Charley

By Michael Wells
Posted Friday, April 9, 2004

14: 6 “Jesus said* to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”
I woke up this morning thinking of an old friend. Charley was my friend from Jr. High on. His mother ran a bar and his father was an absent alcoholic. One day I stole the neighbor’s car with Charley, and when we got it up to 40 mph we discovered that the reason it had been sitting so long was that it didn’t have brakes. Another friend, Clark, had us get close to the ditch, and he jumped out. Charley and I continued until we realized that we could simply turn off the engine. He was a good friend and taught me how to hop the train from the intersection near the school to my house that was a little over a mile away. One day, in high school, a boy from the local reform school told Charley that I said something about his girlfriend that I never said. Charley confronted me and wouldn’t believe that I didn’t say it. He insisted on a fight. That afternoon after school we fought until someone called the police. Here is what is vexing me: If I only knew what I know now, I would have let Charley hit me and never struck back. There is The Way and a not the way. Jesus is The Way and every other way is not the way. Why am I thinking of that? Why do I wish Charley would have been allowed to hit me? I suppose that I am projecting my present revelation on the past, and that is dangerous, for it can cause something demonic called regret. However, I really wish I would have stood still and let him hit me. Well, amen. Charley, like most all of my childhood friends, died by the time he was 33 (one friend died with a brain tumor, one was hit by a train, and the other was killed in a traffic accident). He had quit school to work as a laborer; in the country one night, sitting in his car trying to persuade his wife not to leave him, he shot her and himself. I wonder if I would have let him hit me, would it have made a difference in his life? I am no David, but I am becoming like David in my attitude. When he was with his mighty army and a man came cursing him, David simply said, “Leave him alone; it may be God.” He could see God in everything. I should have let Charley hit me. I have “hit” Christ many times, and yet He has never hit back. Well, amen! Only Jesus knows, but this morning I am thinking of Charley.