he may be a loyal Christian, and besides we need to move quickly to the shipyard or we will all be floundering in the river.”

         “And of course, Sir, he may also be fair at the oars when he has healed a bit.”

         “Good man. You share my thoughts. If we could add a loyal rower to our numbers as we rejoin our fleet the centurion will surely be impressed. In these times, adding one, even a bandaged one, would seem a hopeful sign of renewal. I say we decide what to do with him later. By the time the ship is repaired we will surely know of his possibility.”

         I have no recollection at all of ever having been in a warrior’s galley. My pounding head offers no glimpses of any goodness from this. I know Jesus is my friend and he will never find me here if I’m all armored and aligned in Roman battalions. But I do remember who I am. I know who I am; thank you God, for this clarity.        

         “You are awake now, Friend?”

         One is speaking to me. I answer, “I can hear you.”

         “We believe you were robbed and beaten. Do you remember what happened?”

         “I don’t remember, but I do know who I am.”

         “And who are you?”

         “I am Lazarus, friend of Jesus.”

         “Let’s give him more time. He may have lost his mind but surely he’s a Christian.”

(Continues tomorrow)