Recently, we stayed with dear friends who have two darling little girls. One night, during bath time, screams erupted from the second floor. Leaving my girls to work on the clean-up project we were in the middle of, I climbed the stairs to see if I could help. Two kids only 5 months apart is a tricky business, and an extra hand never goes amiss. As I walked down the hall toward the bedroom, I could hear my friend’s anguished voice., “You have to let me help you, baby.” She was locked in a struggle with her youngest daughter, employing all the “time in” training she had received to help this precious little person currently full of wild rage. As I moved between the bathroom and the bedroom, quietly offering a word of support and finding pajamas for her other daughter, I watched as my friend’s body (and soul) absorbed blow after blow. Her arms formed a gentle and protective circle around her daughter whose fury fueled the screams of “let me go!” and “go away!” It was almost more than I could bear to hear the tears in my friend’s voice.
“I can’t let go, baby. I can’t. You have to let me help you.”
I watched for only a second, but that image plays on in my head as if it were hours. It was not the intensity of the little girl’s shrieks or my awe at my friend’s strength and control that bronzed the image forever in the museum of my thoughts. It was the fact that as I watched, I became that little rage-filled girl, and my friend became the One who made me, holding me close, helping me in spite of myself.
How often have we raged against circumstance or perceived injustice, or…God? How often are we aware only of the restraint rather than the overwhelming love of the One who restrains?
In that room, I was suddenly aware that I was standing in a holy place. I was witnessing a sacred moment. My friend did not abandon her daughter, and she did not let go. She stayed, allowing her body to shield the world from the blows of her daughter and to shield her daughter from the blows of the world. She mirrored the One who made that precious little girl. She mirrored God’s love that never leaves, never gives up. She lived Christ.
Later that evening, her rage spent, that little daughter sat next to my friend at the dinner table, so close and tucked in. My friend was weary, heartsick, bruised...but there was room at the table for her daughter. There would always be room.
My Step
Today, I’m checking my rage. I’m looking up into the face of the one who holds me close when all I want to do is run. Are you looking up? Can you see His overwhelming love for you, too?
I’m reading of the contentment that comes from knowing my God will never leave me and never forsake me.
I’m singing along with Josh Garrels --- there is always a place for me...for you at the table.