Streams of Mercy
I’ve been thinking a great deal in recent days about how we come to be the persons we are, with our unique perspectives on life, the ways we see ourselves and others. No one can tell what goes on in between the person we were and the person we become, there are no maps showing the way there, no charts to mark the change, no warning signs for detours or dead ends. We just travel through life, making our way, and helping each other along the way.
I believe we grow and change and become as people come and go in our lives “for a reason, or a season, or a lifetime” and as they “love us or refuse to love us, or love us in unhealthy ways.” Through every experience we learn the life lesson that “what lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us”, and we come to understand that “things happen to us, so that things can happen in us, so that things can happen through us.” We learn as we live, that we can find peace in the pieces of life, and new beginnings in endings.
A friend is dying and I’m sad to know she lived a neighbor so nearby, yet I hardly knew her. How important it is to be attentive to those around us, to notice who we see and who we never see. So much of our “becoming” comes as we interact with each other, offering encouragement, counsel, and loving support. As we share the joys and sorrows, victories and defeats, hills and valleys of life’s journey, we help each other find the way. When we can’t see our own worth for ourselves, we’re often able to see it reflected in another who catches a glimpse of who we are and of who we might become. I believe God plans for us to do that for one another. In many ways, we “love each other” to wholeness!
Several years ago, I watched the movie “Still Alice” THREE times – it was in Movies on Demand, and I guess I just like the idea of “getting my money’s worth!” My friends, knowing the movie was the story of Alice, who suffered from alzheimers, questioned, with a laugh, “Hey, you did remember that you’d seen it before, when you watched it for the second and third time, right?” I assured them that yes, I was aware of choosing to watch it three times!
Alice’s daughter, Lydia, is staying with her mother for a spell – Lydia, the daughter who was such a disappointment because she wanted to act in plays rather than go to college. Lydia was reading one of her parts and Alice was listening. “Mom, do you understand what I’m saying? Do you know what it means?” Alice pauses for a second, then looks into Lydia’s face with love and says, “It’s about love, Lydia, it’s talking about love. Did I get it right?” Lydia draws her mother into her arms saying, “That’s right, that’s right, you got it right! It’s all about love!”
The bottom line is love. When all the rest falls away, it’s the love we’ve shared that lasts. May we live out of the memory of the love we’ve shared we others all our days! Giving thanks for the gift of life, for neighbors to love one another, and for those streams of mercy, never ceasing.
Elizabeth