Minnie Goes to Heaven (54)

(a novel continued)

Minnie felt better as soon as they began praying.

"Okay Lord, this is your idea," John prayed. "How do we divide this town? 
You know what I mean, Lord," he added.

They sat quietly listening. 

"Did you hear anything?" John asked.

"I don't know if it was just my own  thought," Minnie said, "but I heard, 'I am leading you.'"

"I heard, 'commonsense.'"

"We must be on the right track."

They divided North and South Haven, and old and new Haven by neighbourhood and colour-coded these so that their map became a patchwork of red, yellow, blue and green. Then they assigned a coloured section to each church with the more densely populated sections going to the larger churches. The Catholics would be asked to pray for the entire town. 
"After all Haven is their parish," John said.

"That's the easy part done," Minnie said. "Now, how do we get the churches to agree? Ministers generally don't have time for other people's plans." 

Again they prayed and listened.

"Fasting," Minnie said. "Jesus wants us to fast?"

"He showed me three days," John said. 

"Jesus wants us to fast for three days? It makes me dizzy to miss a meal." 

"There are different kinds of fasts," John said. "I was reading something about a Daniel fast. You eat fruit and vegetables and drink only water."

"Sounds like a cheat," Minnie said. 
"We could just not eat." John said.
"I suppose the Lord will help us through."
They decided to start after supper on Thursday evening and to finish Sunday. They would allow themselves water. 
On Thursday evening after supper Minnie had some qualms. “Shouldn’t we ask Jesus when to start?” 

“I guess that wouldn't hurt.”

So, they asked Jesus. It was a good thing they did. He gave them a different schedule. He told them to fast the first three Fridays in December and on the fourth Friday they were to approach the pastor of their church. 

In the meantime, most evenings in November John and Minnie drove the streets of Haven, praying as they went. They prayed that the Lord would bless the people, that he would turn their thoughts toward him. By month's end they had covered the entire town.