THE THREE
When the mist cleared away, Lilly found herself sitting beside Letty in front of the Vault’s door.
“Told you!” said Letty. “So much faster than walking with John.”
Lilly laughed in spite of all the emptiness she felt. “What are we doing here?”
“You have an appointment,” the Guardian announced with a wry little smile.
“I’m meeting someone in the Vault?”
“Nope, better than that.” She paused dramatically and then swept her hand across the surface of the door. “Through here!”
“The door?” Lilly took a closer look. Beside her, Letty hummed happily. The door was still inscribed with the images she had seen: Adam on his knees scooping dirt, Eve reaching out toward him, the infinity snake swallowing its own tail, the One Mountain topped by an all-seeing eye. It seemed almost a lifetime ago since she had been here, though it had only been a few days.
“I thought the Scholars said that if I go through the door, no one will be able to get me back.”
“That’s why I’m here!” Letty clapped her hands together. “I know all about such doors, and I can get you in and out. One of my specialties.”
“Of course it is. So what do I do?”
“You take my hand and touch wherever you would like to go,” instructed Letty.
“I want to see Eve.”
“As I thought you might.” Letty’s smile was as bright as Lilly had ever seen it. Without another word, the girl stood up from her chair, reached out, and grabbed the Angel’s tiny wrinkled hand, soft as baby skin, then touched the rendering of Eve. A jolting blast went through her, and everything shifted.
When Lilly opened her eyes, she was standing on a mesa overlooking a series of valleys that fell away into the distance. She could make out jagged lines of green haphazardly following creeks and rivers through an otherwise barren wilderness. An arid wind gusted, blowing her skirts around her and carrying the scents of farmed soil and livestock.
To the west, smoke drew Lilly’s attention.
“They fight over grazing land,” Letty explained.
The hand holding hers felt different, and when Lilly glanced down, it was not Letty’s. Turning, she was shocked. Gone was the teeny woman, and in her stead stood an imposing, magnificent blue light-being, shimmering between opaque substance and transparent energy-wave. It instantly reminded Lilly of the blue sentinels standing at the fringes of Adam’s birthday celebration.
The vibrations of Letty’s being resounded from her center, cascading out and stirring up the frequencies of everything in the area. This, then, was the source of the humming.
“Wow!” Lilly gasped. “Letty? Is that you?”
“What! You thought that tiny old thing was how I looked in real life?” The sense of humor was definitely Letty’s, but the voice was younger and full of vitality. “There are many more places you can go without creating waves if you are not impressive.” Letty’s laughter danced around the girl like a happy child.
“I don’t know,” Lilly answered with a chuckle, “I was always pretty impressed by that grumpy little thing.”
The air was warm and dry, the sun pleasant on Lilly’s skin.
“We are headed that way,” Letty directed, pointing behind Lilly. She turned and looked. A short distance away, a stone escarpment rose a thousand feet and blocked her view of the sky. Nestled into its base, near a waterfall, were dozens of tents that billowed and danced in the breeze. Intermittent gusts tugged on their ropes as if teasing them to fly free. Even from a distance, the flapping of the hides was distinct and sharp.
“Is she in the tents?” Lilly asked.
“Yes! Would you like to walk or just be there?”
Lilly giggled. “Let’s walk. No snakes, right?”
“I’m here, so no snakes within a hundred miles.” Lilly believed it.
Letty led the way. The radiance of the Angel was like a mirage spilling over the ground. In the Guardian’s wake, plants emerged and formed a pathway, buds opening up like miniature umbrellas to reveal flowery goodness, which had been dormant in the sands.
“I do that,” Letty announced. “Make deserts bloom. Easier than knitting.”
“Letty, you are full of surprises.”
“That’s why I get along so well with children,” the Angel said. “They’re all about surprises.”
As they approached the dwellings, Lilly realized that another similar green and flowered path ran toward theirs from the opposite end of the mesa. It ended where they were heading, directly in front of the largest of the tents.
