Why does the sun go on shining? Why does the sea rush to shore? Don’t they know it’s the end of the world? ‘Cause you don’t love me anymore.
“The End of the World,” (Skeeter Davis) written by Arthur Kent and Sylvia Dee
So, the archangels Michael and Gabriel were standing on the 18th green at Great Waters looking at their scorecards.
“Not my best round,” Gabriel said. “My wings kept ruining my follow-through.”
“Moses made 18 straight aces here at Great Waters,” Michael said. “Of course, it had to be Moses and Great Waters.”
“Bosh!” Gabriel said.
“No, really. He told me he used a driver he made out of that staff he parted the Red Sea with,” Michael said.
“He didn’t part the Red Sea,” Gabriel said. “All he did was stand there and say, ‘Behold his mighty hand.’ God parted the Red Sea.”
At that moment, the notes of a harp let both angels know they were being summoned.
“Raphael has requested our presence at a staff meeting to be held on Cloud 9,” Michael said. “You go on ahead, and I’ll see you there after I take care of an errand.”
“What errand?” Gabriel asked.
“God answered a prayer not long ago and promised to give T. Michael Stone an idea for a column each week until the end of 2025, and I have to deliver said idea before I return to heaven,” Michael said.
“I think I know T. Michael. Don’t birds suddenly appear every time he is near?”
“Ravens and buzzards, maybe,” Michael said, somewhat sarcastically for an archangel.
“No, I’m serious. Didn’t we all get together on the day he was born and decide to create a dream come true? We sprinkled moon dust in his hair and golden starlight in his eyes of blue.”
“You’re thinking of Brad Pitt,” Michael said. “T. Michael has blue eyes, but I don’t think anyone would describe him as a “dream come true” unless you’re talking about the kind of dream you have after eating too much garlic.”
Moments later, both Michael and Gabriel arrived on Cloud 9 for the meeting.
“I have called all Seraphim and Cherubim to this meeting because we have a serious problem,” the archangel Raphael said. “Lucifer says Hell is nearly full. If something isn’t done to slow down the rise of wickedness, Armageddon may be the only answer. God’s creation needs a wakeup call.”
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty,” the angels chanted in unison.
“Does anyone have a suggestion?” Raphael asked.
“How about a flood?” Gabriel said. “That worked pretty well last time things got this bad.”
“Floods are so Old Testament,” Raphael said. “Besides, people would just blame the flood on climate change and keep misbehaving. We are also ruling out plagues and locusts for the time being.”
Many of the angels then began to grumble.
“How are we to set creation on the straight and narrow without Biblical catastrophes?” Gabriel said.
The grumbling grew louder, and one angel broke his harp over his knee; another poured spaghetti sauce on his head and started eating his own hair.
“Settle down, everyone,” Raphael said. “We don’t have time for bickering. Evil has already made such inroads that Bad Bunny is performing at the Super Bowl.”
“Then Satan has won,” an unidentified angel shouted.
“Oh, please,” Michael said. “Y’all didn’t care much for either Elvis or Little Richard at first, as I recall.”
Abruptly, Gabriel blew on his trumpet, and Moses burst into the room.
“Behold, the Lord of hosts,” Moses said, pointing to something that looked like a burning bush.
“You can tell Lucifer is lying when his lips are moving,” the spirit of God said. “Hell is yet to reach half capacity, though that may change when the baby boomers all die off.”
God paused and looked at Michael.
“Did you give our columnist his weekly idea?”
“I did,” Michael said. “He freaked out, didn’t he?”
“Completely,” Michael said. “He’s afraid he’ll botch the column and offend you. Not only that, he’s on a low-sodium diet and he’s deathly afraid you’ll turn him into a pillar of salt.”
“That’s always a possibility,” God said. “Sometimes I do like to … shake things up.”
The angels groaned.
Selah.