The Scriptures teach that the effects of sin can be passed from one generation to the next. "I will visit the sins of the fathers upon the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me." These sins are handed down as a legacy from father to son to grandson, and to successive generations. I reflect on the violence that has altered the course of my life; how my heart became like stone toward those responsible for my wife's death. I even became hard toward You, O Lord. I am convinced that my present situation is bound to my family's past by an invisible cord, a legacy that I cannot yet understand.
     The Scriptures also teach that blessing can be passed from one generation to the next: Abraham blessed Isaac who blessed Jacob who blessed Joseph. Abraham was "blessed to be a blessing."
     Our family was bound by a two-fold cord: the curse of sin entwined with the blessing of grace. O Lord, may grace triumph over sin and blessing over curse! "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil!"
     I will use this companion journal to explore the relationship between blessing and cursing, and how it has affected our family's heritage. I do this for myself and for any MacDonald who shall follow.

     No story in my family history, however fascinating, can compare with the story of the two-fold cord, the marriage of my grandparents. The ill-fated entwining of these two souls entangled our family bloodline in the discordant strands of evil and grace.
     My grandfather, Will MacDonald, was raised in a Christian home in Culpeper, Virginia, but his own yielding to sin led him to become a savage in the Kentucky wilderness. Because of his rebellion, the strand of evil entered our family line.
     The abundant grace that entered the MacDonald line came through my grandmother, a young Shawnee princess. Raised as a savage in the Ohio wilderness, she abandoned the gods of her fathers, knelt before the cross, and became a Christian.
     Nikki, short for Nikitchecame, My Peaceful Lake, was the daughter of Pucksinwah, the Shawnee Kispotha chief, and the half-sister of Tecumseh, the great Shawnee leader. Nikki was born into the kingdom of darkness in 1770 along the banks of Ohio's Little Miami River in Chillicothe, literally The Place, the center of Shawnee life and culture. Nikki was born again into the kingdom of light in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1791 through the preaching of Francis Asbury, the tireless Methodist circuit rider.
     In 1785, at the age of fourteen, she was presented as a "gift" to Will MacDonald, a wily frontiersman who had saved Tecumseh's life.
     In 1828, long after my Grandpa Will had died, my father, my brother John, and I came to live with Grandma Nikki in Springfield, Ohio. For eight years we helped with her farm. Although she was a full blood Shawnee, over forty years of living in a frontier community, adopting the ways of the white man, and demonstrating Christian love and charity opened many hearts to her. God graced her devoted life, and she had many fine white Christian friends.
     In the afternoons Grandma and I took walks along the edge of the forest, and in the evenings she told stories to all of us. Sometimes, I would lay on the warm stone hearth, watching embers pulse in the fireplace. Those were days I shall always cherish.
     Saturday mornings we sat on the porch and she shared from her heart. These were special times. Her silver hair shimmered like the moon and her eyes danced with the joy of Christ. She gently rocked in her "oaken, broken" rocker, with a quilt draped over her knees. Her thumb marked a place in her old worn Bible. She was a woman deeply devoted to God, one who had come to understand the blessing and the curse.
     During these sessions, I generally whittled at an old stick of sycamore or beech. Dad perched himself on an old log stool, puffing on his pipe, while John leaned against a corner post, his arms resting on his knees.
     One special morning we took our usual places. I was sixteen and John Ezra was eighteen. Grandma had something very important to tell us.
     "Boys, your father and I agree the time has come for you to hear the story of your Grandpa Will, his lie, the stolen knife, and how he fell into the darkness and brought a curse on the MacDonald line.
     "Your Grandpa Will's father, Joseph Hosea MacDonald, was a bitter man. He treated Will badly and Will hated him. In '74, Joseph's cousin, Colonel Angus McDonald, paid a visit to your Grandpa's house in Virginia. Angus was a legendary frontiersman and spun some tall tales of life in the wilderness. Will, only seventeen at the time, hung on every word. Came time for Angus to leave and Will decided to follow. Didn't tell his folks; just slipped away late one morning. Now Angus tried to talk him into going back but your Grandpa Will showed him his father's "Long Knife," that silver sword which had hung over the family's fireplace mantle. Will convinced Angus that his father had sent him, and told him that the Long Knife was a gift, a sign of his father's blessing.
     "It was a lie, boys, a boldfaced lie," she said, pumping her oaken rocker back and forth. "Well, your Grandpa Will never saw his folks again. Never saw Virginia again. Spent the next few years roaming the wilds of Kentucky, staking land claims. Never did honest work. Even after we were married, after he traded for this land, after he built this house and settled down for a short while, your Grandpa never did take to working the land like most. Half our meals came from the hills or the woods. In spite of his wandering ways, God still allowed your Grandpa to make a tidy fortune in land.