“Another Guardian,” Letty declared, offering no other explanation.
Around and behind the gathered tents, Lilly could see a small valley dipping down toward the rock wall, which offered shade. It was full of plants and small trees, shrubs blooming in every color, fruits and vegetables laid out in creative arrangements.
Near the waterfall, the valley narrowed and then opened into a pasture where grazing sheep were feeding. The air itself was fragrant, the rocky cliffs standing like protectors of this idyllic place, the sounds of falling waters welcoming and joyous.
By the time they arrived, a woman had emerged from the tent. Lilly recognized her immediately. It was Mother Eve, older than she had been in Eden but not as elderly as when she had visited the Refuge. Lilly ran the short distance that remained, and Eve swept her up into an embrace. If ever there was home inside someone’s arms, other than Adonai’s, this was it.
“I’ve waited a long time to finally meet you,” Eve said, and hugged her tightly again.
“What do you mean?” Lilly inquired. “We have met many times, although you were older.”
“Well”—the woman laughed—“this might not be the first for you, but it is for me!”
Turning to the Angel, Eve bowed slightly. “Leticia, it has been a while. I’m so honored by your presence.”
“It is my joy, Mother Eve, to be witness to this day. What a momentous occasion.”
“Indeed.” Eve raised her hands. “Now, please come inside and rest awhile. Lilly, for you, we have food and surprises waiting.”
Lilly followed her through a series of flaps and into an ornately decorated and open living area. Several women occupied the space. Most were seated on mats, preparing food and crushing aromatic herbs. One played with several children; another sat at a loom, weaving.
“These are my daughters,” Eve said, smiling. “Adonai’s promise, my joy. And this young woman,” Eve announced to the others, as she took Lilly’s hand, “is also my daughter.”
In spite of the activity in the closed space, air moved easily and freely, the temperature a cool relief against the heat of the day. Baked breads and sweets, fruits and nuts, and an array of dried meats and other delicacies abounded. Eve motioned for Lilly to sit within an arrangement of soft rugs and cushions.
“Let me look at you,” Eve stated, and she did. Lilly returned her gaze. Eve swallowed as the tears filled her eyes. “I can’t believe it’s you!” she finally said. “Since the Beginning I was promised that there would always be three, but did not think that in my lifetime I would meet the other two.”
“I’m sorry, Mother Eve,” Lilly confided, “but I don’t understand what you mean.”
“It’s true, she doesn’t know,” Letty said. She stood near the flap where they had entered.
Eve put her hands over her mouth and then began to laugh. “She doesn’t know? That is the greatest gift of all. She doesn’t know!” Before Lilly could grow uncomfortable, Eve said, “My dear one, Lilly. I am overwhelmed and filled with joy that I will get to tell you.”
“Tell me what?” Lilly asked, curious and interested.
“First,” Eve continued, “you must tell me why you have come.”
“I came to talk to you! I have so many questions, but it seems a little strange now that I realize that you don’t know me.”
“Oh, Lilly,” exclaimed Eve. “I know you, though we may h
ave never met, at least not in my memory.”
One of Eve’s daughters brought Lilly a cup of warm and frothy goat’s milk. Lilly accepted gratefully and sipped.
“So where are we?” she asked Eve.
“We are outside Eden’s gate, a little to the west, but not far.”
“And when is this?”
Eve lifted her eyes to the tent’s apex. “How would I tell you? Lilly, I mark time by the seasons, and four seasons mark a year. For me time began the day of my own turning, the day I chose to leave the garden to find Adam.”
This confirmation of Gerald’s theory broke Lilly’s heart. “How many years ago was that?”
“Almost four hundred, since . . .”
“Why?” Lilly blurted out her question. “Why did you turn and walk out of Eden’s rest? Why didn’t you stay inside the care of God?” It came out stronger than intended, but Eve didn’t seem offended.
