The Needle by J. Scott Hardin	Part 1 appears in this issue.
conclusion

The teacher went on explaining some somber point to the seated audience, whose members looked by turns amazed and skeptical. Despite their confusion and protest, the teacher never lost his patient and compassionate countenance. There was a quality to that face that Ezra was certain he recognized. If he could only recall what it was...

“You were searching for something, my child?” a voice asked from behind. A cold but friendly hand gripped Ezra’s shoulder, and he turned around with a start at the unexpected presence. He found himself gazing up into the eyes of a tall and powerfully built figure. The facial features had a smooth and appealing radiance that set off intent and probing eyes. Ezra thought he could perceive a small curiosity in them, as if the man had been waiting for this. There was a restraint in his face that marked him as a born teacher, but the impression he had was that the man was a teacher of a discipline altogether different from that espoused by the leader who spoke on the hill.

“You were searching for this, I think,” he continued, holding out a thin piece of metal. When Ezra stooped to peer at the object, the man began rolling it between his thumb and the tips of his fingers. It was a long, silvery needle with an open, oval thread hole that reflected brightly in the light. “You have sought this out in life and beyond life, and you shall have it if that be your wish.”

“Good teacher,” Ezra replied in a puzzled voice, “I know I must be dead. Have I been dead a long time? Where is this place to which I have journeyed so long?”

“Time?” the man queried with a wry grin. After a contented pause, he resumed in a more pedantic tone. “Time and Space. How shall I make clear to you who have not the faculties to understand such truths? You have journeyed to this place and at this moment because it is in your nature to do so. Do you not know that you are a creature of God? Do you not know that He has created you with this destiny in His mind’s eye?”

Ezra was uncertain of the meaning of this speech, but he did realize that he was a creature of God. He considered the possibility that these surroundings might be heaven with a certain perplexity because they seemed so desolate and uncomfortable. The otherworldliness of the place was wrong, and he wished he could have gone to hear the men on the hill. Those who had been seated had all risen and were making preparations to leave. Ezra’s companion watched his interest and sighed quietly. He had never stopped gliding the needle back and forth along his fingers with casual grace.

“It is only natural that you will have questions,” he resumed. “Although I am not obliged to, I will answer them because yours is a great example. Those men you noticed over there have written of you in celebrated testament.”

Ezra had a good number of questions on his mind for this teacher who seemed so much more aware of what was happening around them. He thought that God might be testing him and rejoiced that at least He knew him as an example.

“I wanted to join those men on the hill. Do you know who they are?”

“Of course I know them, child. They are twelve students, the most celebrated students the world has ever known.”

“They must be important men then,” Ezra concluded. Instinctively, however, he suspected that men of such high regard ought to have set for themselves a better attire. Men of standing he knew would have. Ezra’s companion smiled again as if having expectations justified. “There was a young fellow who came up to the hill just now, looking for an answer of some kind. He asked the one by the tree, ‘What must I do to inherit eternal life?’ I could hear nothing more, but the man went away very sad.”

“And rightly so, for the answer he received was one with which he could not comply. It is certain that he will forget about the encounter afterwards.”

“How do you know he will?” Ezra wondered.

“Why because you yourself could not hear what was spoken,” his companion replied with the obvious disdain of a man dealing with a presumptuous and errant inferior. He held the needle up before Ezra’s face and paused for a moment in reflection. “That is why your path has led you to this. Perhaps that is the tragedy of your example, that people the world over should know the words and yet you do not.”

Wiping his brow with the damp arm of his robe, Ezra began to shift his scalded feet. His stomach and limbs were on fire, and the stale air outside burned with even greater intensity than ever before. The camel stood complacently, and the newcomer remained as unaffected as ever. A fear had been growing in Ezra that he should know of the conversation that had taken place among the men on the hill. Desperation had been sprouting from his anxiety, and his voice trembled when he resumed his questioning.

“I do not understand what it is that you say, good teacher. Who is it that stood under the tree and taught his students and sent the young man away in sadness?”

“Yes, that too is a part of your example, the tragedy that I should be the one to answer this for you. Could you not recognize in the face of that man beside the tree the Son of God?”

In the beat of a heart, Ezra’s desperation descended into streaks of terror. “I confess I did not,” he protested, “but I will go to him now.”

