Take-away.
Time in the prayer room last week was sacred. Sacred and yet,
kind of mundane. Unremarkable. No angel appeared out of the ether to me. No audible
voice cut through the silence. Yet, there was an unseen presence, inviting me
to sit back and just ‘be’.
And so I relaxed in the comfy seat and picked up a bit of
wire. Invited to string beads as I prayed, I found myself randomly choosing a
bead for each member of my family as I prayed for them, then extending those
beads and those prayers to friends. I could have gone on and on. There are so
many wonderful people in my life: I am so grateful to God for the privilege of
praying for them.
This morning as I prayed for my grandchildren, I held this ‘rosary’
of people precious to me. Each bead is unique. A variety of colours, some are
round, apparently flawless. Some have sharp edges. Some are tapered; some are
straight. All are held together by the thin copper wire on which they are
threaded.
Sometimes in families, straight edges chafe against round
ones. Sometimes in families, those with a smaller footprint – be it their voice,
their place in the family, whatever – feel overshadowed and marginalised by the
more colourful, louder ones. I’ve heard it said that it’s in the rubbing that
we lose our hard edges; it’s in the settling that we find harmony through
Jesus, the wire that holds us all together.
I love the disparity of this stringing of beads. I love that
they don’t follow a pattern; they don’t adhere to a colour scheme; they don’t
lie straight and slot together perfectly. This is the way the Lord has made our
world, vibrant with wild colours and subdued, interesting with geometric shapes
and whimsical splashes; all held together in Him.
May we be part of a rising chorus of those celebrating our
differences rather than those separating us into categories. May the riot of
colour and custom and character rise as a jubilant praise to our amazing
creator God.
No comments:
Post a Comment