The Sanctity of Words

I am not on the way to Haiti.
I have not packed a bag, a passport and a camera.
I am not seated on a plane, ascending over southern soil preparing to descend over Caribbean blue beauty.

No, I find myself in line at the Pig.

Serving God in the ordinary.  Showing up and responding in the present, the everyday moments of our lives.  Being used in the seemingly mundane.  Answering the call to the here and the now — the child gripped in the pain of adolescence, the friend struggling with aging parents, the mother seeking answers for her child with ADD.  Digging deep for encouragement for others requires pushing away the selfish, the lazy, the insatiable appetite of the me.

Investing in others, being alert to a cry from a wounded friend, pursuing in love those reeling from a sting, a cut, a deep wound of hurt and loss.

Is this the trip I am to take — no luggage required?

Could God call me to walk this road – the one marked clearly at the front door of my life — my Samaria?

A childhood friend bears emotional pain — deep and wide –immeasurable pain.  I have not seen her in over twenty years.  But God, the lover and giver of life, has marked a clear unmistakeable path between hurting her and me.  A path of words.

Through his grace and mercy I am blessed by the restoration of an old friendship. And we share and catch up on life.  She tells me all.  this life of pain heaped on pain.  Her story.

I mentioned I’d come visit soon.  I’d pack my bags and come laugh and sit and visit.

She sends a message back– HURRY!!!

I’m pierced by her pain and will pack soon.  But until I got I have my words to give, to offer, to send.

Words that can speak life or death.  Its important, they matter.  These deliverers of healing and hope and blessing.  These jewels and gems of love and encouragement.  Authentic love expressed through the gift of language.

It mattered to Jesus.  It should matter to me a lot.

It should always matter to met, these words I choose to speak and write and deliver and send. And the ones I don’t because the
lazy, the selfish, the self absorbed creep in.  The tyranny of the urgent stomps her feet like a spoiled child.

I will write her again soon and walk this path of words between us.  This path on the road that God has marked for me.

Leading me to my family, my friends, my Samaria.