Tribulation Force by Tim LaHaye; Jerry B. Jenkins

Author:Tim LaHaye; Jerry B. Jenkins
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Last-days, Revelations, Fiction
ISBN: 9780842329217
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
Published: 1996-04-25T07:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

By the time Rayford and Chloe were doing the dishes, Rayford had heard all about her awkward encounter with Bruce. “So he never owned up to sending the flowers?” Rayford said.

“It was so strange, Dad,” she said. “I kept trying to get the subject back onto loneliness and how much we all meant to each other, all four of us, and he seemed not to pick up on it. He would agree we all had needs, and then he would shift back to the subject of study or some other thing he wanted me to look up. I finally said I was just curious about romantic relationships during this period of history, and he said he might talk about it tonight. He said others had raised the same subject with him recently and that he had some questions too, so he had been studying it.”

“Maybe he'll come clean tonight.”

“It isn't a matter of coming clean, Dad. I don't expect him to tell me in front of you and Buck that he sent me the flowers. But maybe we'll be able to read between the lines and find out why he did it.”

Buck was still in Bruce's office when Rayford and Chloe arrived. Bruce began the nightly meeting of the Tribulation Force by getting everyone's permission to put on the table everything that was happening in each life. Everyone nodded.

After outlining the offers that Buck and Rayford had received, Bruce said he felt the need to confess his own sense of inadequacy for the role of pastor of a church of new believers. “I still deal with shame every day. I know I have been forgiven and restored, but living a lie for more than thirty years wears on a person, and even though God says our sins are separated as far as the east is from the west, it's hard for me to forget.” He also admitted his loneliness and fatigue. “Especially,” he said,

“as I think about this pull toward traveling and trying to unite the little pockets of what the Bible calls ‘tribulation saints.’”

Buck wanted to come right out and ask why he hadn't simply signed a card on Chloe's flowers, but he knew it wasn't his place. Bruce moved on to both Rayford's and Buck's new job opportunities. “This may shock all of you, because I have not expressed an opinion yet, but Buck and Rayford, I think both of you should seriously consider accepting these jobs.”

That threw the meeting into an uproar. It was the first time the four of them had spoken so forcefully on such personal subjects. Buck maintained that he would never be able to live with himself if he sold out his journalistic principles and allowed himself to manipulate the news and be manipulated by Nicolae Carpathia.

He was impressed that Rayford did not seem to have his head turned by such a choice job offer, but he found himself agreeing with Bruce that Rayford should consider it.

“Sir,” Buck said, “the very fact that you're not angling for it is a good sign.

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