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JESUS FOR SOLDIERS

by Mark Plimsoll

Once upon a time they found, in New Jersey while digging a freeway, the lost Latter Day Saint tablets numbers thirteen through seventeen. These golden slabs detail most of the missing facts of Jesus' life and offer us a view of his own ruminations in his later years, certainly many years after his death, because they share the characteristics of modern books for older citizens; oversized with large, easy-to-read glyphs.
John, whom Jesus liked to refer to as "Toe-head" for his unusual coloration in one of Macedonian extraction (without black hair and eyes), asked the long-locked Master: "Geez, how we gonna get the Word out?"
"Let those who have ears, hear; those who have eyes, see; knock, and it shall be opened; if not, break 'em down and annihilate 'em."
Luke stopped scraping under his toenails with a twig and said "We're not bloody fools, you know. They've been lookin' for us everywhere an' I don't fancy much that symbol of the fish. It fools no one, you know. Practically brands us as male chauvinists. Can't we have a female disciple or two, you know, break the monotony of intoning male monotones ? Then maybe they won't be so quick to throw stones at us. Some girls, yeah!"
"T'will be too busy washing our feet. Here, Mark. Hit me in mine stomach. Thou shouldst hit me here, hard, don't hold back."
Pow! He hits Jesus in the Stellar Plexus. Christ just grins, puts both out hands, palms up, wiggling his fingers and says "Come on, pansy. Throw your robe outta the way and give it to me!"
Mark whips off the robe and stands there with a bit of soiled cloth woven through his groin, starts spinning around until the others, confused but entertained, start laughing. He jumps into the air near Jesus, out flies one leg and WHAM! nails the unsuspecting Godson full in the forehead, dust flying from his rope sandal.
J. C. stumbles back a few feet, draws his hand across his face and twitch-shakes it like a World Federation wrestler. "My hair musta got in me eyes. Thou couldn't do it again in another millennium!" and he throws his robe to the ground.
A gasp in unison rises from the others as they see His Holiness in all His Nakedness, rippling with muscles, the afternoon sun highlighting with golden rays the fine definition and utter hairlessness of his olive-oiled skin. "Yeah, YEAH!" he yells, strutting proudly, goose-stepping through his followers. "You too could look like this if ya gave up them unleavened cookies and all that wine. Look at me; and I owe it to Mary's Powdered Cow Hooves and Sister Ophelia's deep-fried pork skins. PROTEIN! That's what's lacking around here. I eat about five pounds a day now."
"Oh yeah, Geez. That explains the new odors around the loo lately."
"And the sounds of erupting gasses in the night. I thought the world was comin' to an end, the earth opening up in fissures to swallow us all! How can you eat that stuff? Christ!"
Jesus stopped admiring his own bicep for a moment and looked toward heaven. "Biladao suomen j'da patchouli. Thank you Lord! Disciples, I have just received a message from God. He wants us to pledge our allegiance tonight with this new prayer. As a matter of fact, in about two thousand years a man named David .."
In unison they cried "DAVID! Just like he who slays Giants!"
"Yes, just like that Jew 'David', how well you have learned, my Children. But this David will have a second name, Bowie, named for a man killed while defending the right to own slaves, the knife immortalized. He named himself after a knife, or after a knife named for the pioneer slaver, something like that. Anyway, this modern Bowie will write this, the most powerful prayer of all, the prayer that almost says Jesus expects you to get rich, into a song. It will go something like this; "

"I believe in the power of Love.
"I believe in the State of God
"I will fight for the glory of Man,
"I will kill for the good of the fight for the right to be right."

Jesus H. Christ stood admiring his admiring, agape legions. "And remember, if they don't like the beat, if they can't fall in, if they march to a different drummer, well you know what to do ..."
"WASTE 'EM!!" they yelled and patted each other on the back like happy Gorillas, "Who, WHoo, WHoo, WHOoo, WHOOoo, WHOOO, WHOOO..."
But here it ends, the following golden text obliterated by the teeth of the steamshovel as it tore down the art gallery.