"The Journey" by Robert Brunell

  My wife found this story years ago, and before I published it I wanted to explain a couple of things. When I first read the story, it really made me madder than a wet hen. Because I saw a lot of myself, at that, time in this story. I saw a lot of the people that I was around the same way and well I got mad, okay, lol! So I post this with caution in hope that you will read the whole thing and just take it all as a teaching of where we can slip as the body of Christ if we are not cautious and do as God tells us in 1 John 4:1-6 and "test everything". It is a lengthy read and must of you probably wont read it but for you that do, I promise you will be blessed! Or maybe mad like I was but God taught me a lot from this! This isn't an "Escape from our Savior Jesus Christ". God Bless you all!
Numbers 22:24 "Then the Angel of the LORD stood in a narrow path between the vineyards, with a wall on this side and a wall on that side."

"Escape from Christendom"

"The Journey"  by Robert Burnell, 1980

In my dream I see the lone figure of a man following a road.

As the sun sets beneath the hills, a city comes into view. Nearing it, the traveler sees what appears to be a large group of churches. Spires and crosses pierce the skyline. His pace quickens. Is this his destination? He passes an imposing structure, a neon sign flashing “Cathedral of the Future.” Farther on a floodlit stadium supports a billboard boasting that fifty thousand people crowd into evangelistic meetings there three nights a week. Beyond this, modest “New Testament” chapels and Hebrew Christian synagogues cluster together on the street front.

“Is this the City of God?” I hear the traveler ask a woman at the information booth in the central square.

“No this is Christian City, “she replies.

“But I thought this road led to the City of God!” He exclaims with great disappointment.

“That’s what we all thought when we arrived,” she answers, her tone sympathetic.

“This road continues up the mountain, doesn’t it?” He asks.

“I wouldn’t know, really,” she answers blankly.

I watched the man turn away from her and trudge on up the mountain in the gathering darkness. Reaching the top, he starts out into the blackness; it looks as though there is nothing, absolutely nothing, beyond. With a shudder he retraces his steps into Christian City an takes a room at a hotel.

Strangely unrefreshed, at dawn he arises and follows the road up the mountain again; in the brightening light of the sun he discovers that what seemed like a void the night before is actually a desert–dry, hot, rolling sand as far as the eye can see. The road narrows to a path which rises over a dune and disappears. “Can this trail lead to the City of God?” He wonders aloud. It appears to be quite deserted and rarely traveled.

Indecision slowing his steps, he again returns to Christian City and has lunch in a Christian restaurant. Over the music of a gospel record, I hear him ask a man at the next table, “That path up the mountain, where the desert begins, does it lead to the City of God?”

“Don’t be a fool!” his neighbor replies quickly. “Everyone who has ever taken that path has been lost… Swallowed up by the desert! If you want God, there are plenty of good churches in this town. You should pick one and settle down.”