Goin' Down to Mama's

Sunday Morning Serenity

The past few days have been cold and gray and rainy, but this morning I woke up to sunshine and a fine-feathered chorus singing in the trees outside. The word "restoration" popped into my head. Actually, it has been floating around up there a lot lately. The Old Testament has much to do with restoration, with the great Hebrew leaders and prophets trying to restore their people's faith and commitment and, more importantly, with God's willingness to restore His covenant with them, no matter how many times they stumbled, wandered, disappointed, and failed. Even though there would be only a tiny remnant of the faithful after Jerusalem's final fall, still, God promised restoration. In his book The Reason for God, Reverend Timothy Keller talks about the restoration of shalom—ultimate peace and harmony, the universe as God intended it, the universe before man chose sin and disrupted everything. He makes the point (which I'm probably explaining badly here) that salvation and grace through Christ aren't just about saving your soul and mine—they're about restoring that wonderful original order. It's interesting to think about—what would happen if all of humankind accepted God's gift of grace and committed to following Christ's example of love, peace, forgiveness, and justice. The nightly news would look radically different, I imagine. There wouldn't be very much bad news to report. We all need restoration—in many ways. We need to have our spirits restored when we're discouraged, our strength restored when we're weary, our joy restored after great sorrow. When I was a child, sitting on the piano bench with my beloved teacher, Mrs. Jenny Glenn, she used to always remind me, "Music is a gift from God, and it's meant to be shared." I would say the same thing about restoration—it's a gift from God that we can share with each other. Just in the past couple of weeks, friends and family have restored Dave and me in so many ways. Hoping we can pass their gift along to others who might be walking a rocky road . . .

"I live in a high and holy place,
but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit,
to revive the spirit of the lowly
and to revive the heart of the contrite.
I will not accuse forever,
nor will I always be angry,
for then the spirit of man would grow faint before me—
the breath of man that I have created.
I was enraged by his sinful greed;
I punished him, and hid my face in anger,
yet he kept on in his willful ways.
I have seen his ways, but I will heal him;
I will guide him and restore comfort to him,
creating praise on the lips of the mourners in Israel.
Peace, peace, to those far and near,"
says the Lord. "And I will heal them." 
Isaiah 58:15-19 

 

Hank's Book of Cat Philosophy: #21

You will encounter, as you journey through life,
those who would seek to impose their will on you, 
to mold your thoughts . . .
to control your behavior . . .
to dump a big ole' rain on your parade.
In such cases, I recommend 
a polite "no, thank you." 
Allow me to demonstrate:

Crossing Jordan with an Escort

My cousin sent me this picture, which I had never seen before. That's my mother on the left, Grandme in the center, and Aunt Vivian on the right. It was made during one of our visits to Aunt Vivian's farm in Talladega County, Alabama—which means it was probably taken on a Thursday, our official visiting day with her. I thought her house was Disneyland. It was brimming with things that I found fascinating—floors that sort of echoed when you walked on them; a big shelf full of National Geographics over a desk in the dining room; a swivel rocker I could spin around in really fast when the adults weren't looking; beautiful dishes; the girls' room, with all their grown-up teenagey stuff, like Wind Song cologne and sky-blue eye shadow. Seeing this picture of her with Grandme reminded me of that last year my grandmother was with us. She died in her room in my parents' house. And in the months leading up to her parting, with family keeping a constant vigil, she started getting visits from the Other Side. "I tell you what," Aunt Vivian once said, "when you're sitting up at three o'clock in the morning, and Mother starts talking to those people, you'll turn around and look over your shoulder!" She was kidding, of course. The truth is, we all found "the visitors" oddly comforting and thoroughly fascinating. The one I remember most was Uncle Adam, Grandme's brother, who died when I was a child. He always seemed to appear in the left rear corner of her room. Grandme would look at the exact same spot on the wall and calmly say, "Well, there's Adam." She always saw four birds flying out of his shirt pocket. I can't remember all four, but the last one she always described as "that little brown thrush."  Other visitors were anonymous. Grandme would look up at the ceiling, listen, and then answer . . . somebody. Watching her was like being in the room with somebody who's on the telephone—you couldn't hear what the other voice was saying, only Grandme's responses. I'm sure there are all kinds of medical/logical explanations for what we witnessed. Then again, Grandme was always partial to that old gospel song "I Won't Have to Cross Jordan Alone." I firmly believe she crossed over with an escort. 

