Her eyes were wide as I opened my trunk lid. The van was filled to the roof with Christmas presents – toys for the kids, new pillows and blankets, groceries, and a few nice things for mom too. She stood still, as if she was afraid to believe it was all for them – for her little family.
My mind flashed to the day in clinic when another family caught my attention. They were part of a small Bible study group and wanted to take on a family for Christmas. Wanted to provide for someone who didn’t have much. I agreed to watch out for the right opportunity, and within 24 hours I had found a match. A single mom who had arm-wrestled a meth addiction. Who had lost everything – her kids, her job, her home – but who along the way had found herself. Had scratched and clawed to become a mom again. But it wasn’t easy, and the full-time job she held barely paid the bills. There wasn’t much left over for Christmas.
Until she crashed headlong into a small Bible study group.
It took 18 trips up the apartment stairs to carry everything in. The little Christmas tree could barely be seen. The living room floor was half-covered. And in the middle of the mess, I held onto a sobbing, sweet, beautiful mom who experienced, maybe for the very first time in her life, grace and love that were extravagant.
Who will you love extravagantly?
“Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with Him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant…Love like that.” Ephesians 5:2 (MSG)
So I have this friend. Actually we have only been friends for a few months. But it turns out that we have something unusual in common. We both love foster kids, but that isn’t the uncommon part. What sets my friend apart is that she loves the birth parent of her foster kids. In case you blew past that, let me say it again.
She loves the birth parent of her foster kids.
She believes that she is called to do that – to create opportunities for a mom that has never had anything. To offer relationship that doesn’t have strings attached. Her husband believes it too. And her friends are starting to. In fact, she is rounding up a whole army of people who are willing to go deep with her.
To get dirty. To work hard. To hurt. To get frustrated. To pray. To encourage. To support. To hope. And most of all? To love.
It’s really what we should be about.
For in Christ, neither our most conscientious religion nor disregard of religion amounts to anything. What matters is something far more interior: faith expressed in love. Galatians 5:6 (MSG)
The nurse’s note on the chart told me that the boy was here for wheezing. He had recently been hospitalized because he had been in a house fire, and this was a checkup to make sure he was doing better. I did the normal “doctor” stuff. Asked a few questions about his breathing. Listened to his lungs. Reviewed his medications. He seemed tense, as if he was waiting for me to do something more. Something worse. I fumbled to find some reassuring words, but my ineffectiveness was obvious. Finally I mumbled something to his grandmother about checking out with my attending physician and backed out of the room.
I told her the medical story, but was surprised when my attending asked what had caused the fire. I had been curious myself but was uncomfortable asking – afraid to overstep my self-imposed professional limits. She smiled slightly, and I realized that I was about to get a lesson in human relationships. Within a few moments the whole story was out. The boy had been playing with a lighter and had accidentally set the fire. He had escaped with some minor injuries, but his mom and sister were not so lucky – both had died. He was now in foster care, placed with the maternal grandmother. It was a terrible story, and yet somehow there was grace in the telling of it.
Grace can be defined in several different ways.
Elegance. Beauty. Favor. Mercy.
I saw all of those demonstrated in the conversations I witnessed that day, as my attending engaged a hurting family and created a space for them to share. As a grandmother extended mercy and forgiveness to a grandson. As physical healing ended and emotional healing began.
When people understand that you care about them, that you are truly interested in who they are and where they come from and what they are going through, then the interaction flows in a rhythm that is easy and beautiful. Difficult questions become easier to ask, and difficult stories become safer to tell. In that kind of relationship, there is unbelievable grace. And life is better for it. But we must be willing to care. Are you ready and willing?
“Walk with me and work with me – watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.” Matt. 11:29, MSG