Lien on God: The Hilarious Spiritual Journey of a Court Clerk Who Decides the Bible Is a Legal Document, Binding on God

By Penne Ryan

What if your mustard seed of faith was enough to get answers to your prayers all along?

You are looking at this book because you were intrigued by the title. Is it possible to make a claim on what God has promised, expecting him to answer in a way consistent with His Word, reputation, and His track record?

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: Dec 23, 2022
• ISBN: 9798887385006

Penne Ryan

Penne spent her working career in the court system, beginning as a file clerk, and ending as Division Manager. Her husband, Bob, worked in law enforcement. They had two children and three grandchildren. Penne, now widowed and retired, teaches Bible studies at her local church.

Book preview

Chapter One

Busted

Gin, I said, snapping down my cards, trying to forestall the tsunami I saw coming between my dearest friend and me. We have been friends since high school and can be blunt with one another.

It didn’t work.

We’ve been studying the Book of John, Kathy continued as she wiped up some spilled chips and dip from her chrome and glass kitchen table. Did you know it says, ‘You must be born again?’

I don’t care, I said, adding up the score and glaring at her.

We had been enjoying our evening with Kathy and Ed - friends because both my

husband and hers were in law enforcement and also had a lot in common. But Kathy had done it again. She brought up Bible Study Fellowship and what she was learning. I said I didn’t want to hear it. I was tired. We had to go.

Kathy would stop talking about the Bible for a few weeks so as not to destroy the relationship. But then she’d start in again.

We’ve found this fabulous church in Riverside. You’ve just got to come. She continued wiping down the already gleaming white tile counter. You’ll love the music - they play guitars mostly - and the preacher is fabulous!

Just stop. I am not interested. I gave up that religion stuff a long time ago. Besides, all I need is to have to commute an additional 100 miles on Sunday just to be beaten up or get depressed (my idea of church). Pass the salsa.

But she wouldn’t give up. She’d just wait.

Secretly we called her the Hound of God, the only scrap of my religious background I could remember.

My husband Bob and I would complain to each other all the way up to where we lived in the mountains about how annoying that Jesus talk was.

About six months later, my older sister was having her first baby. She was forty years old, had pre-eclampsia, and the doctor had put her into the hospital for observation in Orange County, about 80 miles from where we lived. We were going to visit her there on the weekend. To get to the hospital, we had to drive right past that church Kathy kept bugging us about.

Cleaning house on Saturday, I had this epiphany and went to find Bob. He was outside, putting in a railroad tie flower bed, four railroad ties high around our backyard. He had no help.

And he marvels he has back issues.

Bob! I said, waving the dust rag in my enthusiasm, leaving a trail as I came down the stairs. I have this great idea to get Kathy and Ed off our backs. We go to that stupid church on the way to visit my sister. I tell Kathy I hate it and we never have to go again. Bob thought that was a wonderful plan.

So, we made our plans and drove out to Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California. I had never been to a church of 16,000 people. It looked more like a Costco building than a church. They had about a dozen parking attendants directing traffic on a three lane driveway - all with smiles on their faces. I couldn’t believe it. And the people taking their children to Sunday School modulars were all smiling, too.

Don’t they get it? I asked Bob, Life is hard. What are they smiling about?

He didn’t know either.

Kathy and Ed had suggested we get there forty-five minutes early to get a seat, but we hadn’t done it.

What were we going to do for an extra forty-five minutes in church, for heaven’s sake?

So, we walked the quarter mile from the back parking lot to the church, needlessly ducking airplanes taking off from the adjacent airport. I had never seen a church that seated 6,000 people per service. Kathy and Ed sat in the third row.

Rats! No easy escape from there.

As we were walking down the aisle of this huge but somehow welcoming church, I felt a bubbling. I couldn’t explain it. It was like an expectation of something. And everyone in the auditorium was smiling.

Don’t they get it? I whispered to Bob, even though everyone else was talking in a normal voice.

After all, we were in church -

What’s everybody smiling about?

He shrugged.

When the music started, tears began running down my cheeks.

I must confess I cry pretty cool. I don’t make a mess or any noise. The tears just flow.

What’s wrong with Penne? The six foot-four, blond hair and blue-eyed Ed, turning sideways in the pew and trying not to look like he was staring, asked Bob.

