A Tale of Two Churches

Eonity was a small town that lay to the west of the great city of Tontrio. Despite being such a small town, it was divided by a towering stone wall with a great gate. The town on one side of the wall was beautiful. The roads were made of stone and the buildings were architectural masterpieces. Only the highest of class were allowed on this side of the gates. On the other side of the wall, the roads were made of dirt and the buildings were shacks made of straw and twigs. This was low-class side of Eonity where the poor scratched out their meager existance.

Unlike most cities in the land, Eonity consisted of mostly high-class, rich citizens, many more than the poor low-class citizens. As in most cities though, the rich were not fond of the poor. They thought of them more as pests than human, and in need of extermination rather than charity. However, as long as they had the wall to separate them, the rich tolerated the peasants. Eonity’s people were primarily Christian on both sides of the wall. Everyone who could afford a Bible had one. Everyone went to one of the towns two churches, one for each side of the wall, of course.

One Sunday morning, just as the sun begin to rise, a young drifter topped a hill to see the small town up ahead. He carried the only possessions he had in the world, a small leather satchel and a wooden staff. His clothes were worn and patched, and bore many stains as well as the stench of sweat. His long, wavy black hair hung in his face as he walked the road. He entered the town, walking past the gate and onto the stone road. As he looked around, no one was to be found at such an early hour.

He wandered around in awe at the sight of the town before he finally came up to the church. The steeple seemed to touch the sky. The beautiful stained glass windows were trimmed with gold and radiated all the colors of the rainbow. He sat down on the marble steps to rest his feet. As he sat there admiring the beauty of the town, the door opened. An older man dressed in fine white linen stepped out and walked over to the drifter. “Young man, why are you here?”, he said sharply. The drifter looked up at the man and said, “I am here to rest. Are you the priest of this cathedral?” “Yes I am,” said the old man “but you may not rest here.” The drifter looked at him and said, “Well, then may I come in and listen when your sermon starts, sir?” Without hesitation, the priest exclaimed, “Absolutely not! You are a commoner. You are too filthy to even sit on my floor. Why would I let you sit on my fine expensive pews?” The drifter stood up and asked, “Well, may I just sit on the steps here and listen to the choir sing?” “Absolutely not!”, said the priest. “The fine people of this community do not wish to see such a nasty and pitiful beggar at the door of their worship. Take your wretched things and leave!” The drifter was awestruck and devastated. He got on his knees and begged to the priest, “Before I go, could you at least give me some water to drink?” The priest shouted with an angered look on his face, “NO! YOU DO NOT BELONG HERE NOR DO WE WANT YOU HERE! LEAVE BEFORE I CALL FOR A GUARD TO HAVE YOU REMOVED!”

With tears in his eyes, the drifter picked up his staff and satchel and left. As he walked away, he heard the priest mutter under his breath, “Hell was made for people like you, filth”. As he arrived at the gate, he was harassed by two guards for being on the wrong side of the wall. They ridiculed him for his clothes and social status. The high-class citizens had come out to see what the commotion was about and they joined in laughing and mocking the poor drifter as well. The guards shoved him down into the cold wet mud outside of the gate, then burst into laughter as they turned and slammed the gates shut.

After a few minutes of tending to his scrapes, he noticed that the road split into two paths: the stone path that led him to the gate and a dirt path that led off down a hill. He stood up and sighed as he headed down the dirt path. As he walked, he noticed that the buildings were nothing more than straw huts and shacks. He could hear the sound of singing in the distance. The longer he walked, the louder the singing got. He eventually came to the building where the singing was coming from. The walls were constructed with pieces of tin, tree branches, straw, and mud. The roof was made of branches, straw, and grass. There were no windows or doors, only holes in the walls covered by tattered pieces of burlap. The only indication of what kind of building this was, was the simple stick cross hanging on the side of the wall. THIS was the church for the poor!

He sat down on the ground outside the entrance of the little church so he could hear better. As he sat there, another man with long hair walked up with a tattered Bible in his hands. He looked at the drifter sitting on the ground and asked, “Hey man, what are you doing here?” The drifter looked up at him and said, “Just sitting here listening. May I do so?” The man looked at him with a confused look on his face and said, “Well sure if you want...but why not just come in and listen?” “I can come in?”, the drifter asked with enthusiasm. “Of course,” said the man “All are welcome here. The Word says, ‘For ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.’ No one is too rich or too poor to hear the Word of God. And no one is too good or too bad for Jesus.” The man offered his hand to help the drifter up. The drifter smiled, took the helping hand, and stood up. They walked in together. The only pews that this church had were a few logs laid on the dirt floor. At the front of the church stood a simple wooden stand with a single, dented tin candlestick sitting on top. The drifter sat down on one of the logs while the other man went up to the front. He laid the Bible down on the stand and opened it. He smiled at the drifter and then began preaching. The drifter smiled back. The man with long hair was the priest of this small church.

After the sermon, the people of the church smiled and welcomed him back for more visits. The priest came up to him and handed him a few coins. “Here, it’s not a lot but it might buy you a few loaves of bread”. The drifter looked down at the copper coins and thanked the priest for being so kind to him.

“I never got your name,” the priest said as he stuck out his hand to shake the drifters. The drifter looked up, smiled, then said, “I am He that this church was built for. My name is Jesus”. He then stuck out his hand and grasped the priest’s hand. The priest was a bit skeptical until he looked down and noticed a hole in the hand he was shaking. He fell to his knees and began to weep. “But Lord, why are you here?,” he said. “You are a king! You are THE King!! You deserve to be on a throne in the grandest cathedral. Not in some lowly shack built by paupers!”. “The building does not make the church. The people do!,” Jesus exclaimed. Jesus pointed at the steeple of the high class church, visible over the wall. “That building was built for me as well. They sing songs about me and listen to sermons about me. However, they would not allow me in when I sat at their door step. They have become boastful and prideful. The pews and the floor were too clean and expensive for me to even sit on to rest. Their clothes were too fine for the likes of me. They so easily forgot that I was born among the sheep and donkeys, and that I lay in a manger as a babe instead of a fine crib. They forget I was a mere carpenter making meager wages and that I wore robes and sandals instead of expensive linens. The people of that community offered an abundance of gold for their beloved earthly treasures that lay on the other side of that wall. Such a petty price to pay for their souls...” Jesus then laid his hand on the priest’s shoulder and smiled. “However, you and your people welcomed me in when I sat by the door. When I begged for water from the other priest, he couldn’t be bothered. Yet, you gave me the entire offering to buy bread and I did not even ask.” Jesus helped the priest back up to his feet. “Be of good cheer, son, for you and your church are blessed. The other church has riches on earth, but here, you have love”. The priest smiled as tears streamed down his face. “Thank you, Lord”. Jesus nodded then picked up his staff and said his goodbyes. It was time for him to continue his journey down the road. The priest never forgot the day that Jesus Christ visited the little town of Eonity. The rich, however, never even knew he stopped by.