Friends, it’s hard to believe that I haven’t written a single blog post in more than a month, but that real life happened. Equally hard to believe is how much I loved the break. Loved. My blogless month was full of celebrations and best friends and adventure and whimsy and all of the things that make life worth it. There are lots of good stories I hope to share and several I want to keep to myself, but first and foremost I need to tell you a story about slugs. Yep, slugs.
A couple of weeks ago I went to a cookout thrown by one of my Church’s ministries and found myself having dinner with a sweet middle aged Hispanic lady, her young daughter, and a couple of female missionaries from the Mormon church. The woman began to tell us a few stories about things she did in her neighborhood to make it a safer, better place to live and also about how she encouraged each of her kids to pray diligently because, as she said, God answers prayers in his own timing. She is the type of person that just pulls people in, and her daughter was the same way!
Her little girl began to talk about her Mom’s prayer life in such a way that made it obvious that she knew her Mom and God have a special, almost magical relationship where he listens to her and works tirelessly to meet the needs of her and her family. I cried a little bit, to be perfectly honest with you, listening to her talk about her Mom.
One of her stories featured her Mom seeing a slug outside. When she went inside to get water, she saw a crow eat the slug. She then prayed to see a new slug, and suddenly a new one appeared-- an answer to her prayer.
Though I was mesmerized with how much this little girl loved her Mom, I was initially prone to explain the story as happenstance versus an answered prayer.
However, that night I couldn’t stop thinking about my new friends and slugs, and began to wish that I had an ounce of their faithfulness. I prayed that when I saw something as ugly and icky as a slug, I would be reminded that God loves and listens to me. When I thought about it that way, I had an “oh, duh” moment. God would reward her prayer for a slug because it was a simple way to bring him praise and glory. Of course he would.
I would suspect that more often than I would care to acknowledge I discount the goodness of God by limiting what I think he can do to giant life-changing miracles, while ignoring his amply provided small, potentially attitude-changing-miracles.
You might know about my attitudes… changing them can really require a miracle. Really.
And with that, please excuse me while I go looking for slugs in Haiti. It’s a metaphor. You get it.
[Prayers appreciated!}
Thanks for reading,
Jess
