For Rowdy Christians Everywhere Read online



  For

  Rowdy

  Christians

  Everywhere

  By Davethe Hammer

  Copyright 2012 by

  Davethe Hammer

  In memory of Tom,

  who took it by force.

  “The belief in a God All Powerful wise and good, is so essential to the moral order of the World and to the happiness of man, that arguments which enforce it cannot be drawn from too many sources nor adapted with too much solicitude to the different characters and capacities to be impressed with it.” --James Madison

  For Rowdy Christians Everywhere

  Book 1: The Crafty Tale of Luke the Hun

  Part I: Searching By Land

  Chapter 1: The Beginning, See

  Chapter 2: The Cross of Gold and the Man of God

  Chapter 3: “I’ll Have a Hot Assorted”

  Chapter 4: Conversin’ With a Relic

  Chapter 5: Electric Man

  Chapter 6: Reading, Riding, Short Division and Fractions (you’ll see)

  Chapter 7: Thunderhouse

  Chapter 8: The Extra-Value Meal: Burgers, Fries, and Prophecy

  Chapter 9: A Business Trip to Bohemia

  Chapter 10: All the Way to Penetanguishene

  Chapter 11: The One About the Bird

  Chapter 12: Trees Like Baptists

  Chapter 13: Corn and Sorrow

  Chapter 14: Second Opinions and Second Shift

  Chapter 15: Tattoos, Tutti Frutti, and Tearful Good-byes

  Chapter 16: Fellowship and Foolycake, Lacrosse Balls and Altar Calls

  Chapter 17: Tricky Shaky

  Chapter 18: The Troll Handled his Sledgehammer Masterfully

  Chapter 19: Bridgette Takes Care of the Pope’s Light Work

  Part II: Searching By Sea

  Chapter 20: Sling the Sloopy Keel Ye Starboard Wenches

  Chapter 21: Good Deed Doers

  Chapter 22: Cold Sea Conversations

  Chapter 23: A Guy From the North Shows Luke How to Play it Cool

  Chapter 24: The Sensitive Side of the Sea

  Chapter 25: Terry’s Bar and Grill

  Chapter 26: Having Fun and Gettin’ Serious

  Chapter 27: There are Rules to this Game

  Chapter 28: A Brief Rap, A Briefer Scrap, and Luke Takes the Teeniest Little Nap

  Chapter 29: Tom II

  Chapter 30: Dragon Isle

  Chapter 31: Serpent St. Helena

  Chapter 32: One Day

  Chapter 33: Help from the Heavens

  Chapter 34: Friends in Wet Places

  Part III: Searching By Bus

  Chapter 35: The Bus to Glory

  Chapter 36: The Bus to Nowhere

  Chapter 37: Rendezvouz and Road Games

  Chapter 38: A Fast Ride, A Wise Guide, and a Smooth Slide

  Part IV: Searching By Faith

  Chapter 39: One Night

  Chapter 40: Luke Meets Coolest Guy of Them All

  Epilogue 1: On the Links With Luke the Hun

  Epilogue 2: Cast and Crew

  Appendix I: Multi-Person Poems

  Appendix II: In Order that the Reader May Better Judge a Particular Matter

  BOOK 2: Sestinas for Sundays, by Luke the Hun

  Foreword

  “As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent.” Revelation 3:19

  This book has almost everything.

  Dragons, Genies and Trolls; princes and fair maidens; talking animals and a really tough fish; Huns and Vikings; Cavemen and Canadians; bread and circuses; fistfights and fishermen; brass knuckles and basketball, euchre games and lacrosse battles; the snows of Baffin Island and the swamps of Atlantis; bus chases and space travel; angels and aliens; bluesmen speaking softly and sea serpents speaking Portuguese; the biography of a king, and the journal of everyman; and last and best, Jesus Christ our Lord. All pleasantly garnished with slogans and banners, sestinas and limericks, haikus and knock-knock jokes, an aroma of postmodernism and a hearty portion of old-fashioned values, simmered in a tasteful sauce of joviality, spirituality, and Cornhusker references. It has everything but surprise endings, that is. Coz I’ll tell ya now: ‘I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.’

  This book is for almost everyone.

  For Christians, may you find something in it, some stories or phrases, to stretch your faith, steel your resolve, strengthen your commitments. Or, just dig on the corny humor (it’s harmless). And maybe it’s the kind of book you could lend to a friend.

  For skeptics and searchers, may you find something in it, some poems or sermons to challenge your faith--to create some questions, or to answer some, and to encourage an open and willing spirit: so that you may begin to seek God, and in seeking, to find! (Remembering the wise words of Hans Denck: “When you hear your brother say something that is strange to you do not immediately argue with him, but listen to see whether he may be right and you also can accept it. If you cannot understand him you must not judge him, and if you think that he may be in error, consider that you may be in greater error.”) For the gospel of Christ is true. Don’t be afraid to at least consider it. Begin with that. I was a scoffer once too. It wasn’t until I seriously searched, not until I first humbled myself enough to admit ‘Maybe I’m wrong’, that I finally saw truth I never could have dreamed of, miracles I always would have missed!

  But mostly I write this book for myself: Any lessons I would pass on, I must first hear myself. When I write another man’s story, I doubtless project a little of my own, and when I read of another man’s life, I must evaluate my own life as well. If anything in these pages blesses you, know that it has blessed me also. I have written what I have written. Each chapter began as an act of faith, and ended by drawing me closer to God. It’s always that way.

  So here it is: the story of Luke the Hun, a fearsome warrior and a pretty good option quarterback, who decided to go straight, to become a man of peace and dreams, and to find the one right answer.

  His story takes place on the pretty planet of Timnalauren, which is kinda like Earth in some respects, different in others. As the legendary Bertralamus J explains it, Timnalauren was the world he designed for a fantasy role-playing game, with monsters and treasures, and middle-ages technology...except then they couldn’t help sprucing it up with all the good stuff they liked from Earth! We’ll have fun there too. Not everything is where you would expect it to be, but everything is where it needs to be.

  Whether the pretty planet of Timnalauren and its people are real or merely a clever fiction I know not. I only know that I have been among them: driving buses, cracking jokes, and eating sandwiches. The one thing I am sure of is, wherever they are, whether in some strange corner of the mind, or in some far-off corner of God’s creation, they are perpetually working out their own salvation with fear and trembling. Should not we who certainly exist do likewise?

  I commit this work now to your edification, and God’s glorification. If it makes you smile, I smile also. If it makes you laugh, I laugh with you. But more than that: I think that it will make you think, I hope that it will make you hope, I pray that it will make you pray. And I believe that it will help one of you to believe.

  Lord, make it so. Amen.

  Book 1: The Crafty Tale of Luke the Hun

  Part 1: Searching by Land