Did the Rapture Occur in Seattle?

It all started off as a friendly game of global domination between friends and it ended in the possible rapture of a significant part of the former Soviet Union.

Global domination… rapture of the former Soviet Union… Have I lost my mind as a result of too many times dumping the R.V. waste? Is hanging out with all of the strange people on the West Coast affecting my thinking? Or are the events of this past Sunday evening and Monday morning reality?

Let me explain.

After worshipping at my friend Mike Gunn’s church in Renton, Washington, Kathy, the kids, and I traveled about ½ hour north to spend a few days with Jay and Pauline Bridgeman and their precious little girls Abigail and Lillian. We had a great time eating a lunch of fish and chips at a local restaurant with the entire Bridgeman family and then going with Pauline and the girls to the beach.

Rather than joining us in turning over rocks to see what sea creatures we might find, Jay went home to do some surgeon paperwork stuff. He tells me that he spent Sunday morning reattaching a guy’s thumb to his hand after it was crushed between a boat and a dock and that he had to catch up on some of the paperwork regarding that case – personally, I think he was secretly preparing for our planned evening game of RISK.

Thus bringing us to the global domination portion of our blog. RISK is the ultimate American game – there is one simple goal – CONQUER THE WORLD! And that is what Jay, Mikey, John, and I attempted to do on Sunday evening. Jay – the 37 year old highly educated teenager – wanted to be the black armies because – in his twisted mind – he believes black is the color of intimidation. At 6’ 1” and 150 pounds soaking wet, Jay needs all the help he can get in order to be intimidating.

After nearly three hours of attacking and re-attacking, I was completely annihilated and forced to watch Mikey, John, and Jay duke it out. It was at this point that I quickly became bored with the board game.

Earlier in the evening Jay’s beeper had gone off. A teenager had broken his wrist and it needed to be set. Fortunately for Jay… and unfortunately for the teenager… it was going to take several hours before an anesthesia team was available. I personally thought that Jay should go right in, give the kid a bullet to bite down on, and tell him to take it like a man. However, Jay the recipient of the Hershey Medical Center Humanitarian Award, decided it would be better to wait for anesthesia (what a whimp).

Jay could have played RISK until 3 a.m. – but we all figured that it would be a good idea to let him get a little bit of sleep before fixing the kid’s arm – I know I want my doctor rested before he starts torqing my wrist all over the place. So of to bed we went.

As dawn arose over the battlefield, a curious four year old named Abigail assessed the strategery of the prior evening (yes, I know strategery isn’t a word, but if it is good enough for President Bush, it is surely good enough for me). Abigail having just learned about End Times theology in her Mars Hill Church preschool Sunday school class decided to pull a 1 Thessalonians 4 and started to remove all of the black armies from the board. Before I could scream “Rapture” nearly all of Jay’s armies were neatly placed in the plastic storage box and vast sections of the former Soviet Union were devoid of any human life.

Thus we never finished the game… Jay was denied true victory over the Leonzo family… the kid’s arm was set… Abigail experienced grace… and all was well in Seattle.