How I started believing in God

Why and how I stopped believing; now that’s easy. Everyone’s got one of those. I’ve got plenty. But to start believing is rare. And what got me started is even rarer.

Me and my brother were on a ship headed back home. My brother wanted to go outside, but I preferred to stay in. So I was decided that my brother would lock me in the cabin from outside since I couldn’t reach the inside lock.

No big deal, reading, reading, I fell asleep. Suddenly the bed started to shake. My table started shaking, everything on top of the table started shaking. My entire cabin was shaking. Shaking violently, feverishly. The lights started flickering on and off. Then the flush began itself. It kept flushing, but when I checked, no one was flushing it. The windows were rattling, there was a strange loud moaning sound from outside. Nothing I’d ever heard before. And I’ve heard nearly every sound the sea can make. And it’s silence. I was petrified. I couldn’t understand what god was telling me, or trying to. I tried the door but it wouldn’t open. SLAM, the bathroom door shut.

I broke down, pathetic, frightened little worm that I was, and I cried, and I prayed, and I begged, and I promised. I promised God that I would believe in him and never doubt his presence, if he’d please send my brother in. I couldn’t face this alone. And I started a mental composition of this promise, if he’d only send my brother back in. And just then, I heard the lock in the door click. I was sure it wasn’t my brother. It was death. And I turned. And as I turned, and as the door opened, and as my brother walked in, everything just stopped. Just stopped dead. It was incredible.

I leapt off the floor and took a running leap onto my completely shell-shocked brother. And as I narrated what had just happened he laughed. “You silly girl,” he tapped me on my head, “I didn’t come back because God sent me. I came back because I thought you shouldn’t miss such an incredible sight.”

“What incredible sight?”

“This is the first ship in the islands to get a mechanical gang-plank lifter. And because the ship is so small, the load of the machine takes up the entire ship’s power and energy. That’s why the whole ship was shuddering so much. Actually such a tiny vessel doesn’t need a machine. Bigger ships still do it manually. That’s why I wanted you to see it. But by the time I got here, the gang-plank had been cleared and the machine switched off.” He paused, smiling. “So now you know, God had nothing to do with it.”

“But I asked God to send you here, that’s why you came.”
“Shut up now. I don’t believe in God. And neither did you, until just now.”
“I now believe.”
“Very very good. Now are you coming? Or should I lock you in?”
I ran up to him, grabbed his hand, and didn’t let go for the rest of the trip back home. And that’s that.