TWENTY-SIX
THE COMING WAR
A few months later, I had some business in McCook, a town about sixty
miles from Imperial and the site of the nearest Wal-Mart. For many
Americans, an hour is an awfully long way to drive to get to Wal-Mart, but
out here in farm country, you get used to it. I had taken Colton with me, and
I’ll never forget the conversation we had on the way back, because while
our son had spoken to me about heaven and even about my own past, he
had never before hinted that he knew my future.
We had driven back through Culbertson, the first town west of McCook,
and were passing a cemetery. Colton, by now out of a car seat, gazed out
the passenger-side window as the rows of headstones filed past.
“Dad, where’s Pop buried?” he asked
“Well, his body is buried in a cemetery down in Ulysses, Kansas, where
Grandma Kay lives,” I said. “Next time we’re down there, I can take you to
see where it is if you want. But you know that’s not where Pop is.”
Colton kept peering out the window. “I know. He’s in heaven. He’s got a
new body. Jesus told me if you don’t go to heaven, you don’t get a new
body.”
Hang on, I thought. New information ahead.
“Really?” was all I said.
“Yeah,” he said, then added, “Dad, did you know there’s going to be a
war?”
“What do you mean?” Were we still on the heaven topic? I wasn’t sure.
“There’s going to be a war, and it’s going to destroy this world. Jesus
and the angels and the good people are going to fight against Satan and
the monsters and the bad people. I saw it.”
I thought of the battle described in the book of Revelation, and my
heartbeat stepped up a notch. “How did you see that?”
“In heaven, the women and the children got to stand back and watch. So
I stood back and watched.” Strangely, his voice was sort of cheerful, as