1989 July/August issue Part 2

What's a nice girl like you...

Young people have the crazy notion now days that the only way to really "get to know" somebody is to get intimate. That's what's important. No it isn't. What's important is what the person lives for and how much they'd be willing to risk for it. The following is reprinted from The Pilot, a Catholic weekly of the Aarchdiocese of Boston, March 31, 1989, with the premission of John Mallon:

1989 July/August issue Part 1

The gift of loneliness

I was not a wife anymore. I was a widow. Another assignment. Another gift. 

   Don’t imagine or a moment that that was the thought that occurred to me the instant the word came. O Lord, was probably all I could think, stunned as we all were.

   One step at a time over the years, as I sought to plumb the mystery of suffering (which cannot be plumbed), I began to see that there is a sense in which everything is a gift, even my widowhood. I hope I can explain.

1989 May/June issue Part 3

Letter to a Missionary

When my father and mother were newly married they sailed to Belgium where they were to work with the Belgian Gospel Mission. They were twenty-four and twenty-three. Recently my brother Jim Howard unearthed a letter to them by an older missionary of the china Inland Mission dated July 21, 1922. It spoke to me freshly and powerfully when I received it yesterday, so I give it to you;

1989 May/June issue Part 2

Humdudgeons or contentment

The word humdudgeon is a new word to me and I like the sound of it. It means “a loud complaint without a trifle.” Heard any of those lately around your house? One mother thought of an excellent antidote; all humdudgeons must be presented not orally but in writing, “of two hundred words or more.” There was a sudden marked reduction in whining and complaining.

   Parents, by example, teach their children to whine. No wonder it is so difficult to teach them not to! Listen to conversations in the elevator, at the hairdresser’s, at the next table in the restaurant. Everybody’s whining about everything- weather, health, the president, the IRS, the insurance mess, traffic, kids.

1989 May/June issue Part 1

Do it at once
"No unwelcome tasks become any the less unwelcome by putting them off till tomorrow. It is only when they are put behind us and done, that we begin to find that there is a sweetness to be tasted afterwards, and that the rememberance of unwelcome duties unhesitatingly done is welcome and pleasant. Accomplished, they are full of blessings, and there is a smile on their faces as they leave us. Undone, they stand threatening and disturbing our tranquility, and hindering our communion with God. If there be lying before you any bit of work from which you shrink, go straight up to it, and do it at once. The only way to get rid of it is to do it." (Alexander MacLarer)

1989 March/April issue Part 3

There Are No Accidents

   My friend Judy Squire of Portola Valley, California, is one of the most cheerful and radiant woman I know. I met her first in prayer meeting at the beginning of a conference. She was sitting in a wheel chair and I noticed something funny about her legs. Later that day I saw her with no legs at all. In the evening she was walking around with crutches. Of course I had to ask her some questions. She was born with no legs, she had artificial ones which she used sometimes, but they were tiresome, she said (laughing) and she often left them behind. When I heard of a little baby boy named Brandon Scott, born without arms or legs, I asked if she would write to his parents, she did;

   “The first thing I would say is that all that this entails is at least one hundred times harder on the parents than the child. A birth defect by God’s grace does not rob childhood from its wonder, nor is a child burdened by high expectations. Given a supportive, creative, and loving family, I know that I enjoyed not a less-than-average life nor an average life, but as I’ve told many, my life has not been ordinary but extraordinary.

   “I am convinced without a doubt that a loving Heavenly Father oversees the creative miracles in the inner sanctum of each mother’s womb (Psalm 139), and that in His sovereignty there are no accidents.

   “’What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Creator calls a butterfly.’ As humanity we see only the imperfect, underside of God’s tapestry of our lives. What we judge to be ‘tragic- the most dreaded thing that could happen,’ I expect we’ll one day see as the awesome reason for the beauty and uniqueness of our life and our family. I think that’s why James 1:2 is a favourite verse of mine. Phillips translation put it this way: ‘When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives, my brothers, don’t resent them as intruders but welcome them as friends. ‘

1989 March/April issue Part 2

Too Many Children?

When I learned that my daughter Valerie was expecting number five, my insides tied themselves in knots.
  Val and Walt were both very peaceful about it, willing to receive this child as they had the others- as a gift from the Lord, remembering His words, “Whoever receives this child in my name receives me” (Luke 9:48). But my imagination ran to the future and its seeming impossibilities- “Poor dear Val. she has her hands more than full. What will she do with five?” Before she was married Valerie had told me she had hoped the Lord would give her six. I had smiled to myself, thinking she would probably ably revise that number after the first three or four. Practical considerations rose like thunderclouds in my mind. Money. Another room to be built into the house. Homeschooling (Valerie was teaching two already). How would the new child receive the attention he needed? Etc., etc.
  Then I began to look at the advantages. I was one of six children myself, and loved growing up in a big family. Children learn early what it means to help and to share, to take responsibility and to make sacrifices, to give place to others, to cooperate and deny themselves. Why all this turmoil in my soul? Well because I love my child! She was tired! Her hands were full! Maybe later, maybe when the others were old enough to help more, maybe... O Lord!
  I tried to talk to God about it. Breakfast time came, we ate, washed dishes, school began in the children’s schoolroom, and I went to my room, my heart churning. What does one do?
I write this because troubled young women have come to me not understanding their mothers’ reactions to the news of another baby. Was it resentment? Did they not love the grandchildren they had? Why would they not want more? Was it nothing but a meddlesome yen to run their children’s lives? Was it a revelation of a worst attitude- an unwillingness to let God be God?