Palm Sunday

A purple bicycle, a girl’s bike with plastic streamers on the handle grips and glitter in the seat, was chained to a tree at the corner of Lancashire Street and Gainsborough drive. Both the tree and the bicycle stood in a flowerbed that, at this time, was swollen with marigolds, irises, pansies and an ivy that had begun to weave itself into the bicycle’s chain.

Stephen Hicks was mowing a lawn. The lawnmower’s hums added a more interesting bass to the generic performance of the Bach concerto playing on his headphones, but Stephen was looking rather than listening. He was looking at the men standing in the marigolds.

There were two of them in suits, one brown, and one grey. The man in the grey suit was kneeling in front of the bike with the hacksaw while the other stood above him offering directions.

“No,” said the man in the brown suit. “You have to pull back on the saw a few times to make a groove and then you go back and forth”

“Does it have to be backwards Mr. Brown?” asked the man in the grey suit. “It would be easier for me to make the groove by going forwards.

“Hey!” shouted Stephen. “What are you doing?”

Both men stood up and bowed. The man who had been called Mr. Brown walked over and put his arm on Stephen’s shoulder.

“Hello friend,” said Mr. Brown. “I am Mr. Brown, and this is my friend Mr. Grey, we are going to take this bike because the Lord has need of it.”

"He will send it back, immediately of course," said Mr. Grey.

Stephen Hicks did not know what to say. After all, it was not his bicycle, and he'd never seen it there before.

"Could you try not to step on the marigolds," he said.

"Certainly," replied Mr. Brown and then Mr. Grey after him. They lifted their feet carefully off of the flowers, many of which were already flattened by the lightly grooved soles of their dress shoes.

* * *
The Lord came riding down Grand River Avenue, on a purple girls bicycle. The plastic streamers flowed in the wind. The glitter in the seat reflected the glorious sun. And when we saw him coming we took off our jackets and laid flowers in his path.