Jim and Mike were still sitting gracefully in their chairs, although the back of the chairs were resting on the floor with the legs at a right angle to the ground. I had just informed them of an assignment Boss had commissioned them for and their little hearts couldn’t take the excitement; i.e., they passed out from sheer joy. We were in the break room when I passed on Boss’s message so they were laying unconscious in front of all our friends, friends they had just updated on what a charming job I had done on doing my recently concluded assignment.
I put down my coffee cup, reached for the vase on the table, pulled out the Lilies of The Valley, Boss’s favorite flower, leaned towards my two pals and unceremoniously tossed the clear, wet fluid on Mike and Jim’s faces. Oh, that felt so good, being able to help revive my friends! There was some sputtering followed by the typical comments like, “What happened? Where am I? What’s going on?” Then the two fallen angels leaped to their feet in an attempt to regain their dignity. That wasn’t pulled off successfully, by the way. The room started to resonate with some chuckling, snickering, and then full blown laughter. Even Jim and Mike couldn’t help but find the humor in the situation. After all, we weren’t programmed for anger.
“That was a good one,” Mike stated. “You really got even.”
“Yeah,” Jim agreed. “Good one.”
“What a minute, I was serious.” I responded. Blood drained from the two faces again; well that’s how it looked, because technically we don’t have blood. They were hoping I was pulling a trick on them, but the message I delivered to them from Boss had been genuine. They really had been assigned to tell some guy name Joseph that his fiancé was expecting, and not with his child. Of course I had helped Boss chose which lucky souls would be selected for this honor. After all, Mike and Jim had volunteered to assist me in fulfilling my task; I thought it only fair they get to reap some of the extended glory.
“What did you have to do with this?” Jim asked
“Boss asked for my thoughts on who should do this job and I couldn’t help but think of my two best friends,” I answered.
“Next time don’t be so friendly,” Mike advised.
An overhead page summoned my two pals to Boss’s office. It was time for them, according to Boss, to spring into action and carry the message downward.
I cheerfully volunteered to go with them for back up, after all, hadn’t they done the same for me? And at least this time we knew where we were going, (we had gotten slightly off course, hitting the wrong continent when we went down to locate my project, Mary). But hey, at least we’d gotten the right planet, the one in the center of Boss’s universe, or so thought the self centered inhabitants.
We arrived at Joe’s house just in time to see Mary’s parents leaving, looking like they’d been beaten with a shame-stick. They had come to inform Joe’s parents that they were sending Mary away for a while, several months in fact, to see her cousin, Elizabeth. Sending her away, what did that sound like? Well, to Joe’s parents it sounded like the end of an engagement, one that had been pre arranged according to centuries of customs. After all, parents don’t send teenage girls away for a few months unless…..Well that kind of thing just wasn’t discussed in decent families, especially since the penalty was stoning, (that didn’t mean partying with marijuana, it meant death by rocks!)
We hung around waiting for Joe to come home from work impatient to intercept him before his parents hit him with the news. When he eventually showed up he was tired and sweaty after a day of chopping wood, sawing and sanding lumber. Boy did he smell like a hard worker, he’d make a wonderful husband and father, if of course we, I mean Jim and Mike, accomplished their mission, but one whiff of Joe was all it took for Mike and Jim to conclude he needed time to freshen up before he received company! There was time to wait for him to rinse the day’s bouquet of labor down the drain with some Dove soap.
We waited outside Joe’s bathroom window, hiding in the bushes like common…well, angels… enjoying his baritone voice singing “Come oh Emanuel” in the shower; If he only knew how soon that request would be answered! The water stopped when the song ended. Jim levitated up to the second floor window to peek on Joe’s progress. Bad timing, Joe, toweling off his hair, had just glanced up to the window in time to see Jim’s face appear, and then quickly disappear.
Before Joe had time to react his dad knocked on the bedroom door, softly, hesitantly. He after all was not looking forward to the conversation that needed to happen. The conversation that would rip his son’s heart open.
“Joe, we need to talk,” Dad explained. Oh come on, that sounded so harsh, we thought, eavesdropping like good….well angels, but what other opening was there for a topic like this.
“What’s up, I’m off to Mary’s for Shabbat dinner.”
Dad paled, his wife, Mom, was just behind him gripping her crisp apron, using the end of it to wipe her face, nervously shifting her weight from one foot to the other.
“Hey, what happened, you look like someone died,” We heard Joe ask. Not yet, we thought.
The three of us, dressed in trench coats to hide our wings, squatting behind bushes with our ears pressed firmly against the outside wall, nonchalantly listened to Joe get the scoop on Mary's parents visit. Mom let Dad do all the talking, well, all the lucid talking, as she paced back and forth wringing her not-so-crisp-anymore apron and repeating over and over, "Oh, dear, how could this happen?... such a sweet child....who would have guessed....such a respected family...tsk,..tsk...."
Joe was stunned. Stunned? What an understatement. And what’s more, he wouldn't believe a word of it. There was some mistake, his parents were jumping to the wrong conclusions he verbalized adamantly and loudly and insistently. Good boy, stand up for your woman, we encouraged just before we caught a glimpse of a shadowy figure across the street smoking, and without a cigarette! Now I knew why Boss sent two guys for this mission. One would be needed to fend off the opposition. Opposition was wearing a hat to conceal what we knew were two twisted and ugly horns placed above one ugly face! (A face made repulsive by having lost its chance to gaze on Boss’s continence for millennia.) Hey, we all need our camouflage gear. Thank heavens I came along for backup, these two would need help.
