Walking with Jesus at the End of the World

By Karl A. D. Brown

In the far distant future the last remnant of humanity survives in colonies built after great wars, plagues and cataclysmic disasters. The story of Christ is shared and a group of new disciples are recruited to bring the gospel to the few living survivors. They become inspired as they hear the story of Jesus’ birth, his miracles, message, crucifixion and resurrection. His message gives them the courage to face dangers and even martyrdom as they spread the gospel at the end of the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Karl A. D. Brown
• Release date: Oct 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005848415

Karl A. D. Brown

Karl A.D. Brown lives in the Upstate New York area. He is married with a lovely wife and two children. He loves the cities and towns of Upstate New York, and they will feature a lot in his stories. He has been writing for a long time, but has recently decided to take the next step and have a little fun with it by sharing with everyone. He enjoys writing stories that involve the supernatural or dystopian societies.Visit his author website: http://www.karladbrownauthor.com/Or follow him on Facebook or Twitter for the latest informatIon.

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Walking with Jesus at the End of the World

By

Karl A.D. Brown

Copyright 2021 Karl A.D. Brown

All rights reserved.

This novel is dedicated to the loving memory of my mother-in-law, Marschelle Shelly Snyder

Table of Contents

Foreword

Chapter One: A Night of Miracles

Chapter Two: The First Meeting

Chapter Three: A Special Birth

Chapter Four: The Ministry Begins

Chapter Five: God among Humanity

Chapter Six: The Parables

Chapter Seven: The Resurrection and the Life

Chapter Eight: An End and a Beginning

Chapter Nine: The Apostles at the End of the World

Chapter Ten: The Coming of the Son of Man

Foreword:

Dear reader, thank you for taking this journey. In this book, all quotes from the Bible are italicized; they are taken from the King James Version. They are accurate and true to the ideas they were meant to express. A Genie is a large, wall-mounted tablet that serves as a computer and television for the people in the North Dakota Colony.

Chapter One: A Night of Miracles

When Michael Goodson woke up, he was shaking all over. He turned and looked at the clock on his nightstand. The glowing green LED informed him it was 4:01 a.m. He switched on the lamp and swung his feet onto the carpeted floor. He shivered because his bedclothes were soaked with sweat; he was cold. He looked up to the ceiling and got his breathing under control. His heart was racing. The dream that scared him awake had seared his mind. He could never remember having a dream like that, ever.

He had been standing in a wide field of wheat. It had been a beautiful clear day. The golden brown stalks of wheat swayed in the wind, but then the sky darkened and a large hand appeared in the sky—a hand that could have snatched him up and all the valley in which he stood. The fingers curled and the index finger pointed and touched the earth. The earth trembled and everything began to die.

He sat up and he was frightened. He willed himself to go into the kitchen for a cold pouch of water. He walked out into the dark room. He almost screamed—there was a man sitting at his small kitchen table. His first thoughts were that it was some kind of home invasion. They were rare in the colony, but they did occur. He was frightened.

Who are you? he demanded as he backed off, suddenly feeling vulnerable. His head was still disorientated from the terrifying dream he had just had.

Peace.

A powerful voice spoke in his head. The voice was so clear and so calm that he stopped backing up. It was strange, because along with the voice came an overwhelming feeling of love, and compassion and it washed over him in waves. He looked at the man sitting in the chair which he had often sat when he had dinner with his late wife, and saw that the man’s face glowed. He wore a white robe.

I am not here to hurt you. I am not here to do you any harm. I am here to select you as one of my witnesses to the end of this world.

Michael felt all the fear and disorientation leave him. The voice in his head was more than a voice; he realized it was like a powerful radio transmission, because with the connection it formed with his mind, he saw images of his life fly past. He saw fleeting images from the mind of the man who still sat in the chair.

One such scene that filled all his mind was of a hand reaching towards him lifting him up. He felt an overwhelming sense of compassion and love. He was so overpowered, overwhelmed with gratitude he fell on his knees and began to weep. The love he felt was so absolute, so clean so clear, he groaned and cried out.

Please I can’t take it.

He must have passed out for a few seconds, because he did not hear or see his visitor move. A hand caught him under his right armpit and lifted him up. The stranger guided him to the seat he had vacated. Michael’s mind was so overwhelmed with the feeling of peace and love he could not speak, although he tried.

No need to speak, the stranger said in a quiet voice, and smiled. My name is Yeshua. You have been chosen to be one of God’s witnesses to the end of this world and the coming of the Eternal kingdom. Your journey begins now. You will be a traveler along the road. Your salvation depends on the journey and decisions you now make from this time forth. Your life will be a witness to the damned as well as the saved. Be ready for your journey; it will be a hard and arduous one. The kingdom of God will soon be revealed. All your friends along this street have been warned as you tonight. Your journey now will be a witness to all Christians. Whether you succeed or not, your journey will be your last testament to the truth of life and to the final death.

The stranger then became transparent, and like smoke, disappeared.

