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" 'Memnoch, Life and Death are part of the cycle, and suffering isits by-product. And the human capacity to know it exempts no one!
Memnoch, that the illuminated souls you brought from Sheol knewit, that they had learnt to accept its beauty, is what made them worthyto come through the heavenly gates!'
" 'No, Lord, that's not true!' I said. 'You've gotten it wrong. Utterly.
Oh, I see what's happened.'
" 'You do? What are you trying to say to me? That I the LordGod, having spent thirty years in this human body, have not struckthe truth?'
" 'But that's just it! You've known all along you were God. Youmentioned times when you thought you were mad or almost forgot,but those were brief! Too brief! And now as you plot your death, youknow Who you are and You won't forget it, will you?'
" 'No, I won't. I must be the Son of God Incarnate to fulfill myministry, to work my miracles, of course. That's the whole point.'
" 'Then, Lord, you don't know what it means to be flesh!'
" 'How dare you assume that you do, Memnoch.'
" 'When you left me in that fleshly body, when you cast me downfor the Daughters of Men to heal and care for, in the early centuriesof this very land, I had no promise you would take me back toHeaven. Lord, you're not playing fair in this experiment. You'veknown all along you're going back, you're going back to be God!'
" 'And who better than I can understand what this flesh feels!' Hedemanded.
" 'Somebody who doesn't fully rest assured that He is the immortalCreator of the Universe,' I said. 'Any mortal man hanging on across now on Golgotha outside Jerusalem would know better thanyou!'
"His eyes grew wide as He stared at me. But He didn't challengeme. His silence unnerved me. And once, again, the power of Hisexpression, the radiance of God in man dazzled me, and drew upon theangel in me to simply shut up and fall at His feet. But I wouldn't do it!
" 'Lord, even when I went to Sheol,' I said, 'I didn't know whetheror not I'd ever come back to Heaven. Don't you see? I don't claim tohave your understanding of anything. We wouldn't be talking here ifI did. But I didn't have any promise I would be allowed back intoHeaven, don't you see? So the suffering and the darkness spoke to meand taught me, because I took the risk that I might never overcome it.
Don't you see?'
"He considered this a long time and then He shook His headsadly. 'Memnoch, you are the one who has failed to understand.
When is Humankind closest to God than when they suffer for thelove of another, when they die so that another might live, when theyplunge towards certain death for the protection of those they leavebehind or those truths about Life which Creation has taught them?'
" 'But the world doesn't need all that, Lord! No, no, no. It doesn'tneed the blood, the suffering, the war. That wasn't what taughtHumans to love! Animals already did all that bloody, horriblecatastrophe to one another. What taught Humans was the warmth andaffection of another, the love for a child, the love in a mate's arms,the capacity to understand another's suffering and want to protectthat other, to rise above savagery into the formation of family andclan and tribe that would mean peace and security for all!'
"There came a long silence. And then very tenderly He laughed.
'Memnoch, my angel. What you learnt of life you learnt in bed.'
"I didn't answer for a moment. The comment was charged withcontempt and humour, of course. Then I spoke:
" 'That's true, Lord. And suffering is so terrible for humans,injustice is so terrible for the balance of their minds that it can destroythose lessons learnt in bed, magnificent as they are!'
" 'Oh, but when love is reached through suffering, Memnoch, ithas a power it can never gain through innocence.'
" 'Why do you say that? I don't believe it! I don't think you graspit. Lord, listen to me. There's one chance for this to be proven myway. One chance.'
" 'If you think for one moment you will interfere with my ministryand my sacrifice, if you think you can turn the tide of the vastforces already moving towards this event, then you are no more anangel, but a demon!' He said.
" 'I don't ask that,' I said. 'Go through with it. Minister, outragethem; be arrested, tried, and executed on the cross, yes, do all of it.
But do it as a man!'
" 'I intend to.'
" 'No, you'll know the whole time you're God. I'm saying Forgetthat you are God! Bury your divinity in the flesh the way it's beenburied intermittently. Bury it, Lord, leaving yourself only your faithand your belief in Heaven, as if it had come to you throughRevelation immense and undeniable.
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