Sarah's Secrets

By Jim Szana

How can a person stand by when something ominous is about to happen to their family?

Sarah is a master storyteller. She retells the story you thought you knew with personal anecdotes and a riveting narrative. She brings to life in the 21st century a believable and, more importantly, inspiring story of a person's struggles and how she copes

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: Oct 11, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685569761

Jim Szana

Jim Szana (Zahn-ah) is a Vietnam vet, a retired blue-collar clinical dentist of fifty years, and an accomplished pianist. The jimszanatrio.com represented the jazz genre of the Touring Artists Roster of the South Dakota Arts Council for twenty years. Jim's ability to paint with words is similar to improvising with notes on the piano. As in music, he is totally not a paper-trained author. Jim has lifelong interests in history, ethics, and theology.

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Sarah’s secrets

Jim Szana

Trilogy Christian Publishers

Tustin, CA

Trilogy Christian Publishers

A Wholly Owned Subsidiary of Trinity Broadcasting Network

2442 Michelle Drive

Tustin, CA 92780

Sarah’s secrets

Copyright © 2022 by Jim Szana

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without written permission from the author. All rights reserved. Printed in the USA.

Rights Department, 2442 Michelle Drive, Tustin, CA 92780.

Trilogy Christian Publishing/TBN and colophon are trademarks of Trinity Broadcasting Network.

Cover design by Jeff Summers

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Trilogy Christian Publishing.

Trilogy Disclaimer: The views and content expressed in this book are those of the author and may not necessarily reflect the views and doctrine of Trilogy Christian Publishing or the Trinity Broadcasting Network.

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN: 978-1-68556-975-4

E-ISBN: 978-1-68556-976-1

This book is dedicated to my mother,

Helen Szana,

who could keep a secret and a confidence

like no one else I have ever met.

Acknowledgements

Sarah’s understanding of life, her view of reality, and her words say what I believe. But who cares what I believe? How amazing that her four-thousand-year-old story allows me to relate to you, dear reader, the personal God who cares for us. We all matter to Him, and He has been so misunderstood.

I would like to acknowledge several persons who have been instrumental in my thinking. I will start with Dr. Edwin R. Thiele, a rather famous historian and archaeologist who figured out and made sense of the numbering of dates in the Book of Kings, where the reign of Israel’s and Judah’s kings appeared so mixed up for so long. He cleared up the apparent conflicting dates that critical biblical historians mocked for so long. I was privileged to be in the last Old Testament history class he taught. He infused life into ancient Assyrian history and was not afraid to ask difficult questions. Such as, How could two million Israelites march around Jericho seven times in one day? Likely, another numbering mistake.

Dr. Jack Provonsha first became a pastor and was located in a remote Alaskan village, where his wife died. Upon returning to the lower forty-eight, he went back to school and became a medical doctor. He maintained a family practice during the rest of his working life and while he was teaching. He kept on learning and eventually attained a Ph.D. in philosophy and ethics. I was privileged to take a couple of lower division and one upper division class from him dealing with ethics. I also attended many presentations he gave at Loma Linda University during the four years I studied as a dental student.

Less than two years later, underneath my bunk at Cam Ranh Bay Air Force Base in Vietnam, with rockets incoming and the sirens blaring, I asked myself, What reason can I give God for allowing me to live another year? I had no answer.

The next year my best friend, Mike, came to visit when I was stationed in Bitburg, Germany. He was fascinated with Francis and Edith Schaeffer. It wasn’t long before we drove him down to the L’Abri Fellowship in the Swiss Alps, where he stayed for four months. I had read and was studying most of Schaeffer’s books, The God Who Is There, He Is There and He Is Not Silent, and others. When we drove back to L’Abri in that gorgeous region of the world, Mike gave us a great tour of the environs.

But probably the most original thinker I have ever read was Immanuel Velikovsky. He was much too radical for the scientific establishment when he published Worlds in Collision in 1950. He and Albert Einstein were friends and enjoyed a longtime correspondence that began in 1946 and continued until Einstein’s untimely death in 1955. At his death, the only opened book on Einstein’s desk was Worlds in Collision.

The theory of evolution requires many eons of uninterrupted uniformity in order to accomplish its slow, deliberate work. In hundreds of ways, Velikovsky demonstrated global catastrophism, including one around 1,500 BCE with the appearance of the planet Venus to our solar system and very nearly colliding with earth. Earth in Upheaval documents major trauma and destruction evidenced in our planet. Scientists were not going to allow anyone or anything to tarnish their theory of uniformity. He was labeled a heretic and died mostly misunderstood in 1979. I began reading his works in 1966. They are fascinating.

