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The young pastor had just finished practicing his sermon for the next morning when a man jumped from behind a tombstone and put a gun to his head.
The Rev. Chad E. Lawrence was listening to a recording of his sermon so his diction would be perfect when worshipers arrived June 26 to hear the Word, as they have done for 300 years at the Parish Church of St. Helena in Beaufort.
Its white steeple soars through bowing oak limbs, like a ladder to heaven from historic graves that cling to the church house doors.
It was about 9:30 p.m., and Lawrence was walking from the sanctuary to his office in the Parish Hall across the street. He thinks he may have seen something out of the corner of his eye, dismissing it as one of the cats that paw through the cemetery from time to time.
Then it happened.
The words, "Don't move or I'll kill you," pierced the warm stillness. "Give me your car keys and your wallet."
The pastor quickly saw "a good-sized handgun." Then, he felt it against his body.
The suspect, described as a black man wearing black, had been lurking behind a knee-high brick wall surrounding the burial plot of a prominent Beaufort family.
"Quit talking on that thing," the man demanded. "Turn it off."
He thought the pastor was talking on a cellphone, but Lawrence explained that it was a voice recorder. He purposely stressed that it was a tape of the sermon he would be preaching in the morning right there in the house of the Lord.
The gunman was more interested in the car keys, which were on the pastor's desk, and the wallet, which was in the car.
"He walked me across the street, the gun to my head or back the entire time."
At one point, Lawrence tried to say something but was told, "Shut up! Don't talk!"
THREE REASONS TO LIVE
They got to the office where Lawrence carries out his duties as an associate rector. It's his first job out of seminary.
He gave the robber the car keys. By this time, he also had his cellphone and voice recorder.
"He told me to get on the floor and lie face down," Lawrence said. "He took off my belt and tied my hands with it with one hand while holding the gun in the other."
The stranger stood over the pastor and barked:
"Give me three reasons why I shouldn't kill you right now."
Lawrence said, "I have a wife and three kids whom I love very much. I'm here to do the Lord's work. And if you do kill me, you're going to have to answer to him."
There was a pause.
"Are you sure about that?" the gunman asked in reference to the third reason.
"Yes, I'm sure," the pastor responded.
He swore at the clergyman and said something about wanting to kill him. He took an extension cord and bound the pastor's legs, sort of hog-tying him.
"I heard him click that gun a little bit," Lawrence said.
Then he felt the gun against his head.
"I'll be back," the man said, and left the Parish Hall the way he had come in, leaving blocks in doors to keep them from locking behind him.
The pastor waited 20 seconds, quickly freed himself, locked his office door and called 911.
Beaufort police officers were there quickly. The suspect was sitting in the car when the first officer arrived. He fled through the graveyard and was still being sought a week later.
'THE WAY TO PEACE'
Lawrence, 37, felt the call to the ministry later than many do. He's been in Beaufort two years and says he still loves it.
He looks at his office picture of his 12-year-old, his twins who are 8, and his wife who he said is shaken but of strong faith.
"If it was my time to go, I was ready to see Him," he told me. "By no means am I ready to leave my wife and children, but I am prepared."
Lawrence said the incident scared him, but at the same time he felt a peace he cannot explain.
The topic of the sermon he'd rehearsed so well was "The Way to Peace." He went through with it, without ever mentioning his ordeal the night before. He read from Jeremiah 28:5-9, quoting: "As for the prophet who prophesies of peace, when the word of the prophet comes to pass, the prophet will be known as one whom the Lord has truly sent."
"The sermon was about peace," Lawrence said. "It was about the peace the one true God gives through repentance -- first turning back to him and seeking forgiveness through his son, Jesus Christ -- and how it then spreads through our lives and works regardless of what we face."
To study in seminary about the fall of man is one thing, but to feel it in the cold steel of a gun barrel is another.
Lawrence is left worrying that societal norms are crumbling when gunmen target a clergyman, or the 78-year-old grocer who was attacked and robbed in his nearby corner store last October.
Everyone is seeking peace, Lawrence said, but there is only one way to find it.
It is his prayer that his assailant will hear his sermon on real peace.
He took the recording with him when he escaped through the churchyard graves.
Follow David Lauderdale at twitter.com/ThatsLauderdale.
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