Hark

If you've been one of the people lucky enough to have an extended conversation with this little guy over the last year you probably came away smiling and impressed with his extensive vocabulary and verbal ability. Two weeks ago, Isaac, now 2 1/2, and I were looking and talking our way through some old Christmas cards as we cut the pictures off for use in a craft project.

When we came to one featuring an angel he asked me the angel's name. As I often do, I turned his question back on him, "well, I don't know, Isaac, what do you think the angel's name is?"

"Hark", he immediately replied.

Makes sense to me.

Isaac is now more than a year older than this picture, but I thought you might enjoy it as much as I do.

Dangerous Prayers

I'm a wimp. I don't like pain and hardship and I've never gotten a charge out of courting danger or loss - for myself or my family. I like being safe and protected and I routinely make choices to preserve my comfortable life. But there have been times I've prayed prayers that court loss and pain. Why? Because knowing and following Truth/Love has seemed like a higher value to me than safety and comfort, worth almost anything I might have to lose to get it -at least while I'm in a cocoon of safety and comfort.



I've been thinking a lot about a deeply passionate prayer that I shouted, cried, and wrote out several years ago after weeks of trying to discern my deepest desire. I asked that my family might know God in his fullness. I have known from experience and intuition that days and seasons would come when I would regret praying that prayer. But still I did it. All that has happened in my family's life, and my heart and mind since that prayer has got me remembering these two other prayers, originally crafted by others, which I borrowed over the years, saying them so often that they became my own. Here they are:


This first was written by Amy Carmichael, an Irish Christian missionary who lived 53 years in South India, founding an orphanage that cared for children rescued from a religiously sanctioned sex trade. I quote here from "A Chance to Die: The Life and Legacy of Amy Carmichael" by Elizabeth Elliot, c. 1987 Fleming H. Revell

From prayer that asks that I may be

Sheltered from winds that beat on Thee,

From fearing when I should aspire,

From faltering when I should climb higher,

From silken self, O Captain, free

Thy soldier who would follow Thee.

From subtle love of softening things,

From easy choices, weakenings,

(Not thus are spirits fortified,

Not this way went the Crucified,)

From all that dims Thy Calvary,

O Lamb of God, deliver me.

Give me the love that leads the way,

the faith that nothing can dismay

The hope no disappointments tire

the passion that will burn like fire,

Let me not sink to be a clod;

Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God.

The next comes from Beth Moore, a popular present day Bible teacher. From "Things Pondered" by Beth Moore, c. 1997 Broadman & Holman

Extremities

Satisfy me not with the lesser of you

Find me no solace in shadows of the True

No ordinary measure of extraordinary means

The depth, the length, and breadth of You

and nothing in between.

Etch these words upon my heart knowing all the while

No ordinary roadblocks plague extraordinary miles

Your power as my portion, Your glory as my fare

Take me to extremities, But meet me fully there.

I've prayed both of these prayers, trembling in my boots, and have internally shouted, "I take it back!" plenty of times. I'm aware of some prayers that others have crafted, that I have refused to utter, fearing either submission to a theology that might throw open the door to unhampered evil, or circumstances of suffering that I hope to avoid. Like I said, I'm a wimp.

The Gift of Welcome

Sometimes he dashes to the driveway naked with arms stretched high, hands signing applause or waving hello while he shouts a greeting, sometimes he races to the front and stands silently watching until the mammoth truck passes out of sight, but always, when he hears the garbage truck coming down the street , Isaac runs outside to watch, admire, and greet the sanitation team that picks up trash. I realized several weeks agot that these men now call him by name with huge hello's, honk the horn for him and wave - more than once - from the cab as well as the back. It is pretty obvious they love being greeted by Isaac, and I realize that even though he is only two years old, Isaac exercises great power when he gives them the wonderful gift of welcome.

For fifteen years now our little terrier, Thompson has been greeting me with great enthusiasm each time I return home - whether I've been gone for 5 days or 5 minutes. Sometimes, when he kept barking for more! more! more! loving, I would think "enough already!" but on a few days I would think, " you're the only one in my life who is always glad to see me."