Michael sat in the chair for the next hour. He had placed his head upon the kitchen table and had been crying. There was no fear in him, just an overwhelming sense of sorrow. He missed his wife; he missed his daughter, who was now grown and going about her own life.

Am I going insane? he wondered out loud. He stood up on his still wobbly legs and went to the recycling can. He sucked the last of the water out of the small pouch and tossed the empty bag into it. His phone rang, and the sudden jangling sound startled him. He went over and answered it.

It was Andrew from up the street. Andrew Packwood was Michael’s best friend. He had been a rock when Ann, Michael’s wife, died.

Mike, Andrew’s shaky voice came through the fuzzy connection. Mike, I don’t know, something happened to me . . . and I needed to call you. I—I—must have had a dream or something . . .

No dream, Drew—if what happened to me happened to you. I had a weird dream about the entire world turning to cinder, and then a man calling himself Yeshua appeared and spoke to me. If this is what happened to you, then it wasn’t a dream, Michael said.

He listened to Andrew’s strained breathing through the crackling phone connection and was about to speak when Andrew said, I am going to come over. Give me a few minutes, okay?

Okay.

He switched on the Genie just to have some company until his friend arrived. The female anchor’s soothing voice was saying, Welcome, early risers, today is day 91,250 of the founding of the North Dakota Colony. We will be celebrating this tremendous milestone with two days of activities and shows in Citizen’s Park. Each Honorable citizen will get an extra thousand credits to spend, and extra food packets will be distributed by the Farming and Food Department.

He turned the volume down until the anchor’s voice became just a barely audible drone. Michael lived in one of the only fifteen small human colonies left in the world. The preceding millennium had been one of plagues, natural disasters, and wars. Humanity had been ruled by insanely despotic men and women who took the world through two all-out nuclear wars and a global biological attack that almost ended man’s sojourn on the planet. At the end of all this suffering, a comet some fanatics had named Wormwood had fallen out of the sky and poisoned most of the water on the planet.

In the end, six underground cities were built, and the handpicked survivors—numbering 100 thousand each—sealed themselves in for seven hundred years. When they emerged and reached out to each other, it was found that only three of the underground refuges had survived. It took another two hundred years for humanity to abandon its underground home and once more live under the stars.

Life had been irrevocably changed. The colonies were born. Groups of people would be sent out to specific parts of the world where the fallout and plagues were minimal, and there they would build communities. These communities were held together by brutal laws disguised in a velvet glove. Michael, who was a scientist, had lived as good a life as was possible in the North Dakota Colony. He had everything he could ever hope for. The Ruling Council saw to the needs of all its citizens. They all had enough food, drink, and drugs for moods, plus any companionship they needed.

They were monitored by their local Council of Discipline constantly; the citizens called it the COD. All homes had a Genie, and every citizen had a cell phone. They were required to carry the cell phones with them at all times. On both these devices, the stories of their whole lives were available. All conversations, commerce, and medical issues were recorded and tracked. Life was good, as long as one lived ‘honorably.’

Outside each colony was a small settlement of a few houses called Exrow. This was where the undesirables and the troublemakers—those who lost their citizenship privileges—were sent. There was a harsh underbelly to the colonies. Justice was public, humiliating, and harsh. It was used as a deterrent, and every effort was made to encourage all citizens to be productive members of the colony.

Before going to his room, Michael got a small pot of coffee going. Once in his bedroom, he pulled on a pair of old grey overalls. Thirty minutes later, there was a rap on his front door. He let in his friend; Andrew was dressed identically. The two men sat in his small living room, Michael in his old chair and Andrew on the couch.

Want some coffee?

Thanks, yeah, I guess I could do with some. I definitely won’t be going back to sleep. This is going to be a strange day, Andrew said.

Michael nodded, went into the kitchen and poured a cup of coffee for his friend. He didn’t bother asking if Andrew wanted cream powder or sweet crystals. The man always had his coffee black. He poured a cup for himself and added the powder and crystals.

So it happened to you too?

Yeah, and the guy, Yeshua, told me that he had visited all the people on our street. That’s five other people. So I suppose we might be seeing them soon, Andrew added between sips.

Maybe. Rachel and Mark Crotten we know. The Stovers well they have always kept to themselves, and that woman who lives at number eight is a strange one. My first impulse was to give you a call, and have a chat about what I just experienced. The others may not be inclined to reach out. Michael cleared his throat and sipped his coffee.

Are you saying that maybe we should take a walk and see if they would like to meet later? Andrew said.

That might be a good idea. Michael replied.

How about we give them an hour and then go knock on doors. Andrew said running his hands through his salt and pepper hair.

Yeah. Let’s do that. Michael said. His face was a little pale, despite the coffee warming him up. He looked at his friend and said, Let’s swap stories. I’ll tell you what happened to me last night—well, I guess early this morning." He then went on to relate his dream and the encounter with the mysterious person who had spoken to him.

