She was old and ornery. While her 90-year old mind seemed to continually sashay on stages of acting past, today it was breaking down. But, not enough to lose its power to teach me a lesson I’d never forget.
The trip to her was a nightmare: traffic was dead stop, arguments abounded and multiple side of the road discussions ensued. My husband and I nearly aborted mission, we nearly ended in the battlefield of argument and we nearly said this is just too far, until we remembered that…
God only calls those he plans to use.
Her house was a museum of past memories, frames of far-off children, piles of yesterday and smells of inactivity, yet the spitfire lady sitting in the middle of it all still breathed the unsaid words, “Please help me.”
We tried. Our eyes saw her need, our hands prayed and our mouths shared the heartfelt, but humanly mismanaged, truth about the one person who meant everything to us.
We shared the gift that makes everything change.
We shared the pulse of what days on earth all add up to.
We shared the only thing that ever really mattered to us.
Then, this young dancing actress, in the body of an old fragile woman, came alive, when she finally saw the one character that really mattered – Jesus.
She saw what she had missed for far so long.
And we all celebrated, for we knew the power of this knowledge.
Tears rolled down her cheeks and she clenched the bible as if she might devour it. She knew she would be okay. She knew that when her life ended, she finally would have something to live for – and that mattered. It mattered a lot. What she most feared, dissolved upon saying the simple words, “I believe.”
New dreams emerged as the curtain to one stage closed for Mary and the next one gloriously opened. All I know is that, this spit-fire, is sure to be putting on one class act in heaven.
Yet, as time passed after leaving Mary’s house so man long years ago, getting by seemed impossible. We freaked out, then surrendered finances in the way one can only do when there is nothing left to do.
When you lose it all to God, all of a sudden you find, what was lost – is found.
One day, completely unexpectedly, Mary danced her way into our hearts – and mailbox – yet again. A letter of her willed monetary love covered our rent and our hearts with God’s faithfulness.
When we follow through on God’s mission – he does his part to progress it along too.
As we pour out, he always pours in.
Not always as we may have originally wanted, but always as we needed.
How many times does God have gifts of faithfulness waiting for those who obey? What if we never made it to see Mary?
We thought we were giving, but we were certainly the ones also receiving.
God never drops us at the doorstep of need alone and without a key. She showed us hand-cupped offerings of nearly empty are multiplied by God into fire hydrant outpourings of God’s love.
God stands ready to move, the question is – will we?
We can’t even begin to imagine what he will do with our small offering of, “I love you.”
Then, perhaps, one day, the final producer will look at us to say, “‘Well done, good and faithful servant!” Mt. 25:23
What a better close to a show is there than that?
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Jill Lynn Buteyn is a co-author of 
Abby McDonald is a writer who can’t contain the lavish love of a God who relentlessly pursues her, even during her darkest times. When she’s not chasing her two little boys around, she loves hiking, photography, and consuming copious amounts of coffee with friends.