Silent World

Two days after I posted “When I was Four,” my world crumbled. Our daughter called with news that her new baby, Greta, born four weeks earlier is profoundly deaf. How ironic that, but hours before, I spoke so glibly about an easy, untroubled life.

Can I still say, as I did in that blog, “Grand or sad, small or large, rich or poor, strong or weak, Your fingers never drop a stich an never make an error in all the grand design till all comes ‘round to right and light swallows up darkness and we, all of us, see how You have woven us into Your story and are glad?“ Is He still in charge? Is He still weaving a tapestry into which all the bright and dark colors of the threads of my life, of Greta’s life, will be woven into something beautiful? Can I still say that He is only good? Can I look into my daughter’s eyes and honestly say, “This too is a gift from the hand of the loving Father?” Can I say, “This is a gift to you, Greta, a gift which is the key to the extraordinary woman that you will one day be?”

He reminds me, “Am I not He who created…Do I not make deaf and mute and blind?” (Ex 4:11). Do I then rail against Him, saying, “Why did you make her so?”

Though I, in my selfishness, would deny her this painful gift, this thorny crown, I turn to Him who has already borne her deafness within Himself, who carried it to the cross, who lived it, who died it and who resurrects it to a new life, to a new meaning, to a new glory in her. He who transforms death into life, who heals the lame, the blind and the deaf will someday make it all clear. She and we and I will know this for what it truly is: a loving gift of our loving Father. May it be soon.

3/5/12

Extra Bed

Note: The following few lines were sent to me by a friend whom I highly respect. She has been my inspiration for giving for a number of years. In those years, she has traveled to Central America, Africa and Malaysia helping those who have vision problems and those effected by the tsunami. I reflect on her thoughts because the reason I don’t do many charitable things is the very thing she expresses here. Words to ponder; words to confront.

****


…And the question I wake up with during storming nights is: How did I get so lucky that I have a warm, safe, comfortable, secure place to sleep. And then I just say God, God, God, God until I fall back asleep. And I wake thinking that I have an extra bed. I could offer it to someone without a place to sleep and then I realize that I am selfish and scared.


3/9/12

Evangelism 101

Lord, what you are to us and in us be to others through us.

03/06/12