Every once and awhile you get one of those glimpses into who you really are. Not who you can be...but who you really are. And there is nothing you can do to take it back. Because it just happened. And you can't change the past.
Now, I don't know where your mind is taking you at the moment, but what I'm writing about is love.
Every once and awhile we are given the opportunity to show our capacity for love. That is what I see when I see what has happened in Haiti. We can debate whether or not God made the earthquake happen. I doubt we'll get anywhere. But what I do know for certain is that what Pat Robertson said about it was wrong.
He said: "They were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III, or whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, we will serve you if you'll get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, okay it's a deal [...] ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other."
This is what I say: "God loves the Haitians. And if it was possible for God to love one people more than another, he loves the Haitians more than most. Because God has an especially tender place in his heart for the suffering."
What I marvel at is that we do, too. That's the truly incredible thing: the millions of dollars being donated, the people lining up to adopt the orphans (including my wife!), the doctors who have left their practice to serve in tents for free, the Red Cross, the US military, Europe, South America, Asia, Africa, The Dominican Republic. My friend Allison. She just hopped on a plane Monday. It is amazing to me. This is love. Every once and awhile we get a glimpse at our capacity for it.
Lord, please keep my friend Dance alive...
Closer to home, God gave Lia and me a similar glimpse (though on a lesser scale). Our kids got the bug. I will spare you the gory details, but they involved projectile vomit. I didn't love the experience, but I was amazed at the love with which I responded. Does that make sense? I did what it took to clean up the mess. I didn't pause first to think about what it would cost. I got dirty. Because I love these children. I did what David and Anna Rose could not do for themselves.
Every once and awhile I get surprised at how much love I have in me. May we discover the same capacity as we care for our sisters and brothers of the island.
