11.08.08
Life …
First I wanted to start out by saying thank you so much for all of the emails and prayers about Samantha’s surgery. We are incredibly blessed with such caring people in our life! I’m sorry I haven’t been able to find time to sit down and write my blog sooner. Samantha’s surgery went well. She is bouncing around like a normal 6 year old. The doctor should be testing her hearing soon to determine how effective the surgery was for her. But I will tell you we have seen a significant improvement in her hearing and in her!
The thing that touched our hearts the most is what we have seen in our little girl. Over the last week she has been the happiest we have ever seen her. She is constantly smiling, singing – just so joyful! It’s amazing and as if a whole new world has opened up for her. As I stand watching her almost float around the house without a single worry in the world, I couldn’t help but smile and bask in the happy, joyfulness of our little angel. I found my heart overflowing in her delight because I love her so much. As I was enjoying that special moment I felt as if God gently whispered to me, “that is how I feel when my children are filled with joyfulness”. And I sat there thinking about what a loving God we have and how much He does want us to experience joy in all. I felt as if at that very moment God was standing there with me smiling at this precious little angel filling the room with peace and love. What a tremendous gift to me on such a stressful day that seemed to suck the life right out of me!
It’s amazing how our attitudes affect the world isn’t it? How many times do we have something going on in our lives that let’s just say causes us to fall short of filling a room with peace and love? Life in this world can be so demanding, so exhausting, and so stressful! It can dangerously cause our hearts to be calloused (emotionally hardened).
Matthew 13:15 “For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them”.
When our hearts harden, we are no longer open to what God is trying to do in our lives or others. Suddenly we can hardly hear God’s voice although He is speaking to us loud and clear (just like I described in my last blog when Samantha’s ears were filled with fluid). When life robs us of that peace and joy, how effective are we when God sends someone into our path?
What do I mean by that? Well, there are no coincidences with God – things don’t “just” happen. It’s not a matter of luck or being in the right place at the right time. If someone crosses our path we need to be open to what God may be doing – whose life He may be trying to touch. A concept I failed to understand for so long is that each of us has a role, a very specific purpose here. Long before we even realize that purpose, we have unknowingly touched many lives that have crossed our paths. I was in a particular season in my life many years ago where I didn’t grasp this concept. I didn’t think I made a difference in a single life but God taught me otherwise. We have touched another life with something as simple as a smile or letting someone step ahead of us in line at the grocery store. That smile, that simple act of kindness God may have used to completely change the path that person was on that day – just like God did for me watching Samantha fill the room with peace and love. I know personally when I let life rob me of God’s peace and joy I certainly am in no mood to help anyone nor do I want to be helped – this is the true danger of a hardened heart!
But God understands this – that is why He has given us a way to peace, joy and eternal life. When we seek worldly things to fill us with peace and joy we may experience joy for a moment or two but it is short-lived. We are left feeling empty again, feeling lost. But thru those failures, thru that emptiness we find that those adversities cause us to seek something bigger … to discover the true meaning of life! To discover Him! Once we welcome Him into our hearts and begin our walk with Him – nothing, not even the grave can rob us of that joy because He is now with us (Psalm 16:9-11) He begins to change us and as we mature in our spiritual walk it is amazing the things we can see, hear and how He changes our hearts. We truly can find joy in ALL. We can be kind and loving, effective and productive (2 Peter 1:1-11) even in our weakness. As Paul describes in 2 Corinthians 12:10 in our weakness, we find strength.
We never know who may be coming into our paths … whose life God may be trying to reach thru us. Often thru those interactions God brings us a very special gift like the story of the old Fisherman (I share below – thank you Faye :).
May God bless each of you and fill your life with peace, joy and a true understanding of life … the life He wants for each of us and that is eternal life with Him thru His son Jesus Christ (John 3:16). God bless!
Love,
Sandi :)
THE OLD FISHERMAN
Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to out-patients at the Clinic.
One summer evening as I was preparing supper, there was a knock at the door I opened it to see a truly awful looking man. ‘Why, he’s hardly taller than my eight-year-old,’ I thought as I stared at the stooped, shriveled body.
But the appalling thing was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, ‘Good evening. I’ve come to see if you’ve a room for just one night. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no bus ’till morning.’
He told me he’d been hunting for a room since noon but with no success; no one seemed to have a room. ‘I guess it’s my face. I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more treatments…’
For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me: ‘I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning.’ I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch. I went inside and finished getting supper. When we were ready, I asked the old man if he would join us. ‘No thank you. I have plenty’ And he held up a brown paper bag.
When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk with him a few minutes. It didn’t take a long time to see that this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body. He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her five children and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from a back injury.
He didn’t tell it by way of complaint; in fact, every other sentence was prefaced with thanks to God for a blessing. He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him the strength to keep going.
At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children’s room for him. When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded, and the little man was out on the porch. He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus, haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said, ‘Could I please come back and stay the next time I have a treatment? I won’t put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a chair.’ He paused a moment and then added, ‘Your children made me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children don’t seem to mind.’ I told him he was welcome to come again.
And on his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the largest oysters I had ever seen. He said he had shucked them that morning before he left so that they’d be nice and fresh. I knew his bus left at 4 a.m., and I wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.
In the years he came to stay overnight with us there was never a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables from his garden. Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special delivery; fish and oysters packed in a box of fresh young spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed. Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these and knowing how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.
When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first morning. ‘Did you keep that awful looking man last night? I turned him away! You can lose roomers by putting up such people!’
Maybe we did lose roomers once or twice But oh! If only they could have known him, perhaps their illness would have been easier to bear. I know our family always will be grateful to have known him; from him we learned what it was to accept the bad without complaint and the good with gratitude to God.
- Author Unknown
