I am up early after last night’s Watoto concert. Three lovely little girls and their “Auntie”
are asleep in our home and the energy of them and the choir has me buzzing.
God is speaking to my heart and I want to listen.
I shared a bit with the congregation about our trip to
Uganda and to Watoto in 2010, commenting that holding babies for two weeks was
literally an experience of heaven on earth and that Carol and I hoped to return
someday and do it some more.
Holding innocent abandoned babies is somehow a taste of
heaven – this thought had never really formed in my head until I heard those
words coming out of my mouth. God is
present in these precious little ones and you can feel Him when you touch
them. The Sacred and the Holy comes to
us in the form of a baby – sounds familiar to those of us who believe in Jesus.
The message of the Watoto choir is simply how God can heal
our brokenness through his love and grace.
In the case of these kids, that includes brokenness through harsh
poverty, the death of parents and family in many cases, and other calamities
related to civil strife and living conditions that are hard to imagine from the
comfort of our lives in America. These
kids have already experienced loss in significant ways and they are now
experiencing healing through God’s love manifest in Watoto and the people who
care for them, and are raising them in family-like groups, teaching them in
schools, and investing in each of their lives.
They are literally healed through the hands and hearts of
the Body of Christ at Watoto – the church and community that cares enough to
rescue them from their broken circumstances and bring them new life and
redemption.
We too are not alone
Our loss of Daniel continues to weigh on my soul, but I also
sense the healing touch of God through the experiences we have had over these
last four years.
Like the Watoto children, we too are experiencing God’s love and
compassion through the Body of Christ – the church and our family and friends
who are loving us and walking with us through these circumstances. Just yesterday a colleague at my office asked
me about Daniel’s upcoming death anniversary – it strikes me now how
significant it is for me to hear those words and to know that others are aware
of the weight and complexity of these feelings that are still lingering in my
heart and likely will always be there.
Just being asked this question opened me up to the care that this person
was sharing and the sense that others were present on the journey that so often
feels so incredibly lonely and isolating in my heart.
At its essence, grief is a very lonely journey since it is
such a personal and interior experience.
Each person’s experience of loss is unique in many respects and the
emotions, questions, dis-ease that accompany loss all seem to be very personal
and intimate.
In spite of this reality, it is also true that I am not
alone in my pain and that matters more than anything. God cares for me and that care is delivered
to me through the kind and simple words of others.
Thanks be to God for the friends and family who are
present to share in my journey.
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