I am lucky to have had parents who habitually kissed each other good-bye when one left the house without the other and greeted each other in like manner when they returned home. That simple act bestowed a sense of normalcy and stability upon us children that I'm sure we took for granted then, and give thanks for now as married adults. My husband and I decided early in our marriage that we needed to continue that tradition whether we were happy or disgusted with each other, and though our good-bye hugs and welcome kisses have been perfunctory or angry at times, we find that neither of us has out-grown our need of them.

I remember determining as a young mother to help my husband, David, feel loved and appreciated when he came home at night by stopping whatever chore I was doing, calling a hearty "Daddy's home!" to our two boys, and helping them stop their play for a moment to welcome Dad home. David often made his entrance back home extra special by a signature whistle pattern that he reserved for ONLY our sons. He would pull up quietly, get out of his truck, sneak behind something to hide and begin to whistle his "call". The delight in their eyes when they realized Daddy was nearby and ready to play was priceless.

Smiling a welcome seems to come naturally to our two grandsons, largely, I think, because our daughter-in-love, who has been able to be a stay-at-home-mom, has routinely offered them huge smiles of affirmation from their births on, whenever they wake from a nap, finish an activity together, or catch her eye in passing. It's a joy to see even the 4 month old initiate a smile when he catches a family member's eye and take such delight when the smile is returned.

Smiling at others did not come naturally to me - perhaps a common trait of serious intuitives - so I have had to learn it as a married adult under my husband's kind tutelage. I have watched him interact with strangers for years, witnessing the power of his welcoming smile upon others.

Strange, isn't it, that something that costs us so little, can give others so much?

One Face in a Million

Of the many faces I saw during my week of walking the streets of Calcutta, India 2 1/2 years ago, one pierced deeper and has stayed longer than any other. That week, Kyle and Michelle, our son and new daughter-in-law, were on a mission to expose both sets of their parents to the everyday suffering of the poor of Calcutta, among whom they had been living and serving for several years. So although we parents stayed in a good hotel and ate in upscale restaurants suitable for pampered Americans, we spent several days following them as they threaded through the crowds in the always busy streets, and became acquainted with the people and places that had populated their e-mails and conversations with us over the past few years.

Before our trip to Calcutta, I had worked diligently for a number years to see and treat each person I met as an individual of great worth and promise - created in the image of God and worthy of being treated with dignity and respect. But here, the streets seemed filled with so many people who had no place to sleep other than the street, no posessions to carry with them and no food to eat. Each time we stepped out of our hotel we would be immediately approached and followed by people with outstretched palms and murmuring voices asking for rupees. There were so many that they quickly lost their individuality and their name became Beggar. It took no more than two days walking the streets of this city to feel that I, too, had lost my individuality. My name had become Rich Foreigner and my face had been replaced by a dollar sign.

By the time we got to the ferry next to the Howrah bridge on our walking tour that day, we had walked through so many clusters of men, women, and children calling to us, touching us, and asking, asking, asking for money, that the ones who stood out to me were the silent ones. Some risked being trampled as they sat in the dust with upturned palm among a surging crowd in the market and some huddled along the walkways in the subway stations, inches from a puddle of urine, brown heaps of gaunt, folded limbs with deep set eyes so worn down by disease or hunger that they no longer asked, no longer hoped.


At the ferry, a young man with a small child in his arms approached our tightly clustered group of 6 with beseeching eyes. He said nothing, but persistently sought our eyes with his. His hair was thick and stiff with layers of dust, his dirty clothes had hunks of material torn away, and he gently held the child with splotchy hair close to his chest. Were they father and son? Brothers? Co-workers?


