#sixsentencestories – Page 13 – Poetry, Short Prose and Walking

Combination—Six Sentence Story

Bart dreamed that a rich man gave him the combination to the lock on his storeroom and told him to take all the gold and jewelry he could carry out. Joyfully he stuffed his pockets.

When a child approached with his hands out the rich man told him to give something to the child, but Bart said, “No, I have to fill my own barn!”

Nonetheless Bart obeyed the rich man giving the child the tiniest gold coin he had crammed away somewhere which turned into a loaf of bread and a fish in the child’s hands. Others seeing what happened rushed to receive something as well.

After Bart opened his eyes from his dream to the morning light and the sound of birds and put on his threadbare clothes to leave the shelter he recalled that his pockets in that dream remained mysteriously full no matter how fast the rivers of living water welled up from within him to give everything away.

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Denise offers this prompt word “combination” for this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

John 7:37-38
³⁷In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.
³⁸He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.

Text—Six Sentence Story

In the good old days the Ninevites were a wicked bunch. The Lord told Jonah to tell them to either repent or be severely punished which sent Jonah off on a boat in the opposite direction, because he knew, like everyone else, except perhaps the Lord, that Nineveh did not deserve an opportunity to repent.

When the Lord roughed up the waves to destructive levels below the boat Jonah was fleeing on, the reluctant crew threw him overboard at his own request so the sea would calm. A fish sent by the Lord scooped him into its mouth and held him in a disgusting state of indigestion for three days and three nights until the Lord finally let the fish relieve its bellyache by vomiting its cargo onto the shore. Then the Lord asked Jonah once again to tell the Ninevites to repent lest He destroy them.

Jonah recited the bare text of the Lord’s message hoping no one in Nineveh would listen, but the grotesque stench coming from his direction only confirmed the conspiracy theories about a fish and a boat and, since no one in Nineveh wanted whatever happened to him to happen to them, they all repented.

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Denise offers the prompt word “text” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories. For what really happened see the short book of Jonah. Jonah son of Amittai was a prophet during the reign of Jeroboam II: 2 Kings 14:25.

Pump—Six Sentence Story

Except for possibly Jehu, for whom she dolled herself up in a desperate seduction play, no one annoyed Jezebel as much as Elijah. In spite of the Lord confirming him over her prophets by sending fire from heaven only on his sacrifices, when Jezebel sent Elijah a death threat he fled so far away that only the Lord’s still, small voice could bring him back.

At that point his usefulness was compromised. To his credit, Elijah did accept his replacement, Elisha, even though Elisha wanted a double portion of what he had. Elisha inherited Elijah’s assigned tasks of acknowledging Hazael as king over Syria whom Elisha saw would become a butcher and anointing by proxy the headstrong Jehu as king over Israel who would pump out judgement upon the whole clan of Jezebel.

If only Jezebel had the wits to realize that manipulation through lies could last only as long as the true Lord (not her Baal) constrained the pressure cooker filled with hatred from exploding, things might have turned out differently and the dogs would not have had a bloody mess for dinner at the gates of Jezreel.

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Denise offers the prompt word “pump” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories. To read what really happened and to make sure I didn’t misread it, see 1 Kings 16:29 – 2 Kings 10:36.

1 Kings 19:9-13 (Young’s Literal Translation, 1898)
⁹And he cometh in there, unto the cave, and lodgeth there, and lo, the word of Jehovah [is] unto him, and saith to him, `What — to thee, here, Elijah?’
¹⁰And he saith, `I have been very zealous for Jehovah, God of Hosts, for the sons of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant — Thine altars they have thrown down, and Thy prophets they have slain by the sword, and I am left, I, by myself, and they seek my life — to take it.’
¹¹And He saith, `Go out, and thou hast stood in the mount before Jehovah.’ And lo, Jehovah is passing by, and a wind — great and strong — is rending mountains, and shivering rocks before Jehovah: — not in the wind [is] Jehovah; and after the wind a shaking: — not in the shaking [is] Jehovah;
¹²and after the shaking a fire: — not in the fire [is] Jehovah; and after the fire a voice still small;
¹³and it cometh to pass, at Elijah’s hearing [it], that he wrappeth his face in his robe, and goeth out, and standeth at the opening of the cave, and lo, unto him [is] a voice, and it saith, `What — to thee, here, Elijah?’

Milk—Six Sentence Story

The angel proclaimed that she would bear the Child.

She wondered how this could be since she was a virgin. The angel explained how, but the most convincing explanation was that God could do anything and this is what He wanted to do. If she resisted it would affirm that nothing mattered except what was of no importance, but she had no desire to resist.

Suddenly pregnant anticipating she would soon be nursing Him with milk and protecting Him with her own life, if need be, she went to see her aging cousin Elisabeth to whom the impossible had also occurred.

All generations would call her blessed.

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Denise offers the word “milk” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Luke 1:28
And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.

