The Final Testament of the Holy Bible by James Frey Read Free Book Online

kids, Jacob would hit Ben. And as he got older, they hit him more, and they hit him harder. I would hear him in his room crying, and I would go in and give him hugs and tell him I loved him. He always said I was the only person in the family who loved him, and he would tell me I was the best little sister in the world. My father and Jacob mostly ignored me, and my mother was always worried about my father, and Ben paid the most attention to me, so I was closest to him and loved him most.
    Each day there would be updates, and new stories. Ben was improving faster than the doctors had ever seen. He had another brain surgery. He was stable but still in a coma. There were protests at the construction site, and people were talking about lawsuits, and the developer was saying it wasn’t his fault. I couldn’t believe how much attention it was getting. I thought somebody who knew our family when we were Jewish, before we accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, would recognize him and come forward, but no one did. The papers just kept calling him the Miracle Man. It was really the first time in my life that I had ever read newspapers, and I could see why people hated them. They didn’t seem dangerous, though, just sort of silly.
    I kept the same schedule and waited until the coverage slowed down. I was worried that if I wentto see him before the reporters went away someone might figure out who he was and I would get into trouble with Jacob and the church. I was also waiting for some kind of sign from the Lord. I believed, at the time, that the Lord always provided those who lived by his word with signs that told them which way to go in life. One afternoon I heard one of the women in the church choir talking about how she had just gotten a letter from a brother that she didn’t see any more because he drank and slept with women other than his wife. Her brother had found Christ and had been born again and had given up his evil ways and wanted to see her. She was standing beneath a cross as she was talking, and she was holding a Bible, and there was light streaming through a window across her face. I thought for sure it was a message from above. Now I understand there is no such thing, that there is no above and no one to send us supernatural messages. There is just coincidence or our individual interpretations of what we see around us, and if we do see something it’s an accident, and it means nothing. That is truly the word of God.
    At the time, though, I was convinced otherwise, and I decided to go and try to see Ben. I rarely went into Manhattan. If I did, I was with Jacob and my mother, and usually other members of our church. Our senior pastor preached that Manhattan was part of Satan’s Empire. An island filled with sin and devoted to greed, where homosexuals and perverts were allowed to live freely and prosper, and where the word of the Lord was defamed and blasphemed. I was scaredof it. I was worried that if I went alone I would be raped or forced into sin in some way. There were temptations everywhere, on every block and in every building, bars and restaurants and banks controlled by Masons, stores that sold impure clothing, entire neighborhoods devoted to homosexual sex. Satan’s hold was strong. I know now that it’s a ridiculous way to think, but I didn’t know then. So I prayed for strength, I prayed long and hard, and when I felt strong enough I slipped out of the church and took the subway under the river. I followed the directions I had gotten from a church computer and got off the subway and went straight to the hospital. When I went in, I asked for intensive care and took an elevator to the right floor. I was very scared. I was shaking as I stepped out of the elevator and started walking down the hall. I was holding a copy of the Bible that had been printed in Israel and blessed by the head of our church. I was wearing a cross that Jacob had given me when I turned seventeen and that he said would always