Eve drew in a long deep breath and then sighed. Lilly could see that the question pained her. The answer was written already into the lines on her otherwise youthful face, her hair beginning to show the gray that Lilly so remembered.
“I couldn’t trust,” she said. “Lilly, I couldn’t trust that Adonai would meet all my longings, that all my desires would find fulfillment apart from Adam. I couldn’t trust that God would create a way to bring about Their promise. I began to believe that it was up to me to make it happen. Adam turned to the place from which he was drawn—the ground—and looked to it and the works of his hands for meaning, identity, security, and love. I behaved much the same. I turned to the place from which I was drawn. I looked to Adam.”
“What happened?” Lilly felt disappointment in Eve . . . and herself.
“The ground cannot give to man what only God can grant, and only face-to-face. So the earth reacted with thorn and thistle. Adam toils against creation with a grieving spirit. Our male children war against one another for land because they deceive themselves and think it can produce what they believe they truly need.”
Lilly set her cup of milk aside. “And you, Mother Eve, what happened to you?”
“When I turned to Adam to give me what only God can grant, and only face-to-face, Adam and his sons reacted with power and dominion. Now I, with a grieving spirit, toil against these men to bring my children into this world.” Eve lowered her voice and glanced at the gathered women. “My daughters compete and war one against another for men and family, as if these could produce what we had hoped and now are demanding.”
The weight of this truth crushed Lilly. So much of the devastation on the earth came back to this: we turned away from God.
“Why did you leave the garden?”
“Every day Adam would come to Eden’s boundary, and every day I would sit and listen to his appeal. As furious as I was with him for all his betrayal, I didn’t want him to believe that I had abandoned him. Perhaps this desire to reach out to the other, to make amends and repair loss, to build a bridge and heal, is a part of God’s maternal being that is in all of us. Womb-love, mercy!
“But then he stopped coming. Adam disappeared, and day after day I came to the boundary and waited. Every day I would ask God what I must do and every day God would ask me again to trust, and I would until the next day. But the days came and went, and Adam did not return. I began thinking about the promise God had made me, that I would have a seed that would crush the serpent’s head. The more I thought about it, the more alone I felt, the less I would seek the face of God, and slowly I turned my face away. I didn’t want to trust, I wanted answers.”
“Why didn’t God give you answers?” Lilly asked.
“God asks for trust,” Eve declared. “I was wrong to turn.”
“But why didn’t God stop you? Why did God let you turn your face away?”
“Lilly, I have learned that God has more respect for me than I do for myself, that God submits to the choices I make, that my ability to say no and turn my face away is essential for Love to be Love. Adonai has never hidden His face from me, nor has He kept from me the consequences of my choosing. That is why many of my sons and my daughters curse the face and name of God. But God refuses to be like what we have become and take power and dominion. He has the audacity to consent and even submit to all our choosing. Then He joins us in the darkness we create because of all our turning.”
Lilly burst into tears. “It’s all my fault!” she wailed.
Eve was immediately with her, arms around and rocking, as any mother should. Another woman brought bread, hot and scented with olive oil, as if it might help. “Your fault, my dear? Whatever are you saying?”
“I’m the reason Adam stopped coming to the wall of Eden.”
“Hush now, Lilly, I told you, I know who you are.”
“You do?” Lilly asked between her sobs. “How would you know me?”
“Adam told me.”
Lilly looked up at the woman, who offered a cloth. “Adam told you?” She blew her nose.
“Of course he told me.” She smiled. “He thought your name was Lilith, but in a dream, Adonai told me the truth of your being.”
“Adam told you what I did?” Hot shame washed over her skin.
“Yes, every detail, but Adonai told me why and who you really were. You never were this Lilith. She was a lie from the beginning.”
Finally, Lilly was relieved of her burden. She started laughing and then crying and then laughing some more, and so too did Eve. A wide-eyed child brought Lilly a white desert flower as a comfort, and Lilly accepted it happily. She took the little girl on her lap. Eve ran her elegant hand over the child’s coarse hair, smiling.