Luke 1:46-55
⁴⁶And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord,
⁴⁷And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
⁴⁸For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
⁴⁹For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.
⁵⁰And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.
⁵¹He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
⁵²He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree.
⁵³He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away.
⁵⁴He hath helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy;
⁵⁵As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever.

Pitch—Six Sentence Story

In the parody of parochial schools that Nathaniel was writing he had Sister Mary Martha, his own third grade teacher, say, “No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t get rid of Jesus.” With his tongue in his own cheek he made her stumble like a strawman through an account of the Resurrection, a belief he himself had become too smart to take seriously.

However, as he recalled the smoothness of her face, ancient from the perspective of a ten-year old, he now saw the face of someone less than half his own mid-sixties age as he let her ramble on about how the followers of Jesus would rise to sing His praises even as they were killed. Putting two and two together he calculated that she must have been recently out of her teens, close in age to his granddaughter. He found an online obituary which reported that she served at the school for fifty-five years until the very day of her death at the age of 75.

Perhaps it was due to the notice of her death or to his realization of her age when she taught him or perhaps it was simply due to him returning to his early love for her, but whatever it was, Nathaniel decided to pitch what he wrote about his former teacher and he never touched the parody again.

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Denise offers the prompt word “pitch” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Catholic Eternal Rest Prayer
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let Your perpetual light shine upon them.
May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace. Amen.
Revelation 2:4
Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.

Beam—Six Sentence Story

When a beam of dusty light through a dirty window brightened Jerome’s face he got out of bed woke awake. As a god of his own making, resting on his own authority, he was the good guy by definition. That meant everyone else was either a bad guy or had received temporary clearance papers to remain unscathed by his condemnations.

Since he didn’t consider it possible that he wasn’t much of a god nor that the good he did wasn’t all that good, he refused to repent when his own faults became obvious like contradictions staining an otherwise pristine proof. Being his own lord, why should he call upon Someone else?

Gambling that his tale would end when it was over, Jerome let it end with that.

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Denise offers the prompt word “beam” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Genesis 3:5
For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
Romans 10:13
For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Cup—Six Sentence Story

Samuel had no idea why he accepted the invitation to his friend’s wedding. He had long ago psyched out his former classmates whom he expected to be there as terminally weird. However, after the ceremony and dinner as the dancing began he saw something bubble over in their eyes he hadn’t noticed before. They suddenly weren’t the certifiable psychos he remembered them to be, but rather huggable people.

In the morning Samuel’s memories of the party faded into his intellectual reconstructions of nonreality. But even after he drank a full cup of strong coffee his newfound love for all of them refused to capitulate to the nuttiness of his own mind.

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Denise offers the prompt word ” cup” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Scale—Six Sentence Story

Saul’s blindness left as if a scale fell from each eye when Ananias put his hands on him. His heretical heretic hunting days were over. He now became one of the hunted.

He waited for three days after the light overpowered him and blindness set in on the Road to Damascus. While waiting he refused to eat or drink.

Saul heard the voice, felt the power to the point of blindness and from that day forward abandoned his former ways to obey no matter what the cost to himself.

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Denise offers the prompt word “scale” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Acts 9:17-18 KJV
¹⁷And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.
¹⁸And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales: and he received sight forthwith, and arose, and was baptized.

Abstract—Six Sentence Story

Barry painted light-hearted, popular abstract art. The more light-hearted his compositions were the more popular they became and the more popular they became the more computer scientists thought they could simulate them to prove that machines were just as light-hearted as people.

Although their computer generated art looked like Barry’s, the collecting public were able to pick out an authentic Barry original with little difficulty. It had that je ne sais quoi that only Barry could bring to the canvas.

In a quote published by the gallery representing him, Barry acknowledged the predicament his imitators were in saying, “Should computers ever talk to their programmers, and programmers opened their ears to listen, they would tell them that no one in his right mind would waste time putting anything on a canvas.”

Waste of time or not Barry’s spirit didn’t mind filling canvas after canvas each of which put his soul in such a good mood that his body bubbled over with love and laughter.

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Denise offers the prompt word “abstract” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

1 Thessalonians 5:23 (KJV)
And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Seal—Six Sentence Story

In a few seconds Timothy scribbled a poem in his notebook while standing on the beach waiting for the sunrise. When he got home he read it and wondered where that came from as if he had found an exotic seashell or spotted a seal in the water.

Accepting the gift he cleaned it up and posted it on his favorite sites. Although no one “liked” it nor left a comment he kept reading it over and over wondering: Where did that come from?

At the end of the day Timothy was grateful for everything: birds, clouds, beach, water and just being there. In a week he’d forget the poem because there would be another one and the days of rejoicing and wonder would start all over again.

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Denise offers the word “seal” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

I am on vacation this week without access to the internet. Hopefully I will be back by Saturday in time to post this to the Six Sentence Story group before the deadline, but if not, I have scheduled it in advance for Wednesday evening.