A Little Good News

Remember Anne Murray of "Snowbird" fame? I always loved her voice because she made singing sound so effortless, and I had several of her records back in the 70s. One song that never got played on the radio included the line, "We sure could use a little good news today." It kept playing in my head from the minute I heard about little Ethan's ordeal in Midland City, Alabama. So many prayers went up for him—and so many prayers were answered. I was busy in the Story Shack during the rescue, and I'll never forget how excited my mother sounded when I called her about something unrelated late that afternoon. "Did you hear?" she said. "They've saved that little boy! Thank the Lord!" We sure needed that good news, didn't we? The next morning, on my way to the Shack, I detoured through the front yard and gathered some of Aunt Vivian's daffodils. It seemed entirely appropriate that her sunny little flowers would be in bloom while good news about a precious child was being broadcast. Nobody loved children more than Aunt Vivian. Her son-in-law just sent me some pictures of my cousin Kathy and me, taken on her farm when we were young teenagers. We never outgrew Aunt Vivian because she made it her business to show kids of any age a good time—from "ridin' hawsey" on her lap when we were little to swimming in her ice-cold spring when we got big enough to graduating to "the big table," where she allowed us to drink from her fancy tea goblets (which Aunt Joyce and Mama dared us to drop). This has been a week of ups and downs. Good news about a child, not so good news about a dear loved one who's dealing with sickness and aging and all that brings with it. It's funny how things change with the years. As a child, your happiness revolves around what's happening to you. But as you get older, so much of your happiness depends on what's happening to the people you love. That's why a little good news goes a long way. That's why we need daffodils:)

Sunday Morning Serenity

Do not be far from me, for trouble is near,
and there is no one to help." Psalm 22:11 
 

Do you ever speed-pray? Maybe you're having a busy morning and you're running late for work, when Mama calls to tell you about a friend or family member who's sick or going through a hard time, and you do a quick "God bless so-and-so and please, please, help them to get better" on your way out the door? I have absolutely done that. And when I compare those prayers to the fervent ones of Isaiah and Jeremiah (I have finally arrived at the prophets in my Old Testament reading), I have to wonder what God thinks of them. There's a difference between how I pray when I feel like everything's probably going to be okay and how I pray when I'm not at all sure about that. Once, I was on a night flight to New York during a horrible storm—the kind where the plane would abruptly drop so far and so fast that passengers audibly squealed and gasped. The pilot had already announced that we might have to divert to a different location, and we were in a holding pattern for what seemed like an eternity. I was seated next to an African American woman who had gone home to Alabama to attend a funeral and was on her way back to Queens. After the plane did its worst drop through the sky, she sensed my terror, grabbed my hand, and said, "Nothing you can do—just give it to Jesus." And the two of us prayed out loud on a crowded Delta jet. I can't remember exactly what she looked like, but I vividly remember how her hand felt clasping mine. I remember the comforting sound of her voice in prayer. I remember her faith and how she used it to restore mine. Finally, the pilot saw a window in the weather, did the air-born equivalent of putting the pedal to the metal, and broke through the clouds. After our endless flight in darkness, suddenly the glittering Manhattan skyline appeared beneath us, and the words "I'll see the lights of Glory and I'll know He lives" popped into my head—a line from the hymn "Because He Lives." What we two women said on that plane—actually, what many people likely said on that plane—was a fervent, sincere prayer. Nothing on-the-fly (no pun intended) about it. And that's what every prayer should be—fervent, sincere, committed. My prayer life is a work in progress. It needs to be so much better than it is. The people I pray for, and the God I pray to, deserve so much more than what I've been offering. This morning I prayed, sincerely, that the friends who lost their jobs last week will be guided to a new path; that a loved one's health will be restored; and that a precious five-year-old whom I've never met will be rescued and safely returned to his family in a small Alabama town.  
 

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18