What’s wrong with you? Six foot-three brown and hazel Bob pivoted to ask me.

Nothing, I hissed back, tears streaming. I’m fine!

While in the service, I read everything in the pew. Well, as good as I could through tears.

I’m nosy that way. Writing training manuals and position descriptions as part of my job at the court made me think if something were important enough to write down, I ought to read it.

One item was a Prayer Request Card. Since we were on our way to see my sister, I filled one out.

What are you doing? Bob asked me, turning in the pew to whisper in my ear.

I’m writing a Prayer Request for my sister’s baby delivery.

You can’t do that. You don’t believe in this stuff.

I know, but there are 6,000 people here who do, and I’m taking advantage of it.

Meanwhile, simple music was played on guitars. Everyone knew the words except us.

I loved those words. Everything in me wanted to know those words. I had no idea at the time they were from the Psalms.

The sermon was uncomplicated. It was about Peter. Pastor Greg Laurie didn’t call him a saint. The pastor spoke about the many mistakes Peter had made. Yet God still loved and forgave Peter.

The possibility that God loved sinners made me start crying again.

I didn’t know I had that much liquid in my entire body.

Is Penne okay? Ed asked Bob.

What’s wrong with you? Bob asked me.

Nothing! I’m FINE! Leave me alone.

I got saved.¹

Kathy and Ed gave me a Bible in a modern translation that very day.

I think she already knew I was going to get saved.

When we arrived at the hospital a couple of hours later, my sister had just delivered a healthy baby boy. I told her about the Prayer Card. She said she had felt like there were thousands of people in the delivery room with her.

She meant that in a good way.

* * * * * * *

Everything had changed. That day at church I felt a thousand-pound weight lift off me. (You see, if you don’t have anywhere to put stuff, you carry it by yourself. If there is no God, you are responsible for crime. You are responsible for smog and global warming if there is no God. Once I knew God loved me and would care for me, the weight was lifted off.) I realized I had felt as if I had been living in a world that was only seven feet high but now the whole realm of heaven opened up to me. The new reality felt phenomenal. God cared for me! God loved me! It was astounding.

Even work at the courthouse seemed different when I returned Monday morning. Suddenly, although I had known about the problems of my staff previously, I now cared more: single moms, a grandmother raising her grandson, money issues.

These people need help. We’ve got to pray!

So, I distributed a sign-up sheet for a prayer meeting, which I held in the Law Library next to one of the courtrooms.

I got complaints.

I didn’t care.

We met on Thursdays at noon.

I had a couple of problems. I was the boss and a very private person. I didn’t really want to know the prayer request details and didn’t want to tell mine. So, I had everyone write their requests and pray over the slips of paper without knowing what they contained.

Kind of a stealth prayer meeting.

Pathetic, actually.

But God was good. Every week we had answers. Then people would tell what the problem was and how God answered the prayer. It was awesome.

I thought I had done a good thing helping my employees. Wasn’t I great?

A few months later, I discovered the real reason for the prayer meeting. But we’ll get to that later on. First, I need to explain my experience with reading the Bible for myself and why it was a miracle I ever got saved at all.

* * * * * * * * * *

I couldn’t believe the Bible was so simple. I had been taught my entire church life that a lay person (anyone not an ordained minister) couldn’t possibly understand what now seemed to be clear and concise. What a shock. I began a Read-Through-the-Bible-in-a-Year program and was astounded by the details of the Israelites’ lives: records of births, deaths, and marriages; legal descriptions of land and documentation of transfers of properties; wills and testaments. It was probably because I had worked ten years in the court system filing papers and verifying them for legal sufficiency that it occurred to me - these were legal documents, and the Bible was a compilation much like the County Hall of Records.

A legal document is defined as being issued under proper authority prescribing a penalty or course of conduct, conferring a right privilege, authority, or immunity, or imposing an obligation, and relevant or applicable to the general public, members of a class, or persons in a locality, as distinguished from named individuals or organizations.²

I decided the Bible is a legal document.

Plus, the words in the Bible are sworn before God.

Then it occurred to me that a legal document is binding: on both parties. I perused it more carefully the second time - to know what I was getting into. As I read it, I thought the following and said it out loud to God:

"Dear Lord: Either Your Word is true, or it’s not. Either it says what it means and means what it says, or it does not. Either it’s all true or none of it is true. Either it’s