If you read between the lines of the Old Testament, nobody does it better than Rabbi Joseph Telushkin. I read his book Biblical Literacy in 1998 and have learned so much of what was written in Hebrew Scripture. He had a way of explaining those things not said.

The imagination of C. S. Lewis did not cross my path until I had read his understated Mere Christianity. I was later quite surprised by The Chronicles of Narnia. Reading A Grief Observed touched me in places beyond touching.

My long-time (sixty-five years) friend, retired Major General C. J. Hindman, has been there for me and is also quick to point out the flaws in my thinking and grammatical mistakes. His complimentary words can be found on the back cover of this book.

The President of our 1970 School of Dentistry class, Dennis Meidinger, carefully scrutinized my rough manuscript and added plenty of red marks, which were needed and appreciated.

I especially want to thank Trinity Broadcasting Network, TBN, and their publishing subsidiary TRILOGY for accepting my manuscript. They are very organized and seem to genuinely care about sharing this old, old story.

Much thanks to my editor from WorldMissionsMedia group. She polished this up and made me look better than I am.

Rhonda Webb has been the go-between in all the aspects of bringing this book to completion at Trilogy. She has been so kind and easy to work with.

Special kudos to Jeff Summers, the graphic designer, who totally amazed this old dentist by depicting Sarah’s smile. I’ve worked with teeth for more than fifty years, and hers are just right. They’re not too white, not perfectly straight, but real. The mystery of what does she look like? is captivating.

Finally, my wife, Sandy, has put up with me getting up early in the morning and writing while she still sleeps. A writer writes alone and with little commotion. But the most impressive thing is she allowed me to take over the dining room table where we eat. When company came over, I had major clean-up and put away duties involving that table. She became good at asking, Where are you? as I stared at nothing in particular. Thank you for typing the manuscript that I wrote by hand and critiquing Sarah’s Secrets.

There are other friends I have left out. Little remarks can be really important. Thanks to everyone who inspired me, and I hope this book will inspire you right back.

—Jim Szana,

August 2022

Contents

Chapter 1. Ur 1

Chapter 2. Breaking Out 9

Chapter 3. Paddan Aram, Unity 11

Chapter 4. To the Promised Land 16

Chapter 5. A Short Stay 20

Chapter 6. Egypt 24

Chapter 7. Expelled 28

Chapter 8. Melchizedek 31

Chapter 9. Surprised 35

Chapter 10. Noah 39

Chapter 11. Garden of Eden Lost 42

Chapter 12. A Second Trip 52

Chapter 13. Journey Back to the Ark 55

Chapter 14. The Box 60

Chapter 15. Hagar & Forgiveness 65

Chapter 16. Impromptu Feast 73

Chapter 17. Strange Act 81

Chapter 18. Laughter Arrives 85

Chapter 19. Ishmael Leaves 92

Chapter 20. Isaac’s Child 97

Chapter 21. Isaac’s Friend 101

Chapter 22. Your Mind is a Garden 107

Chapter 23. Seeds in His Mind 112

Chapter 24. Back to Salem 117

Chapter 25. Everything Has Changed 122

Chapter 26. The Three-Day Journey 130

Chapter 27. The Binding 135

Chapter 28. From Not Coping to Hoping 142

Chapter 29. Mother of the Promise 149

Epilogue 153

Author’s Note 154

Chapter 1

Ur

The epitaph on the gravestone reads, Here I am right now. Not so far from where you are.

We see things not as they are, not even as they were. We see things as we are.

My first recollections of my brother Abram are as a little girl of about five years old. So, that would make him about fifteen. We were at Dad’s shop, and Dad was away. A customer walked in and wished to buy an idol.

How old are you? asked my brother.

Fifty years old, answered the customer.

What? A grown man like you bowed before a mere image that was just made yesterday? Think it over!

Another time, again, while our father was away, a woman came and placed an offering of a bowl of flour before the idols. No sooner had the woman left when my brother picked up a stick and broke all the idols. Only one did he spare, the largest. In the hand of this one, he placed the stick.

Upon his return, our father saw the destruction of the idols and ran up to my brother, shouting, Who did this?

Just listen, Father, and be amazed, said Abram. "A woman came in and brought a full bowl of flour for an offering. I placed the bowl at the feet of the idols. Immediately, a murderous battle broke out among them. Each of the idols said the flour was meant for him. While they all squabbled and pulled at the bowl, the largest of them, determined to create order,