Lead Me Home by Stacy Hawkins Adams

earlier had strained her faith.
    “I couldn’t understand how this woman, who would have done anything God asked of her—who
did
do anything and everything she felt God was leading her to do—had to suffer like this; why God didn’t heal her and let her keep her leg,” Marlene said. “Mama never felt the same after that loss; she just went downhill. When we buried her five months later, I stopped going to church for a while. Now I know I should have followed Abigail’s example and remained steadfast when I didn’t understand; but for a long time, I felt like Ruth’s mother-in-law Naomi, like God had forsaken me.”
    Shiloh glanced at Jade to see if she wanted to respond, but a slight smile was fixed on her expressionless face, and Shiloh wondered if Jade had let her mind wander, because she didn’t seem to be in tune with Marlene’s sharing.
    “What led you back to God, Marlene?” Shiloh finally asked.
    Marlene leaned forward in her chair, and her voice softened.
    “Honestly, it was Mama. It took me forever to go through all of her stuff, and about two years after she died—that will be three yearsago this month—I finally decided to clean out the chests of drawers I had moved from her home into my attic. In one of them, I found a journal she had been keeping the last year of her life …”
    Marlene’s eyes watered and she choked up.
    “It was the journal I had given her the Mother’s Day before her death. I sat on my living room sofa on that Saturday afternoon and read all of her entries. In the last few pages, I found some truths that shook me to my core. Mama wrote on the day after her leg was amputated just five words: ‘Thy will be done, Lord.’ And then later she wrote, ‘You are my joy, Heavenly Father.’ And her final entry said, ‘Your love is better than life. I love you more each day, and in you I find my peace and rest.’”
    Marlene sat back in her seat and wiped her cheeks. “I will never forget those words; they’re stamped in my heart and mind,” she said. “Mama loved God anyhow. So why did I think I had the right to hold a grudge when she had accepted his will? I returned to St. Stephens Baptist the very next day and rededicated my life to God.”
    “Wow. Amen.” Jade offered that double-word feedback and turned to Shiloh. “You go ahead and finish us out, okay?”
    Shiloh wrapped up the discussion, and about ten minutes later, ended with prayer.
    When everyone was gone except Shiloh and Jade, and they were walking through the education wing shutting off lights, Jade paused and turned to her.
    “Thank you for tonight, Shiloh. I guess I’m not as ready as I thought I was to lead this study.”
    Shiloh touched her arm, but she didn’t know what to say. Tonight hadn’t gone well, and Shiloh was concerned that if the awkwardness continued, the women might stop coming and dissuade others from participating, too. At the same time, she remembered Randy’sadmonition, and also what God had dropped into her spirit a few weeks ago: Jade’s interest in being here and helping lead the study might be him doing something in particular with her, or through her.
    “Don’t worry about it, Jade,” Shiloh said. “We all start somewhere. But you do seem a bit perplexed by how to get the women talking, or engaged in the topic you’ve presented. Maybe we can think about how to lead the study together, with me covering certain parts and you handling others—at least until they get used to both of us teaching.”
    Jade was on the verge of tears, but instead of allowing them to fall, she inhaled and mustered a smile. “Didn’t you know? I’m only comfortable with makeup, fashion, shoes, and shopping.”
    Shiloh’s eyes widened, and Jade nodded. “Yeah—I know that’s what the ladies of St. Stephens Baptist think about me and say about me behind my back. They think I’m shallow and dumb. I’m not, you know; but I admit that I don’t know my Bible like I should. Vic and I have been