Rhineland Inheritance by T. Davis Bunn

Author:T. Davis Bunn
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781441270900
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group

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Jake dropped Servais off at the headquarters building in Badenburg and headed toward the center of town. He found Chaplain Fox surrounded by helpers at the feeding station, preparing the day’s meal. They had long since found it necessary to declare the lot off limits until the chaplain had blessed the meal and serving had begun; as a result, a crowd was already gathering just outside the lot’s perimeters. If he had not been so distracted, Jake would have taken great comfort from the fact that a few of the kids had actually had enough energy to start a game of tag down the street.

Jake pulled the chaplain over to one side and told him about all the fuss being made over the relief effort. He finished with the complaint, “I’m not a hero. I don’t even feel like a hero.”

“Not many honest people do, Jake.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Most heroics are built on tragedy,” Chaplain Fox replied. “And most heroes do not act alone. If a man is honest with himself, he can take little pleasure in gaining from someone else’s misery. And he will always feel uncomfortable if people make him into a symbol for the noble actions of many.”

Jake kicked at a loose stone, sending it spinning across the rubble-strewn lot. “So what is the answer?”

“Allow God to use you for His glory, not for your own,” he answered simply. “When your moment of honor comes, remember David’s prayer. Who am I, David asks of God, that you would call me by name? And what have I done that causes you to give such greatness to your servant’s house?” The chaplain paused to smile at the little girl whose mother was tending the cooking fire, then continued. “Here at the moment when David is being crowned king of all Israel, he humbles himself before God and declares himself a servant. That to me is the only sane way to approach recognition and honor. To dedicate it to the Lord and seek to do His will.”

Jake was still mulling over the chaplain’s words when a voice behind him called out, “Excuse me please, Herr Kapitän.”

He turned and saw Frau Friedrichs, the first woman who had brought her sick child to him. The memory of most faces were blurred by hurry and fatigue. But as she had been the first, Jake recognized her immediately. He walked over and asked in German, “How is your son?”

“Weak,” she replied, her voice long since drained of all emotion. It was as flat and as hollow as her features. “Very weak. But he lives.”

Jake nodded. He had seen too many of the children hanging on by the slenderest of threads. Too many. “Is he taking any food?”

“Your priest gives me what he can,” she replied. “I make a soup. He drinks some when he wakes up.”

He noted the darkened rings surrounding her sunken eyes, the hollowed cheeks. “Then he should live.”

She nodded. “You are a good man. You did all you could.

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