"I think I already touched on that", Aaron says. I mean the God wiping his ass for him metaphor. He simply never was one for accepting responsibility. For anything. He was kicked out of the residential hotel where he was living because he couldn't stop beating up any tenant who got on his nerves. He ended up chronically homeless, and I only heard a bit about him, then nothing. I really thought for many years that he was dead, since I couldn't imagine anyone surviving long with his kind of mentality. I only found out last year that he was living here, and fortunately we didn't actually have to see each other. Carl explained to me that Father Griffin actually rescued him from the street about five years ago, helped him get housing, but even then he was often threatening his neighbours with violence, so Robert got the brilliant idea of bringing him out here. Carl?"
"Doug and I had some very interesting chats the first few days he was with us. He talked a lot about you, Aaron, about how you taught and mentored him and showed him how to be a true follower of Jesus. It was this embarrassing hagiography, he didn't have one single bad word to say about you. He practically worshipped you."
"That is just really painful to hear. What kind of shape was he in?"
"He seemed to be already coming around. Life on the street of course had prematurely aged him. He loved to teach, often with his own invented parables. Especially anything that had to do with a seed as metaphor. He really liked to gather 'round the kiddies for one of his evening wisdom talks after dinner. He appeared to thrive on this. And he did have some interesting things to say. He ofen referred to us all as 'Lttle Ones', not exactly as children but it was an image he got from one of the books he told me that you guys used to read together."
"Oh, yes", says Aaron. "Lilith, by George Macdonald."
"That happens", I say, "to be one of the books that Robert gave me to read while I am staying here..."
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