“How could I have lost the green dishes?”
Last Christmas, my mother-in-law gave me her beautiful green
and gold china plates—the very same china a special woman in her life handed
down to her. We packaged and shipped several boxes of china from Indiana to
Oregon that day; LeAnne gave her granddaughters many beautiful pieces. But the green and gold dishes she gave
to me. Down on my knees in our
garage, I rummaged through box after box only to come up empty. Sadly, I wondered if the dishes were
lost during shipment when the doorbell rang. A sweet friend came over to help me decorate my house for
Christmas but I didn’t have my “act” together and told her so
apologetically. “I feel like I’m
wasting your time—I can’t find the dishes LeAnne gave me.”
“It’s possible they are in this old Goodwill suitcase we
used to ship them in but the lock is broken and I can’t open it.” Without
blinking an eye, my friend rolled up her sleeves and with a screwdriver and a hammer,
broke open the suitcase after several tries; the green and gold dishes were not
there.
By this time, the dual feelings of waste and loss were
distracting me: I was wasting my friend’s precious time (she has three young
children who were in school) and I potentially lost something beautiful given
to me by a loved one. As I poured
my friend a cup of coffee, I heard her words, “Pam, stop worrying about wasting
my time—this is an excuse for us to be together.” That’s when I realized why it was so important I pour out
everything in me to find the dishes. I pushed aside the natural feelings of waste and loss
as we maximized our final half hour together tearing apart two more boxes. Suddenly, my friend pulled out a
wrapped dish hidden underneath the crinkly paper and my eyes fell upon the
beautiful gold and green dish.
“That’s it! You
found LeAnne’s gift to me.” The
upheaval of tearing apart my garage and my house to find those dishes, the
disorder I brought to my friend’s free time—made a mess of the natural things
in life. But I saw that the
natural had to be torn apart in order to make it spiritual. God’s goodness to me that day was how
he supplied time even when we spent it in ways I hadn’t planned. Right up to the last minute, we set my
dining room table with beautiful things . . . beautiful things given to me by
someone else.
But there’s something more . . .
 |
| Each beautiful piece on my dining room table, including the re-upholstered chairs, were gifts from different friends and family. |
One week ago, LeAnne passed away after suffering from a year and a half with a life-destroying disease. In my mother-in-law’s last week, a friend of hers travelled miles and miles to care for her as her hospice nurse. She cleared her schedule and poured out her life like water to the last drop until LeAnne took her last breath. This friend pushed aside the very human feelings of waste and loss—knowing death was inevitable and chose to maximize her love to LeAnne. The upheaval not only of her own life but of LeAnne’s spirit as she connected powerfully with her dying friend was a beautiful, life-giving sacrifice. The natural course of death was sacrificed to be made spiritual.
God’s goodness to LeAnne and her friend was that he maximized the
suffering and made it beautiful-- right up to the last minute of her life . . . he made the end of her life beautiful.
As family and friends pour into your home these next few
days, ask God to show you how he is using the natural, material, tangible
aspects of our world, even our own messy humanity to bring you into closer life
with him. Could this world be the
usher into relationship with each other and God? Life with him is not just “out there” in a spiritual cosmos. It’s here—the beautiful, intangible God-life
is in our skin as we actively pursue one another in love. Mysterious and beautiful, God maximizes
everything to let us know he is near, with us, Emmanuel.
Merry Christmas. Lovingly, Pam
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