Devoted Read Online Free PDF

“‘And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up.’” She opens her eyes, and I smile at her, grateful for a little sister whose righteousness is an example to me.
    *   *   *
    It’s the Sunday after my mother’s miscarriage, and she’s spent all week in bed. After she had a dream the baby was a boy, Mom and Dad decided on the name Joshua, but she still didn’t get up. As my own duties around the house mount in her absence, I check on her regularly, and she’s always the same; a lump on the bed, sometimes weeping a little, but more often than not staring out into space. One morning after Sarah spilled her orange juice twice and the twins fussed about starting their schoolwork, I found myself questioning why my mother would even want to be in charge of so many of us all the time, day after day. Then I found myself holding my breath out of anxiety again as I thought about my future children. I gave my forearm a firm smack to snap myself out of it.
    As my brothers and sisters finish getting ready for church, I find myself standing by the kitchen counter, dish towel in hand, staring at the peeling green and white linoleum of the kitchen floor. Mom and Dad are talking to each other in their bedroom, and I know I shouldn’t be listening but I’m not able to stop. What if Mom doesn’t get better? What if this is worse than the time Faith told me about? My parents’ voices slip from behind the cracked-open bedroom door into the kitchen where I’m cleaning up after breakfast.
    â€œIt’s time to go now, Elizabeth,” Dad says. Quiet but urgent. Soft but insistent. “We have to leave now.”
    â€œJacob, I can’t,” Mom answers in a sharp, still voice I’ve never heard her use before. “I honestly cannot go.”
    â€œYes, you can. You will.”
    â€œPlease don’t make me go.” I can’t see her, but I can hear her. She can barely get the words out.
    â€œâ€˜Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: For the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.’”
    â€œJacob, talk to me,” my mother begs, her voice on the verge of breaking. “Please talk to me. Please don’t preach to me. Not now. Just talk to me. Talk to me, please.”
    I’m holding my breath, shocked at what I’m hearing. Mom’s always taught us that a woman’s role is to submit to her husband because the husband is the head of the family just like Christ is the head of the church. I don’t think I’ve ever heard her ask my father for something she didn’t already know he wanted to give.
    And Dad doesn’t want to give her the chance to stay home from Sunday services at Calvary Christian.
    The bedroom door shuts, and my parents’ voices are too muffled to make out. I finish up in the kitchen, and a few moments later Dad walks out, his face more stern than normal.
    â€œYour mother is still recovering,” he says, “and she’ll be staying behind today. We need to make sure we really pray for her and for Joshua today at church. They need us to lift them up to the Lord.”
    â€œOf course,” I respond, unable to remember the last time my mother didn’t come to services at Calvary Christian.
    In our ancient, fifteen-person van on the way to church, Dad asks us what the Bible tells us about Joshua.
    â€œGod let Joshua approach Mount Sinai when all the other Israelites weren’t allowed,” Ruth answers. “Joshua was special.”
    â€œAnd that’s why we chose that name for such a special soul as our baby,” Dad tells us. “So special God called him home early.”
    â€œSo special,” Ruth repeats, nodding.
    â€œSpecial!” Sarah mimics, clapping her hands.
    I scan the faces of my siblings, but everyone wears the same neutral expression. The same soft half smiles we