Grace May yet Win

Ed used to crouch

outside Morrisons—

not always asking,

just hoping

someone,

tipsy from a night out,

might drop a fiver

and not ask why.

He said it was for food—

but it wasn’t.

Not really.

The city’s full of street kitchens.

What he needed

was the bag of brown

that quieted the ache

that never really left.

He was all edges—

bones,

eyes,

silence.

Like he’d walked

from a forgotten war,

a body abandoned

by safety and sleep.

A dig had gone bad.

Leg swollen, blackened.

Amputation was mentioned.

Ed just looked away.

He’d already lost

more than most men ever carry.

And still—he came.

Lighthouse.

Worship.

Where he’d belt Rod Stewart:

‘We are sailing’

‘weare crying, forever dying,’

like a prophet of the broken,

like a choir of the damned—

like Jesus might join in

on the second chorus,

with all his angel host responding:

‘To be near you, to be free.’

Sometimes he’d cry.

Sometimes we all did.

He’d sit through the call to worship:

“Life is full of many different storms.”

Hands trembling,

tattoos fading.

And perhaps —

this was holy ground,

a thin space.

Then one day,

the instruments vanished.

Guitar.

Keyboard.

Gone.

Crack Converters took them.

And one day

he screamed it out in the car park:

“I did it.

I’m sorry.”

What could we do?

We held the ache.

We lit the candle anyway.

He asked to reaffirm his baptism

before we took him to the station.

So we did.

Hands on his head.

Water.

Tears.

Oil.

A strange peace—

like the veil thinned.

Then court.

The judge looked at the notes,

the support we offered.

Was about to let him go.

I stood, choked:

“If you release him today,

I’ll be doing his funeral next month.”

And that’s what happened.

Two weeks later—

hospital.

Millie went to visit.

Routine.

We thought.

But she rang.

Her voice shook:

“He’s dying.

Bring your green book.

Bring your oil.”

We sat by his bed

as machines hummed prayers

I could not find.

Millie on one side.

Me on the other.

It’s sacred ground,

a holy space

when an image-bearer

breathes their last.

Ed’s chest rose and fell—

until it didn’t.

We buried him—

toothless,

thin,

tattooed.

But not unloved.

I said words

about resurrection

with a dry mouth,

wet eyes,

and a heart

that didn’t feel full of victory.

Three died over the next month or so.

Three.

What is grace

if it doesn’t stop the bleeding?

What is hope

if we keep digging graves?

I believed back then.

I still want to.

But doubt walks with me now,

quiet and honest.

The God I pray to

did not heal Ed’s leg.

Did not pull him

from the edge in time.

But I believe—

sometimes through clenched teeth—

that God was with him.

On the floor.

In the car park.

In the ICU.

It’s been ten years,

maybe eleven,

And sometimes,

when I light a candle

or hear Rod Stewart

in a corner shop,

I remember.

And I ache.

And I wait.

We’ve seen others

break free

this side of the veil.

But not Ed.

Not this time.

Still—

he is the Healer of all hurts.

There is not a hurt

he will not heal.

Not a tear

he will not catch.

And so we wait.

For the reconciliation

of all things.

For Ed to rise—

whole,

singing,

shining.

Because grace—

bloody,

reckless,

relentless grace—

grace that didn’t quit on Ed,

even when he quit on himself—

may

yet

win.

- Rev’d Jon Swales