     "Well, boys, back in '77, there was a lot of new folk coming down the Ohio; seemed like every day they was coming. Most of them was heading for Kentucky. This place was the hunting ground for both the Shawnee and the Cherokee. But the white folk, they wanted to stay there, live there, build houses, plant fields, and graze cattle. At first your grandpa and his buddies helped the folks coming down the Ohio as best they could, helped start new towns, helped build forts.
     But after a while, the white folks got to fighting the Indians. They was all ranging through the woods--burning, scalping, looting, and taking prisoners. There was a lot of hate in those days, boys, on both sides.
     "Your Grandpa was no stranger to all this. In fact, he was a big part of it. In '78, the killings and the violence got so bad that folks called Kentucky the dark and bloody ground.
     "In '85, your Grandpa saved my half-brother's life. He shot a tomahawk out of the hand of a frontiersman who was about to lay it into Tecumseh's skull. Don't exactly know what drove him to do that, boys, only know that God had his plans. If Will hadn't saved his life, we never would have married, he never would have dragged me off to Lexington, I would have never met Francis Asbury or my Savior Jesus, your father Eli never would have been born and neither would you."
     She smiled and winked at us, a momentary respite from her otherwise grim tale.
     "1790 started off to be a right good year for us, boys. Why, that was the year your daddy was born, and that was the year I met my Savior. And I even got your Grandpa to go to some of brother Francis' meetings. Why, I thought for sure that Will was gonna give his heart to Jesus, too, just like I had done."
     "But then, only ten miles north of our cabin in Lexington, a tragedy plunged your Grandpa deep into a prison of hatred. One afternoon in late December while out on a hunt, your Grandpa happened on an Indian raid. Nine Shawnees fell on a small cabin, pulled the family out into the open and began to torture them. Tied up the whole family first, and then laid a tomahawk right into the father's skull. Next, they took two of the three children and scalped them right in front of their mother. Will listened to her screams, but knew he was outnumbered, so he just hid at the base of a big oak tree, horrified. Your Grandpa knew the Shawnee, and what would happen next.
     "One of the warriors grabbed the woman, ripped her clothes off, then stuck his knife into her belly. The Shawnee took the last child captive and then burned the cabin and barn. Your grandpa waited in the woods several hours, to be sure that the Indians were gone. Then he walked down to the site of the raid and spent the next day burying the victims. His heart grew to hate even more than ever before, and he vowed to avenge their deaths.
     "News about the brutal Shawnee attack was all over these parts. I tell you boys, as a full blood Shawnee, I was scared for my own safety. But brother Francis helped to calm down the townspeople and convinced them that I was not their enemy.
     "Several days after he seen that brutal murder, your Grandpa came to get his things and told me he was a leaving for good. Treated me real bad that night. Hit me in the face and knocked me down. Your daddy was just a baby at the time. I was scared for him, too.
     "Never saw your Grandpa Will again after that night."
     Nikki shifted in her rocker and started up again. John and I had not moved, our eyes glued to her dark, sad face. "After your Grandpa left, I guess I could have gone back to my people, but I had made so many good friends at church, and they loved me and took care of me and your daddy after your Grandpa left. I just realized that these people were my true family.
     "Six years later, in 1797, a group of us moved here, to Springfield. Then, twenty-two years after your Grandpa left, your grandpa's old buddy, Jasper, showed up on my porch. And he told me a tale about your Grandpa Will that I still have a hard time believing, boys. And if Jasper hadn't told me personally, I still wouldn't believe it.
     "Seems that two years after the brutal murders in Lexington, your grandpa was out hunting with Jasper and a couple of his other buddies. It was early February '93 and a blanket of snow was on the ground. They spotted a small band of Indians--a family, maybe seven or eight of them. Will and the others decided to hold a raid of their own that night. Well, they snuck up and murdered them in cold blood. Even took some scalps. And after all the blood, boys, as they was a getting ready to leave, your Grandpa seen a young Indian woman hiding in the woods. She had new life in her belly."
     Grandma's eyes narrowed and she focused in on me. My small knife was now on the ground next to the whittling stick. "Now, boys," she said, "this ain't too pleasant to hear, but you need to hear it, so listen up careful. All that hatred and anger that had been building up inside your Grandpa Will took hold of him, drove him to chase that young woman down and plunge his Long Knife into her belly. She screamed. He reached into her womb and pulled out the baby. Left them lying on the ground to die.
     "Jasper said that after this happened, something changed in your Grandpa. Said he seemed possessed by the Devil. And after a while, Jasper left your Grandpa to hisself. Said he couldn't stand to be with him no more.
     "Jasper told me that in those years after he killed the pregnant woman and her baby that nothing could stop your Grandpa from murdering Indians.
     "In fact, Jasper said your Grandpa was a butcher.
     "Jasper told me that he met up with your Grandpa again in 1813, up north at the Battle of the Thames on the same bloody field that my brother Tecumseh died on defending his people.
     "Your Grandpa was killed in that battle, too."
