Cattle to the Slaughter

By John Lang

Cattle To The Slaughter is a murder mystery with plenty of twists and turns to entice anybody who loves the genre and to keep the reader guessing.
Read about Joshua Jenkins, a retiring minister who faces his worst nightmares in a murder mystery at the churchs Campground where two hundred girls die under mysterious circumstances.
Was he responsible for the deaths or was it the fault of the new District Superintendent, Crystal Starr, or was it something that no one expected to occur?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 9, 2014
• ISBN: 9781503523852

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

EXORDIUM

Prison, where hardened criminals serve their sentences and where the lowest of the low dwell.

You are probably asking yourself: ‘What is a minister such as I doing in prison?’

I am here as a permanent resident and will explain what the meaning behind that and how it came to be.

I am about to tell you something that may appear difficult to hear, and perhaps hard to believe.

Yet, it could happen in your area if individuals become so desperate to resolve certain problems and neglect to obey their own laws.

It can also happen if one forgets the ominous warnings mentioned in the Scriptures.

However, I did not heed the ominous warnings nor take them seriously.

I consider myself guilty for allowing the events to occur. For the signs were in plain sight and the frustration and desperation within me blinded my common sense.

Let me start at the beginning; my name is Joshua Jenkins, former District Superintendent for my state.

From my blissful days in high school and college, I recall my teachers’ lessons in World History.

I read about many evil deeds done by individuals in the name of religion to force people to obey the ministry.

For example, I read about the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, and the Salem Witch Trials.

I thought to myself; How could God-fearing people allow these terrible events to occur?

It was hypocritical of me to think that, for I was susceptible to making the same mistakes as they were.

Those terrible events that I just mentioned to you a minute ago were the acts of unrighteous men and not of God.

However, there were occasions where the Wrath of God was indeed a part of history.

For example, there is the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah with fire and brimstone mentioned in the Book of Genesis.

Some prominent people believe that event to be fictitious.

I know that the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah occurred because I went overseas to the location of Sodom and Gomorrah.

When I arrived, I found large deposits of sulfur, formerly called ‘brimstone’ back in the day.

When I returned home, The Great Depression left everyone unemployed and I wanted to make sure I could support a wife and children.

Therefore, I told my girlfriend Eunice that our marriage would have to wait until the economy recovered.

In 1938, my brother and I affiliated ourselves with the newly created Christian Savior Church.

Oil tycoon Ralph Clark was the General Superintendent that founded the Organization.

He attributed his wealth as a Gift from God and decided to share his beliefs with the world.

In 1941, I served as a Lieutenant in the Second World War in Europe and received the Medal of Honor.

My younger brother John served in the Army alongside General Douglas MacArthur.

After the war ended, I finally married my childhood girlfriend, Eunice Mayberry.

Though we were both thirty-two years old and marrying late in life, it did not matter for we were finally together.

Two years later during one of the coldest winters on record, my wife gave birth to our only child, Mark.

Several months later, my brother John married his college sweetheart, Maude Lincoln.

One year later on Independence Day, my sister-in-law Maude gave birth to my precious niece, Beth.

During that same year, I heard the Calling of the Lord to enter the ministry and went to Bible School.

During my years in Bible School, I met Matthew Klondike and adopted him as my mentor.

Moreover, I met my childhood friend John Anderson there and rekindled our friendship.

It was there where I also met Peter Johnson, Lloyd McKenzie, Judith Snyder, Bernice Ferguson and Penelope Frost.

Little did we realize at that time we would all be on the District Board of our Church in our State someday.

During the first semester of Bible College, I became acquainted with my newfound friends.

My mentor Matthew Klondike operated movie cameras for an independent film company.

It was at the studio where he met his wife, Betty Logan whom people said she looked like Betty Grable.

My childhood friend John Anderson owned his own car manufacturing plant where he made jeeps and tanks during World War Two.

When the war ended, he went back to manufacturing cars for growing families.

Moreover, he married his childhood girlfriend, Ethel Smith.

