Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

VANESSA DAVIS GRIGGS is a motivational speaker and the author of Goodness and Mercy, Practicing What You Preach, If Memory Serves, Strongholds, Blessed Trinity, Wings of Grace, and Promises Beyond Jordan. A recipient of several awards, this married mother of three adult sons and grandmother of two adorable granddaughters lives in Birmingham, Alabama. Visit her online at www.VanessaDavisGriggs.com.

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The Truth Is the Light

DAFINA BOOKS

Chapter One

"Crown me!" said the ninety-nine-year-old man with dark chocolate skin, who didn't look a day over seventy. He sat back against the flowery-cushioned chair and folded his arms, all while displaying a playful grin.

"Crown you?" said a matched-in-tone thirty-five-year-old, resembling a slimmed-down teddy bear as he shook his head while mirroring the old man's grin. "Crown you?"

"That's what I just said, so quit stalling and get to crowning me."

The younger man first started to chuckle before it turned into a refrained laugh. "Gramps, I've told you twice already: We're playing chess, not checkers. The rules are different. There's no crowning a piece when it reaches the other side, not in chess."

"You say that there is my queen, right?" Gramps touched the game piece that represented his queen.

"Yes."

"Well, if there's a queen, then there's got to be a king with some real power a lot closer and, frankly, better than this joker here." He touched his king. "So quit bumping your gums and crown me so I can get some real help in protecting my queen." Gramps nodded, proudly flaunting his new set of dentures, as he grinned at his favorite grandson.

Clarence Walker couldn't do anything but smile and shake his head in both amusement and adoration. "I've told you. Because there's already a king on the board"-he pointed to the king-"we don't crown in chess. Just admit it. You don't really want to learn how to play chess, do you? That's why you're acting this way."

"I tried to tell you from the git-go that I'm a checkers man and strictly a checkers man. When you get my age, it's hard for an old dog to learn new tricks. I know how to fetch. I know how to roll over and even play dead. But all this fancy stuff like walking on your hind legs and twirling around ... Well, you can take that to some young pup eager to learn. Teach the young pups this stuff. With checkers: I move, I jump, and I get crowned when I reach the other side. Just like Heaven." He pointed his index finger and circled it around the board. "I get enough kings, I set you up, trap you, wipe the board with you, and like normal-game over." Gramps stroked his white, trimmed beard.

Gramps was on a roll now. "All this having to remember pawns, knights, rooks, and bishops, which direction each moves in, how many spaces they can move when they move ... I ain't got time for all of that. Then to have a king that's less powerful than his queen? Check and checkmate? Nope, I can't get with that. You know what your problem is, don't you? You don't like me whuppin' up on you like I normally do. You're trying to find somethin' that'll confuse old Gramps. Now is that check or checkmate?"

"No, Gramps. I'm merely trying to help keep you sharp. That's all. Studies show that when you do something new and different, it exercises your brain. You do know that your brain is a muscle, so it needs working out just like the rest of your body does."

"Humph!" Gramps said. "If I was any sharper, merely passing by me too closely would cut you." Gramps sensed his grandson had something on his mind he wanted to talk about other than chess. Gramps leaned forward and placed his elbows on the table as he put his clasped hands underneath his chin. "Okay, so what's going on with you?"

Clarence sat back and became more serious. "Gramps, I'm getting baptized this coming Sunday night. I gave my life to Christ ... for real this time. It wasn't just going forward to shake a preacher's hand like when I was twelve and my daddy made me do it to get it over with. Do you think you'd care to come and see me be baptized on Sunday?"

A smile crept over the old man's face as he leaned back against his seat. "So you done finally seen the light, huh?"

"Yeah, Gramps. I've finally seen the light. And I'm not running from the Lord anymore. Something happened to me on Sunday. I can't explain everything about it. But I know that the same man that walked into that building is not the same man that walked out. Something changed on the inside of me; it was an inside job. I see a difference."

The old man nodded. "Oh, you preaching to the choir now. I understand exactly how you feel. I ran from the Lord for a long time myself, both physically and figuratively." Gramps readjusted his slender body more comfortably. "I know your mama is happy about all of this. My baby girl has been doing some kind of praying for you, yes, she has. And knowing your daddy like I do, I'm sure he acted like the father of the biblical Prodigal Son who finally returned home after wallowing for a time in a pigsty."

"Mom is too excited. She kept grabbing my face and pressing it in like she used to when I was a little boy. Like she wanted to be certain that I was really real-that it was actually me she was talking to and not some dream or figment of her imagination. Now, Dad, on the other hand, probably would have been happy had I done this at his church."

Gramps leaned in. "Hold up there, whippersnapper. You mean to tell me you were somewhere else when this miraculous conversion occurred? You telling me this didn't take place at your daddy's church?"

"No, Gramps. It didn't happen at my daddy's church."

"Well, look out below! I'm sure that went over like a boulder falling off a tall building in New York City during lunchtime."

"You know my daddy."

"Yeah. Me, of all people, knows your daddy. Not one of my favorite folks in the world, that's for sure. No need in me trying to pretend he and I are bosom buddies, especially not after the way he treated my daughter. But Clarence, your father did give us you and your older brother, Knowledge. So I don't count him being in her life all bad."

Clarence tried to force a smile. "I told him about me being saved and about my scheduled baptism for Sunday. I asked him to come."

Gramps scratched his head. "You don't even have to tell how that conversation went. To him, you getting saved-and in another preacher's house at that-had to be the ultimate openhanded slap to his face. In his super-religious eyes, you are officially and publicly humiliating him. And everybody who's anybody knows your father loves the spotlight and equally detests being disgraced-intentional, accidental, or otherwise."

"That's the part of this that I don't understand. The greater point should be that I've repented of my sins and that I'm changing my ways. What difference does it make where it happened and with whom, as long as it happened? Daddy took it like I was deliberately trying to make him look bad ... like I was purposely trying to embarrass him by getting saved under another pastor's leadership instead of his. But I heard God speak to my heart just as clearly. And in that moment, I knew I had to move right then and there. I realized where I end up spending my eternity depended on my receiving Jesus."

Gramps picked up his bishop off the chessboard and held it up. He began to make air circles with it. "Are you following what God is telling you to do?" he asked.

"Yes, sir."

"Then Clarence Eugene Walker, in the end, that's all that really matters." Gramps set the bishop back in the same spot he'd picked it up from with a deliberate thud....