     Grandma sat quietly for a few moments. None of us knew what to say. Finally, she threw off her quilt and went back inside the cabin. A moment later she returned with a sword in one hand. "Sam, the Lord has shown me that I should give you this. You must stand against the evil that wrought this sword and redeem what your grandfather lost."
     Grandma looked straight at me. "The day that Jasper came by and told me the sad story about your Grandpa, he gave me back the Long Knife that you now have in your hand--the sword Will stole off of his father's mantle, the sword he used to brutally murder the pregnant Indian woman and her baby, the sword that butchered so many innocent people. Jasper said that as your Grandpa lay dying on the battlefield, he made Jasper swear that he would return the sword to the MacDonald family where it belonged. I was the only family Jasper knew of.
     "Just remember, boys, it all started with your Grandpa's little lie--the lie he told to Angus when he ran away with him. But that little lie was the first fruit of something dark within your Grandpa's heart--his wanting to live his life his own way, to be his own god."
     I remember exchanging glances with my brother John as I held the sword. We didn't know quite what to make of Grandma's words.
     "Now I know this sounds like something you'd hear on Sunday morning. I've rocked in this chair for thirty years, watching my people driven from their lands. I've read the Scriptures and thought about your Grandpa Will. He and the other frontiersmen came west to claim the land they thought was theirs. They believed their destiny was to possess this land from sea to sea. But their spirit of adventure turned to murder and violence.
     "Before long, tens of thousands were streaming westward on foot and horseback, in wagons, flat boats, and steamers to possess the wide green land that flowed with milk and honey." Grandma's face was filled with pain. "Chiksika, one of my half-brothers said `the white race is a monster who is always hungry, and what he eats is land.' Think on it and ask yourself if it ain't so."
     Not too long after Grandma told us this story, her life came to a quick and violent end. Always concerned about others, she was helping the underground railroad get runaway slaves into Canada. My father warned her of the potential dangers, but in her usual fashion, she insisted that this was what God wanted her to do.
     One evening, three bounty hunters came to her cabin looking for a runaway. Of course Grandma wasn't about to give them any information. One of the men pushed her down and her head hit the porch steps. They set fire to her cabin and rode off. John and I were with our father in a field just beyond the ridge and saw the smoke rising. By the time we arrived, Grandma was groggy. We were able get her to safety, but the cabin burned all the way to the ground. Father carried her to the barn where she told us what happened. She prayed that God would forgive the men for what they had done, and that the slaves would find freedom.
     To my surprise, Nikki told my father and brother to leave the barn. She pulled on my shirt and brought my face down close to hers in the cool semi-darkness. Her round black eyes stared into mine.
     "Remember the Long Knife, Sam. And remember what I'm going to tell you. For fifty-one years I've lived the life of a white woman. Been a good life, and I've come to know the white man's God, and His Son, Jesus. I believe He's the one true God."
     She coughed, then continued to speak. "I still remember my days as a maiden, playing with my brothers and sisters along the banks of the Miami-se-pe. How I long to go home to the wigewa of my mother, to run my fingers again through her hair as I did as a child.
     "I'd tell her about the Son of God, Sam, for I fear I won't see her in heaven. But I know this can't be."
     Grandma Nikki's eyes were moist with tears; she coughed again and tightened her grip on my shirt. I shall never forget that moment, staring into the face of a woman now so close to Christ and to heaven, yet suddenly and painfully so distant from her family and home. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes. I leaned closer and squeezed her hands in mine.
     "The day of our wedding, my brother Tecumseh grabbed your Grandpa Will by the shoulders and stared into his eyes. Then he spoke a word to him that you must now hear. `You have shed innocent blood. But because you saved my life and are my friend, I have prayed to my god, Moneto. I asked that he would tell me what to say to you. Moneto was silent for three days. Then, at dawn, I heard a voice more powerful and more clearly than I have ever heard before.
     "`Out of your loins will come two men with strong medicine. With their lips they will drink from a bitter spring. With their ears they will hear the cry of the blood. With their eyes they will see the dark root of evil in men's souls.'"
     Grandma spoke through her pain. "Wasn't old Moneto that spoke to my half-brother, boys, but the Lord, himself. He knew in advance about that Long Knife, that sword of sin, and how He'd work healing for the blood it would shed."
     Her hands loosened from my shirt, and she died on the barn floor. I wept.
     I think often of Grandpa and Grandma, the savage and the Christian, the two-fold cord. What would be the testimony of the gleaming, sin-stained blade of my grandfather's Long Knife? Is this not the Devil's fiendish, eternal scheme to scar God's creation with a bloodline fashioned from human life? Does not God require that which is past?
     Grandma Nikki died, hoping that the curse of sin and the chains of darkness that sought to entangle the MacDonald bloodline would one day be broken by the blessings of grace. Her legacy of faithfulness must never be forgotten, lest the Devil find a way to revisit his curse upon us.