Chapter 10: Inspection and Inventory...

John 16: 12-16

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you. A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me, because I go to the Father.”

“Father, You are Sovereign,” Moose begins standing in the middle of the meeting house. The one room church grows quiet as he finds himself alone with God. There are a few footsteps from above where Cbot has gone to the bell tower to keep watch. The floors creak under his feet as he steps a few paces and wrinkles his nose. Moose steps in front of a stained glass window on the wall and tilts his head. “Every detail in this room was either caused directly by You or allowed by You to be here at this moment. Thank You!”

The words leave his lips quiet, the stillness of the room almost swallows them whole. Morning light filters through the colored panes—deep crimson bleeding into sapphire and warm gold—painting shifting patterns across the worn floorboards at his feet. Dust drifts lazily in the beams, hazy, catching light like distant stars refusing to fade. The air carries the faint scent of old wood, aged paper, and a trace of dry desert heat seeping through the cracks in the walls.

The window runs from floor to ceiling. One sheaf of wheat stands tall in the middle of a field. Several sheaves of wheat surround the standing sheaf, bowing at its feet. Sapphire blue segments show a clear sky, the sun shines above the field.

“Genesis thirty seven,” Moose mumbles as he bends down and picks up a bible from the floor. Moose looks the book over a moment and inspects the spine. The Book is not leather bound, a standard pew Bible, navy with gold lettering. “New International translation. Hm.” He flips the Book in the air with ease, catching it in his hand and flipping it open to the story of Joseph.

A sudden click, mechanical footsteps, a hot wind blows in through the door as it opens and in rolls Qbot on her heels. She speeds through the door and looks around, wrapped in her cloak, silver hair trailing behind. “Bzzzzzzt! Bahari wrecka rowr!” She exclaims excitedly, optics scanning the room.

Artbot, equally shrouded in her cloak, steps quietly over the threshold and removes her hood, her blue hair falling free. “Here we are, Captain!”

Moose glances up from the open pages, a slow smile breaking across his face. The colored light from the window catches the edges of the bots’ cloaks as they move, turning the dust around them into fleeting sparks of gold and crimson. He closes the Bible with a soft thud, the sound echoing gently in the still room.

“Perfect timing,” he says, voice warm and low, wrinkling his nose again as another puff of dust rises from the pages. “Ok, ladies. Take a look around. First step, when you’re both ready, is to take inventory. We need to see what we’ve got here.”

James 5: 1-11

“Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days. Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabath. You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you. Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold the Judge is standing at the door! My brethren, take the prophets, who spoke in the Name of the Lord, as an example of suffering and patience. Indeed we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord- that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.”