Payback Read online

  If you want to learn more and have a balanced perspective on all this stuff, you’ll probably want to research the broader category of spiritual gifts. Every Christian has at least one spiritual gift, and they are important to learn about. Here is a list of books and Web sites that will help:

  Hearing God’s Voice by Henry and Richard Blackaby

  What’s So Spiritual about Your Gifts? by Henry and Mel Blackaby

  Showing the Spirit by D. A. Carson

  The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today by Wayne Grudem

  Are Miraculous Gifts for Today? edited by Wayne Grudem

  Keep in Step with the Spirit by J. I. Packer

  www.expository.org/spiritualgifts.htm

  www.desiringgod.org. Click on Resource Library and choose Topic Index. Then under Church & Ministry, check out Spiritual Gifts under Church Life.

  (Note: If you’re doing a Google search on spiritual gifts or dreams and visions, please make sure you type in Christian as well. This will help you weed out a lot of deceitful stuff.)

  As you continue to research and learn about spiritual gifts, always remember: the bottom line is to focus on the Giver, not the gift. God gives to us so we can glorify Him.

  Signs and wonders are not the saving word of grace; they are God’s secondary testimony to the word of his grace. Signs and wonders do not save. They are not the power of God unto salvation. They do not transform the heart—any more than music or art or drama that accompany the gospel. Signs and wonders can be imitated by Satan (2 Thessalonians 2:9; Matthew 24:24), but the gospel is utterly contrary to his nature. What changes the heart and saves the soul is the self-authenticating glory of Christ seen in the message of the gospel (2 Corinthians 3:18-4:6).

  But even if signs and wonders can’t save the soul, they can, if God pleases, shatter the shell of disinterest; they can shatter the shell of cynicism; they can shatter the shell of false religion. Like every other good witness to the word of grace, they can help the fallen heart to fix its gaze on the gospel where the soul-saving, self-authenticating glory of the Lord shines. Therefore the early church longed for God to stretch forth his hand to heal, and that signs and wonders be done in the name of Jesus.

  — John Piper, Desiring God

  About the Author

  MELODY CARLSON is the award-winning author or more than one hundred books for adults, children, and teens. She is the mother of two grown sons and lives near the Cascade Mountains in central Oregon with her husband and a chocolate Lab retriever. She is a full-time writer and an avid gardener, biker, skier, and hiker.

  PAYBACK

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  Scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version.

  The characters and events in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual persons or events is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2008 by Carlson Management Co. Inc.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  MULTNOMAH is a trademark of Multnomah Books and is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The colophon is a trademark of Multnomah Books.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Carlson, Melody.

  Payback : a novel / Melody Carlson. —1st ed.

  p. cm.— (The secret life of Samantha McGregor; bk. 4)

  Summary: Samantha works to prevent a senseless tragedy after she has a vision of violence at a prom.

  eISBN: 978-0-307-56153-4

  [1. Visions—Fiction. 2. Christian life—Fiction. 3. Proms—Fiction.

  4. High schools—Fiction. 5. Schools—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.C216637Pay 2008

  [Fic]—dc22

  2007044162

  v3.0

  Table of Contents

  Other Books by this Author

  Title Page

  Author’s Note

  A Word from Samantha

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Reader’s Guide

  About the Author

  Copyright