We crossed the street to do some friendly intimidation.
“Hey, I’m here for your team this time,” Opposition declared, not that we would ever believe him. “God’s law says that guy has the right to make this woman a public example and I’m just going to be his support system.”
Enough said, we thought, we can’t let this guy near Joe, not tonight, not while his resistance is down.
Jim and I moved in on Opposition while Mike abrupty took off at Olympian speed in the opposite direction. Coward, I thought hardly believing what I was seeing. I had to revise my opinion when I realized that Mike was hurrying after Joe who, against his parent’s guidance, was running to Mary’s house.
Opposition took off after Mike, Jim took off after Opposition and I took off after them all. Joe would have to be deaf, or deeply distracted, to not hear all the footsteps pounding after him. We all rounded a corner and stopped. We had lost Joe. No, there he was, I recognized Mary’s house. Her parents, still in the grip of shame, wouldn’t open the door for Joe, despite his persistence. He finally turned, beaten and forlorn; convinced something was awfully out of kilter, to make his way…where? Anywhere but home, not to face his parents, not to face their pity.
Hands stuffed in his pockets, head hung low, Joe headed down town, probably to dig up some friends, or find solace in a quiet hangout. Opposition was hot on his heels, ready to influence him to follow the law. We chased after Opposition, and Jim got the lead just as Joe disappeared down an alley.
We got to the alley entrance in time to see Joe spring up from behind a trash can and swing a large board into Opposition’s midsection, knocking the hot air out of him; foul, sulfur smelling hot air. Whew. Being so close behind Opposition, Jim was next; Joe gripped him by the coat collar and squashed him to a wall, bunching Jim’s wings up inside the coat making him look hunchbacked, like the magnificent hunch backed whales in the ocean. Oh, wait a minute, that’s hump backed, oh well, same difference.
“What are you guys doing following me?” Joe questioned Jim, recognizing him as the face in his bathroom window.
“We’re here to tell you that Mary is expecting-” Whoosh, a fist landed below Jim’s diaphragm.
“How would you know Mary’s expecting unless you had something to do with it?” No way could poor Jim answer that one, not with his stomach in his mouth. Ouch, that had to have hurt, I thought, from a safe distance mind you, hey, I was just a tag along, I didn’t need to get in the fracas, besides, I had just had my wings groomed and there was no need to ruffle them!
Arriving last Mike assessed the situation and pounced on top of Joe with such force he melded into his frame. Once filled with the spirit, (of Mike) Joe fell to the ground unconscience, like a typical holy roller slain in the spirit, thereby releasing Jim who was now able to nurse his tummy ache.
“I’ll get his attention,” Mike announced getting miffed with his assignment’s attitude. Mike, vaporizing, jumped into Joe’s head and explained the situation with Mary, {that she was with child by the Holy Spirit and Joe shouldn’t be ashamed to take her as wife}, demonstrating something of an attitude himself. He was tired of this human’s present state of mind; after all Joe had the reputation of being faithful, so show some faith, huh. Exiting Joe’s cranium from both ears like a plume of cloud vapor, Mike indicated he was ready to go, but first we carried Joe home and laid him to rest in a swing on his porch. Opposition we left gasping for breath in the alley lying in refuse, a suitable place for his kind.
Back at headquarters Boss requested Jim and Mike’s presence in his office, and then closed the doors, insisting on no interruptions. Oh, Oh. Behind closed doors Boss informed them their mission had been victorious. Joe had chosen the best recourse, chased Mary down, pleaded with her to fulfill their marriage vows and they were at this moment on their way to Joe’s ancestral home for a national census. (Time passes at a different speed up here.) However, Boss proposed some courses for the two of them, as successful as their mission was he had some misgivings over the unorthodox methods they had employed.
When Jim and Mike finally made it to the break room they found half the staff standing and floating around the bulletin board enjoying a good laugh.
“Let us see,” Mike quipped trying to jostle his way to the front while getting pushed back by dozens of wings that were heaving with amusement. Jim managed to hover up over the crowd and moaned when he glimpsed the objects of everyone’s delight. I had done a good job after all; I had thought the alley would be too dark to get just what I wanted but no; the pictures of Jim had come out just right, pressed against the wall with the wind knocked out of his sail by a human. Oh yeah, by the look on his face I still claim that punch had to have hurt! And the piqued expression on Mike’s face just before he nosedived into Joe’s brain to do dream therapy was absolutely side-splitting. Of course everyone really relished the photo of Opposition getting slam banged. Joe would be a good protector.
“Oh, why’d you do that,” Mike and Jim asked in unison, smothering their own giggles, unable to deny the comical element involved in their efforts.
“Hey, someone had to record our trip for the baby album, after all, we were a part of history, or should I say His Story?”
Without warning our choir director broke into the lounge looking so jumpy you’d think he was having a baby, “Hey guys, I need a thousand or more volunteers, we’ve got orders to sing to some shepherds in a field watching sheep!”
Isaiah 7:13-17
math. 1:25
Luke 1:39-56
luke 2: 8-20
john 1:32-34
John 19:34
gal. 4:4-7
