Streams of Mercy

I came across a book I once read to my children, to their delight

“There was once a land called Grayland, where everything was gray. The sky was gray. The grass was gray. The flowers were gray. Every day it looked like rain. Even the people were gray. Every morning they pulled back their curtains on another gray day. They put on their gray clothes and ran downstairs to a gray breakfast. Then they shut their gray front doors and hurried past the gray shop to catch the gray bus to work. Gray spotted dogs barked as they passed. The children played with their gray toys and went to school in gray clothes. It was very dull. There was no color anywhere. No cheerful red. No orange. No blue. No green. No yellow. Not even brown! But the people didn’t mind – because they didn’t know. They had never seen a blue sky or green grass or yellow buttercups. So they were happy enough in Grayland, in a gray sort of way.”

Everything changed the day a large and colorful hot air balloon carrying four brightly dressed children came floating in. The little gray boy ran to meet it! The children told him of wonderful colors:

“A Land of Color,” sighed the Little Gray Boy. He’d been quite happy with gray before. Now it made him feel sad. If only someone could make his Grayland into a Land of Color!

To make a long story short, the Little Gray Boy went to the Mayor, the Wizard and the Witch, with no success. At last a Grandmother said, “Why don’t you ask the Maker?”

“There was a long pause. The people hung their heads. Why, they had forgotten all about the Maker. Now they began to remember. They remembered stories of long ago – stories of The Beginning, of a beautiful Land of Color where the Maker and his people were happy together. Before things went wrong and the colors faded away… Yes, they would ask the Maker. And that was what they did. They said they were sorry for forgetting him. And they asked him to make their Grayland into a Land of Color – please! …and they waited and waited and waited …After a time there came a tremendous thunderstorm, and the raindrops that fell were of different colors. Green drops fell on the leaves and the grass. Brown drops fell on the earth. Red drops fell on the poppies, and yellow drops fell on the buttercups … The people thanked the Maker- ‘Thank you,’ they said, ‘for our Land of Color. We promise we’ll never forget you again.’”

Many times these days, our world seems like a Grayland and people come in shades of gray and hopelessness. This book that once delighted my children brings hope and joy to my heart this day. That colorful hot air balloon of hope floats by for those with eyes to see, and The Maker stills rains color on our gray days, for those with hearts to understand.

Elizabeth