During the Second World War, Lloyd McKenzie failed his physical; therefore, he founded his own pharmaceutical and distributed medicine to the wounded soldiers.

Moreover, he married his high school sweetheart Phyllis Morgan and now makes medicines for hospitals.

Additionally, Penelope Frost was his personal secretary who arranged all his meetings and appointments.

Peter Johnson owned his own photography studio where he specialized in wedding and graduation photos and taking photos of children for school albums.

Both Bernice Ferguson and Judith Snyder served as Red Cross nurses during the Second World War.

Tragically, both women lost their husbands on D-Day and adopted each other as sisters.

Anyway, the next four years strained my marriage and my fatherhood to Mark, but my family understood my decision.

At age thirty-eight, I became an ordained minister of my Organization.

My colleagues from Bible School also became ordained ministers and accompanied me at my graduation.

Sadly, our General Superintendent Ralph Clark died during the festivities and the General Board appointed his son Moses Clark to succeed him.

One year later, the District Board appointed me Pastor of the church in the Downtown Area.

The congregation warmly welcomed my family and me with an extravagant banquet at the local restaurant.

Ten years later, Moses Clark died in a car accident, therefore, the General Board appointed his twenty-year-old son Luke Clark to succeed him.

Three years later, on my fifty-second birthday, when my son Mark turned eighteen, he married his high school sweetheart, Mary Kelly.

Within a year after that, my granddaughter Marcia was born, and a few weeks later, my sister-in-law Maude gave birth to my niece, Beth.

It was on that same day, the District Board of my state elected me as District Superintendent.

However, the festivities came to a sad conclusion when General Superintendent Luke Clark died and the General Board appointed his twenty-year-old son Samuel Clark to succeed him.

Over the next few years, church attendance fluctuated like a roller coaster and our Organization changed their stance on certain issues to make the people happy.

For example, our General Board approved marijuana usage for medical purposes.

Personally, I believed in Divine Healing, but the General Board vetoed my disapproval.

Moreover, the General Board permitted divorce as well as optional tithing.

I could not believe our General Board compromised our ethics to those who could not live as a Christian should.

Despite my protests, the General Board vetoed them; life went on, and I did not pursue the matter any further.

Besides that, Samuel Clark, our General Superintendent felt he knew better than I did and considered the situation closed.

Moreover, he insisted that preachers omit certain Scriptures from our sermons because some people considered them ‘offensive’.

I discussed the situation with my mentor Matthew Klondike, and my close friend John Anderson.

They suggested that I drop any further protests because Samuel Clark was wealthy and could remove me from the ministry for protesting his decisions.

However, I chose to pray and ask God to do something about the descent of our moral code.

During the past sixteen years as a District Superintendent, I received many messages from the Lord in dreams and visions.

I expounded those messages to both the ministry and the congregations of the state.

My experience in discerning signs, dreams and visions should have forewarned me of the events to come.

However, nothing could prepare me for what was about to happen at the General Conference.

It occurred during one of the evangelical sermons.

Without warning, ten thousand young ladies left our Organization.

No one saw it coming, and many theories and rumors emerged after the event occurred.

One of the theories was that an evangelist preached against the recent popular female singers, and did not mention any popular male singers.

The rumor that followed afterward was an accusation of sexism against female singers.

The most disturbing rumor that spread was about the General Superintendent, Samuel Clark.

He apparently made sexual advances towards a group of young ladies.

He supposedly invited them to entertain the General Board in a private room.

Apparently, he asked the young ladies at gunpoint to disrobe in front of the General Board, participate in a nudist pageant, and then perform lap-dances.

My wife and I immediately followed the young ladies out of the General Conference Building to talk to them. We did everything in our power to persuade them to stay in the fellowship of believers.

However, it was to no avail, they left the immediate area and vowed to leave the church for good.

After the girls boarded a nearby bus, my wife Eunice suffered a major stroke and died instantly.

Many parents came to me afterward and offered their condolences.

However, immediately after that, they complained about the rumors.

They