Well, I had the same dream, Andrew said, once Michael was done speaking. "He was sitting in my living room on my couch. When I woke up, he was calling me. I was in a right state after that dream, as you can imagine. I grabbed the baseball bat from under the bed and went into the living room. ‘Who are you?’ I asked, but there was no fight or conviction in me . . . the dream had taken something from me.

‘I am here to tell you that I have chosen you as a witness,’ He said, and all at once I felt warm and loved. The fear left me because I could feel that he was good. Here, Andrew seemed to be searching for words, trying to articulate what Michael knew through his own experience was most likely indescribable.

He said, ‘The hour of the Son of man is nigh. Your life and your actions from this time forth will be a witness and a testimony to the world of the justness and love of me the Christ.’ Then he said that everyone on this street had been called, and that they all will be witnesses, and their lives and actions will be a map to life everlasting or to the final death of the soul. Then he just up and vanished. That’s the best I can describe it. Andrew let out a shuddering breath and finished off his coffee.

The two men sat and mentally turned over each of their stories silently for a few minutes. Then Michael said, This is 3230 AD; no one believes in religion anymore. This is stuff we learned at college, sitting through modified history classes.

Andrew shook his head in acknowledgement. Both men knew the state of the world they lived in. It was a world in which North and South America was one country. Borders were dissolved. The Great Wars of the last millennium, in which humanity had almost destroyed itself, had made the old order of world governance obsolete.

Yeah, religion was seen for what it was the root of all the wars, hate, and intolerance humanity had ever suffered, Andrew said.

"Yeah, I remember I had a Professor Strovak, I think her name was. She had written a couple of books; her most famous one was called The Killing of Superstition. I think that’s what she had called it. I remember she said that when religion died, it finally made peace possible. The population was finally in check with strict control measures. Men and women were finally equal. What I always wanted to ask her but never dared was: why, then, did the people of the time begin a fourth world war and once again use nuclear and biological weapons? Why would they do that if their world had been so rosy?" Michael wondered.

Andrew shook his head, placed his empty cup on Mike’s coffee table, and said, "Oh yeah, you gotta love the one we have today, where there is no hunger because all our food comes from one source. Everyone’s equal, but some are more so than others, depending on whom you know. The world has fewer resources since the last war killed off most of the population, and there are areas that will not be habitable for eons. Most people now prefer a synthetic companion to a human being as their mate or spouse. The fact that you and Ann got married marked you as odd from the get-go there, Mike. The fact that you had applied to have a child in the old fashion way and not the preferred one through the Gen Labs gene editing program—that cost you possibly 300 points on your citizenship score alone. That will stay there for years.

It’s no coincidence that all the people on this street are misfits. We all got sent here so they could keep a closer eye on us. That said, did you turn off everything? Andrew dropped his voice to a barely perceptible whisper as he said this.

Yes, everything is off. The Genie and cell phone are off, Michael said, dropping his voice unconsciously.

That will cost you a few points—you’ll be seen as unsociable. To want any real privacy is downright suspicious. Andrew grinned. He then eyed the clock. Time to go check out the neighbors and see if they have anything to say.

With that, both men stepped out onto Michael’s porch. Andrew then went down the short gravel path and Michael followed him.

The first house they went to was Mark and Rachel Crotten’s. They were both in their late forties. Michael saw their pale, tired faces, which told him immediately that they too had been visited. Rachel beckoned them to come in. They went into the hall and sat at the kitchen table.

Okay, turn off your Genie and your phones, or anything that can be used to record or listen in. The couple nodded and did as Michael suggested. Then they all sat down at the table. Mark offered them coffee, but the two men passed.

Best to save your water rations, Andrew said.

So, we had a visitor last night. Did you? Michael said.

Rachel nodded and said, Yes, a man calling himself Yeshua came to us all in white. He told us to not be afraid that we were chosen to be witnesses.

Yes, we were in bed—didn’t sleep. Well, I had a really bad dream. Mark chimed in. I woke up and saw a light coming from the living room. Can’t tell you how terrified it made me. You know all this talk about UFOs and whatnot, these days. I woke up Rachel, and we saw this guy sitting at our dinner table. He said that we were to be witnesses: ‘Through you souls will be saved. Find Me, and the Holy Spirit will find you,’ He said.

That’s new, ‘find Yeshua.’ I wonder what he means by that, Michael said.

Yeah, we know that Yeshua—known more widely as Jesus—was a historical figure who started the Christian religion. We were taught that he was just a historical figure who was long dead. Andrew nodded trying to make sense of the statement.

Maybe he means we should try to find for ourselves who he really was, Mark chipped in.

All we will find is what we got taught in history at college: that Yeshua was one of the founders of the Christian religion. He is mentioned in the section on past religious faiths, before the Great Wars. We won’t find too much on him or any of the prewar religions. Most of that was purged, Rachel, who was a teacher at the local community school, said.

Look, let’s chat with the other neighbors on the street and listen to what they have to say. Then we can come up with a consensus as to what we should do, Michael said.

Mark drained his coffee and they went knocking on doors. They found out that the other neighbors, the