“Look, Maddie,” I coaxed my 22-month-old granddaughter as I jiggled a Woody cowboy doll from Toy Story. She looked up from her pursuit of flinging toys from the doll play pen as I bounced the figure and sang, “I’m an old cowhand, from the Rio Grande…” She grinned slowly and began to jiggle herself, picking up the rhythm and rising on tiptoe with one foot. Suddenly she put something in my face, and I realized it was a microphone pulled loose from its stand, the connection dangling at the end. Must be part of a play set they had.
Their play room was beginning to look like the nursery in Sunnyside Daycare from the aforementioned movie. This red-haired angel didn’t talk much, but her actions said it all. She understood everything. Earlier, her juice box straw kept slipping, turning away at an awkward angle. But when I tried to help her, she resisted and maneuvered the box to a satisfactory position herself, sipping from the straw that bent horizontally across the box top.
I loved getting to spend time with my young granddaughters on this visit. And how fascinating to observe this marvelous creation! She was a wonder and a mystery, unique, yet predictable in her age appropriate behavior. It struck me that every person is like that: an individual like no other, specially designed by God for His purposes. I suddenly felt a new appreciation for others. No matter what the exterior of a person, they are infinitely interesting and complex.
My husband is blessed to be a “people person.” He seems never to know a stranger, drawing out the most casual acquaintance and finding common ground for conversation. Every excursion we took on this trip was slowed down by his stopping to talk (at length!) to someone, from the fund raisers outside Walmart to the hostess at the train snack bar. Despite my impatience, he always came back telling me the most interesting things he had found out. At a hotel we had stayed in, Howard took our computer to the front desk for help with the free wifi, staying an inordinately long time.
Turns out he had engaged the desk clerk in conversation, who revealed her discontented heart at leaving her home years before to come there with a boyfriend, which hadn’t worked out, but she had never returned home. She admitted to him that she had never gone to church, but he told me he directed her to a church, telling her God had a plan for her life. “If He has a plan for my life, why did He bring me here?” the woman questioned. Howard pointed out that it was not God who brought her there, but He could make good come out of it. He said her countenance had changed when he left, and she said she would consider going to church. Everybody has a story, and sometimes all it takes is a listening ear to bring out an opportunity for ministry. Or a listening heart when God speaks, even through watching a child in a toy-strewn nursery.
No comments:
Post a Comment