What to do? I had already determined to follow the personal alms-giving policy our son and daughter-in-law had come to after years of anguished living and experimental giving with a tightly knit community of young Americans who lived and volunteered among "the poorest of the poor". They had tried to develop relationships and work on projects that would foster positive, lasting differences in people's lives. In this city where people asked them for money all day long , they had decided to make alms-giving the exception rather than the rule and to do it within the context of a continuing relationship. I rationalized that my time was not long enough nor my heart strong enough to think my way through all the poverty factors and come to a better conclusion, so I borrowed theirs. I averted my eyes from the dry and dusty face of the young man and pulled in my section of the American huddle even tighter.


Without making a sound, the dusty young man in torn and dirty clothes held the pantless, silent child close with one arm, and with upturned palm moved in closer to engage our eyes. His eyes asked of each of us the question he did not speak. Like the other parents, I turned my eyes away from him and toward those of my son. He was the tallest in our group, and had lived here by far the longest. I watched his face to see what he would do as the man stood silently in front of him, asking with his eyes.


Everything else faded away and time slowed down as I focused on the face of my firstborn child, the one in whom I had invested so very much of my life over the years..


Our son's intense struggle was played out in his pain-filled eyes and in small muscles that twitched around his mouth. Over the past several years Kyle had seen and fed thousands of hungry people in dirty clothes without shoes, had spent his days searching the streets and train stations and streets for the weakest and dying to carry each one back to the Missionaries of Charity's Home for the Dying, had held kerosene lamps while cleaning maggoty wounds, and had raged over destitute people ignored in hospital hallways and dead people abandoned on streets and train tracks.


In those slow motion moments the volume of poverty and suffering Kyle had witnessed in this city over the years, coupled with continuing frustration and disappointment over the lack of any lasting difference coming from his efforts, flashed across his face like a war newsreel with mangled bodies, wailing women and dazed children.

A merciful heart is a vulnerable thing and and in the face of continuous onslaughts of pain and suffering, most of us choose to protect our hearts by covering them with anger or contempt or obsessive consumption of food, drink, work, activity, or possessions. Kyle is no different. Though he tried to cover his heart with anger as he gave the mute man enough money for a meal for both him and the child, it was too late - the mercy in him had broken his heart once again and shattered like glass across his face.


That face - the anguished, shattered-heart face of my first born son - is the face from Calcutta I cannot forget, the one that continues to pierce my heart years later.

Photo of the Howrah Bridge, Kolkata, India, by Courtney Cox, copyright 2004; used by permission

Thanksgiving

Two years ago, in the midst of an extended inner dialogue questioning the existence of God, I was left in charge of our 4 month old grandson for a little while. I sat on our porch, surrounded by fuschia bouganveilla and fragrant jasmine and cradled him in my arms. I studied his face, and zeroed in on feeling the exact points on my skin where his tiny fingers touched.


I rocked and sang him to sleep and thought about mothers in other places of the world: mothers whose cradle is a sidewalk in Calcutta which floods with garbage and human waste during the rainy season, mothers dying of AIDS in a dusty African village wondering who will care for their children when they are gone, mothers with breasts as dried up as the parched land around them, cradling their baby for a few more hours before death steals their hope once again.

Pictures of children filled my mind: children who will grow to adulthood without their parents, children who have witnessed the rape, mutilation and murder of their family members, children who have themselves been forced to do the same horrible things to others, children whose life teachers have fostered only hatred and destruction.

My life had been built on the foundation of an all-powerful God who is love, and principles of reaping the consequences of what is chosen. But now, in the face of the suffering of these other mothers, answers I would have once given about the inequities of life and the long term generational impact of individual choices felt arrogant and empty. Why would, how could all-powerful LOVE choose not to stop multitudes of children living and dying in extreme poverty and war day after day, generation after generation?

Does hope really remain when all else is gone? Where is the choice in these life circumstances? How could anyone say that these mothers and children have the same chance to believe that God is good, that they have a choice to follow or spurn Love as I have had? As this baby in my arms will probably have? He will likely never know the pain of starvation or the horror of being a child soldier.

