Escape from Paradise by D. Richard Ferguson

Author:D. Richard Ferguson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Christian fiction, Christian adventure, Christian Allegory, adventure, action, action/adventure, Frank Peretti, Ted Dekker, Pilgrim's progress, Christian fantasy
Publisher: Food For Your Soul Ministries
Published: 2021-02-23T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

Abigail stood. “This isn’t worth it. Let’s just take the ridgeline.”

The group angled across the sidehill and descended to the easier path. Once on the smooth, well-kept trail, Adam limped alongside Abigail while Watson and Kailyn trailed behind.

“Will she be okay?” Adam asked, looking over his shoulder.

Abigail glanced back as well. “She’s strong.”

She turned to Adam. Her brow arched and her cheekbones lifted, tugging at her slightly parted lips. Hope shone from her eyes like sunlight streaming through windows. Her expression was ... magical. His anxieties melted.

“So your ... weapon—it keeps you from having bad desires? Does that mean you never want fruit?”

“It’s like any weapon,” Abigail replied. “It only works when I use it. If I lay it down, I’m as vulnerable as anyone else.”

“What was the treasure?”

Abigail looked at him. “The treasure?”

He pulled the cottage piece from his pocket and ran his thumb across the words in his joy. “Your joy over the treasure drove you to give up everything to get it. If the treasure isn’t gold, what else is there?”

Her eyes brightened. “Great question.” She lifted her hand to her cheek. “I noticed when you mentioned my smile back in the lowlands, you looked at my scar. Let me tell you the story of how I got both the smile and the scar. It happened in the room of delights—in the cottage. It has a series of stone barriers down the center. The left side is the path of empty pleasure. The right, the way of painful happiness.”

“Wait, what?” Adam wrinkled his forehead. “Empty pleasure I get. But painful happiness?”

“Just listen,” she said. “When you enter the room, you have to choose a side because the floor moves and carries you forward.”

“So you’re forced to choose between empty pleasure and painful happiness? Which side did you pick?”

“Neither side sounded good to me, but I thought pleasure would be better than pain, so I went left.”

“And was it—”

“Adam, just listen,” she repeated, touching his shoulder. “The left side was amazing. Right away I thought I understood why it’s called the room of delights. I’ve enjoyed a lot of pleasures in life. This felt better than all of them. But once I passed the first barrier, the pleasure left me so suddenly that I collapsed on the floor. My energy was gone. Worse than that, hope was gone. The future seemed black as night. All I felt was suffocating despair.”

Her chin quivered, and she dropped her head. Then she drew a deep breath to continue.

“The floor carried me to the second barrier. I didn’t think I could handle any pain, so I chose the left side again. And again, sheer ecstasy.”

“Same result at the end?”

“Worse. This time when the pleasure faded, not only did I have no hope, but I lost my ability to enjoy happy memories. All I could remember were injustices, abuses, and decisions I regret. I was drowning in darkness. I wanted to cry, but I didn’t even have strength for that.”

“So did the floor stop then?”

“It never stopped.

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