“Will you?” his companion jested, sweeping his hand wide across the arid expanse.

With a jerk, Ezra turned around and saw that the men had all left, and he felt overwhelming loss. “It cannot be,” he reasoned, “not now that I have finally found Him. It cannot be! Why has He left me?”

To this the teacher made no reply. Not even he could work out the reason behind it. After a moment, he added to the silence, “Now that is a matter of justice with which I have experienced difficulty myself. God may act because He wills it so; even you know of the truth of that. He has never kept this privilege secreted. As you are what He has made of you, so He is what He has made of Himself.”

“But wait, good teacher. I know what I should do. If the Son of God truly has departed, maybe he left some message with that young man he sent away. Surely God would leave me some clue, and you yourself declared that I was an example. Do you know where we may find Him?”

Ezra’s surging hope disappeared at his companion’s sudden, contemptuous laughter. “Oh but He has, child. Do you not see in your own person that rich young man who went away with such profound sadness? Your journey has neared its end now that you have rediscovered yourself. You see how narrow is your understanding of Time and Space that to find the man warned, you must look within.”

“Teacher,” the man pleaded, “please tell me the warning of the Son of God. Surely if I can be made to understand it, He will allow me an eternal life.”

“What do you mean? Can you not recount it even now? He explained to you that to inherit eternal life, you must forsake all your possessions and follow Him. This you refused.”

Recognition crossed over Ezra’s face as wave upon wave of hot air crushed into him from all quarters. “How can you not feel this heat? Can we find shelter anywhere? I heard someone playing music nearby.”

“Heat?” Again the teacher broke into a wry smile. “Do you suppose you have yet learned what there is to know of heat? That music, as you call it, is a shelter of sorts, a gateway to my home. You will stay with me there. Come, we will go to it.”

Despite his panic and weariness, Ezra latched onto the rolling needle in his mind. “No, I must go to He who is my maker. I am His child, and He left that needle for me. It must be the way to Him.”

“The needle. Of course, my child, it is as you say. He left it for you, but to use it, you must know what His Son explained to those students.”

Ezra was nearly shaking from the heat. He could no longer see the hill where the discussion had taken place. His view was a yellow tangle of sand and dunes and dirty wind that stung wherever his robes did not cover.

“What did He tell them? Please?” The pleading tone carried much anguish.

“Very well. If He left a way open, I shall not be the one who bars you from taking it if you can.” The teacher’s expression became grave, and he continued more slowly. “What he told his disciples was ‘it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.’ So take your needle then, if you wish it, child. As you may see, your camel is beside you.”

With that, the teacher held out the silvery needle in an open palm. Ezra stared at it in horror and then considered his camel. “No,” he stammered, “this cannot be. I have been faithful to God all my life.”

“This is true enough,” the teacher conceded, “but have you been faithful to the teachings of His Son?”

“How could I know? I confess, I did not know.”

“Confession, child, is one concern that will no longer be a burden to you. Where we go now, none of my minions will prevent you from confessing as often or as deeply as you wish, but you need not do so. In my home, it has no influence or effect on salvation.”

He closed his fist tight over the needle and took a step forward. “You wondered of heat, and it is your time to know it fully.” Before Ezra had a chance to step back, the teacher clasped his hand in an unbreakable grip.

Ezra cried out. The heat was overwhelming, and layer upon layer pushed not only into his hand but through his whole body. He knelt down and wept like a child.

“It is done,” said the teacher with finality. He held the piece of metal up as though contemplating it.

Ezra recognized in its new shape the precise curvature of a number. When he turned his eyes to his own ruined hand, he saw that the number had been burned onto it three times: six-six-six. A gust of grainy wind came forth, and Ezra’s hand sifted apart. He screamed from the caverns of his soul with all his might. In a moment, it was over. Only a dwindling streak of ash marred the landscape and an echo of a cry that was the sound of the ages.

Lucifer looked back to the tree on the hill and saw tears slipping down in gentle arcs on the cheeks of the Son of God. “Strange, “he mused, “I thought it would be smaller.” With that, he threw aside the twisted needle and stepped into darkness.

Copyright © 2010 by J. Scott Hardin

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