Along with the baby in my arms had come a weighty awareness I never had as a young mother of the immense, privilege that belongs to a child born in America. What undeserved joy to hold a contented, healthy baby in your arms, to gaze at his face and know that you are welcoming him into a life where his chances of survival to adulthood and of a full and rich life are high.

The invisible butterfly touch of Isaac's hand on my arm broke through all the witnessed suffering and I simply HAD to give thanks for the wonder of the conception and birth of this child. The joy was incomplete without thanksgiving.

If the existentialist conclusions my wounded heart had been whispering were right and there is no supernatural Other who grants that privilege and joy of bringing children into the world, then who do you thank for the new baby in your arms?

All the alternative answers I formulated seemed to suck all the joy and purpose out of giving thanks, and giving thanks seemed to to me to be intrinsically necessary to a well-lived life. A world with no Supernatural Lover is a flat, two dimensional world - a world without enough space to host the exhilarating joy of new life.

Sad Day for Bomma

Before I became a grandmother, I heard from enough friends and family about the authentic joys of grandparenting to look forward to it as a pleasant experience. And when one friend asked me what I would want my grandchildren to call me, I thought, " a simple, unembellished 'Grandma' will do - no silly 'mimi' or 'mawmaw' for me.

But for quite a few months now, I have been "Bomma" to the blonde tyke on my lap, and never has there been a more glorious name to my ears. Nothing matches the joy of getting out of my car in his driveway as he dashes out of the porch to greet me, wearing nothing but a HUGE smile, shouting, "BOMMA! You are here!"

Yesterday my daughter-in-love asked me if I noticed that he had started to correct his pronounciation of grandma. Yes, I had, in fact. The day before Isaac had called me "Brama" once when asking me for something. And though I am thrilled that his brain/ear/mouth connection is healthy and his speech/language development keeps racing along, it was still a sad day for Bomma.

Probably "Bompa, play your bombone!" has fallen by the wayside, as well. A sad day, indeed.

Breaking Silence

I simply could not stop looking and listening. While others sat in the warm cabin of the day cruise ship, I stood on the deck for hours, snapping photos, embracing the cold wind that stung my cheeks and laughing aloud at times at the vast Alaskan display before me. The deck filled with watchers as we inched closer to our legislated 1/4 mile distance from the glacier, and talk stilled as the engines went silent. In the cold we stood and listened to the sound of an eons old glacier breaking silence.

I remember waking, years ago, to the sound of my own voice mumbling unintelligible syllables. In that dream I was being pressed upon by a supernatural presence so powerful that I knew my breath and soul was about to be extinguished if I did not succeed in speaking aloud the magic Name that would deliver me. I I tried with extreme effort several times to utter the name, yet no sound came out of my mouth. I marshalled every last ounce of strength in my body to try one more time, and that is when I woke up.

The slowly melting glacier and the dream scenario are the closest images I can think of to describe the struggle I have had these past two plus years to name my thoughts, to capture and describe the questions I have lived with and the trails of reasoning and remembering I have followed. The inner struggle has been so intense that I have found myself unable to speak, unable to articulate or even name to others the inner paths I walked along. I have been mute.

For all my adult life, words, sentences, and paragraphs have been my home territory and frequent journal entries a necessity for my mental and emotional health. Writing and prayer enabled me to sort through gnarly relationship challenges and to see myself and others with different eyes. I was sure of what truth was, and the focus of my life was listening to, with, and on behalf of others, helping them to approach God with words and find truth and hope in the process.

But these past two years I have wondered often if I will ever again feel a comfortable certainty about what is true, what isn't, and how to live in truth. These past two years I have been a woman who has carried on an extensive and at times excruciating inner conversation, struggling, with all my might to find and speak the words that might reveal and frame the truth and meaning .

Several years ago I wanted to post regularly to a blog that others would read because I felt my words might be able to influence and help others to seek and live truth. At this point, I see my posts to this blog more as a promise I need to keep, a means of personal discipline and accountability, and a way of breaking silence.