JIMMY (impatiently, voice rising slightly): Horace, you’ll cha—Change? Well, there’s nothing to change. You’re normal. Trust me. These . . . feelings . . . will go away. Just don’t give in to them. Pray. Ask God to give you strength and in no time . . .

(Someone calls him from across the yard.)

HORACE: But what if I can’t change?

JIMMY (sternly): You’ll change. (He starts toward the front of the churchyard.)

HORACE: But if I can’t?

(JIMMY stops and looks at HORACE, narrowing his eyes.)

JIMMY: Horace, you do realize that in the end this is a very serious matter, don’t you? Search your heart. Take it to the Lord. But don’t dwell on it too much. You’ll be fine. Believe me.

(JIMMY turns and walks away. HORACE stands beneath the tree, his hands in his pockets, looking up at the tree.)

A preacher. A minister. A man of God. In the book of Luke the apostle writes that Jesus returns to Nazareth and reads from the Scriptures during the services, saying that he has come to fulfill them. He tells us that the people in the synagogue were then “filled with wrath, and rose up, and thrust him out of the city, and led him unto the brow of the hill whereon their city was built, that they might cast him down headlong.” My grandmother knew this story when she began, in her subtle way, to nudge me closer and closer to the pulpit. But then everybody knew; it’s commonly known among Southern Baptists that it’s hard to preach to people you know and who’ve known you all your life and most of your family’s life. It is formidable. And it happens rarely. But in this case it was the result of my grandmother’s unearthly will. That and the will of a few dead folks.