When she calmed again, Lilly asked, “I still don’t understand why you left the garden. Was it because you felt bad for Adam?”
“Ah, if only I were that noble. The truth is much more twisted. As I have looked back over time, I realize I did it for myself. I was trying to fill the void I created by my own turning, to counter the fear that all my longings would go unmet. I did not admit that at the time. I justified my actions in the most beautiful and God-pleasing ways.
“I kept wondering how I could produce a promised seed apart from Adam. It wasn’t long before I thought that God was putting me to a test, to see if I would mature and make my own decision. Instead of trusting God to do what I considered impossible, I believed that leaving Eden and joining Adam would accomplish the promise. I didn’t need a serpent to deceive me; I lied to myself and then believed it. I believed that leaving Eden was an act of godliness, a participation in God’s purpose.”
“Oh my goodness,” Lilly declared. “I did the exact same thing when I left Eden and offered myself to Adam.”
“Well, you and I are probably not the only ones to try to satisfy our own longings. Adam was devastated to see me, but after we found a way back to each other, we conceived. Months later we had our first child.”
“The one God promised?”
“I again convinced myself he was the promised seed, to justify my choices. When he was born, I cried out, ‘I have delivered a man-child, Adonai.’ For years after Cain’s birth I blindly held on to this hope, until I began to see the turning in him too. When his brother was born, I named him Abel, which means ‘sighing,’ because my hope was fading away.
“Even though Adonai warned him of his own turning, Cain killed Abel. Adonai again reached out to Cain, but he spurned the mark and covering that God offered. Instead he separated himself from us and entered the land of wandering and restlessness. He built the first city there, and named it Enoch, which means new beginnings, after my grandson. He no longer speaks of Adonai, but only of the one God, Elohim. To him Ruach is only the ghost of a memory. My descendants through Cain are full of darkness, murder, and deceit.”
For a time silence cradled the women’s grief and regret.
Lilly said, “Is there any hope for us?”
Eve sighed and smiled. “Yes, Adonai is our certain hope, and that is why you are here!”
“
I still don’t understand what any of this has to do with me.”
“Lilly, I told you there were three.”
“Three what?” Lilly shook her head.
“Three women who would frame human history. The one to whom the promise of the seed was given—that would be me. The one through whom the promise was delivered. And that would be . . .” She turned around and indicated a smaller woman seated close by, patting dough into loaves. At first glance the woman appeared not much older than Lilly, her bright dark eyes set wonderfully inside a smooth complexion, noticeably lighter than the others.
“That would be me!” she stated, an impish grin upon her face.
“You see, Lilly, you were not the first to arrive here today,” said Eve.
The woman stood and brushed flour from her hands before approaching Lilly. “Just like Eve, I have waited my entire life to meet you.” The child on Lilly’s lap ran off to play with others as Lilly rose and greeted her.
“It has been a challenge to hold my tongue!” the woman said, embracing her cheerfully.
For the first time Lilly noticed another spirit being standing near Letty. They were similar in form, though their vibrating shades and hues differed.
“Who are you?” Lilly asked, pulling back.
“I am Mary, the mother of the promised seed, the second Adam, Jesus.”
All the pieces came together in Lilly’s mind. “No way! You are Mary, the mother of Jesus? John tried to explain about the second Adam to me, and I didn’t understand.”
“John sends his greetings, Lilly, even though you have barely been apart. He already misses you,” Mary said.
“John? He changed the world for me.”
“John is like that. As a Witness, he’s done that before.”
Without drawing attention, Lilly pinched herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming.
“So who is the third?”
Eve and Mary spoke in unison. “You!”
Lilly blinked. “Me?”
“You! Lilly, you are the Bride, the one to whom the promised seed will forever be united.”
“Me?” Fresh tears began to rise from an even deeper well, from a sacred place in the depths of the soul where only God has access. “No one would want me. I’m too broken.”