A Welcomed Serenity

It’s been a while since we’ve had our own living room, designed the way we want. Sitting in my rocker, I can enjoy the large bookshelves on my right that I built a few weeks ago. We decided to stain the wood a medium oak, and it does look attractive. The shelves reach seven feet high while covering the length of a 10-foot wall. In the adjoining dining room, another even larger, home-built bookshelf covers that wall.

In front of me, large, dark stained, wooden doors open up to a patio graced with palm trees. Matching the doors, is our nara-wood parquet floor. To my left, a broad window is covered with laced green curtains, harmonizing with the outside flowers and plants that look into our living room. Beneath the window our rattan sofa sits quietly with its matching green cushions and lime-green pillows. A rattan chair and two end tables guard the sofa.

Martha arranged the colorful, artificial flowers that fill two corners of the room. I added a six-foot tall plant to accent the open space near my rocker. There’s no TV to disturb the serenity of the songbirds singing from the trees outside the window. A cool tropical breeze tempts me to close my eyes and sleep in the comfort of my little living room.

But outside the gate of our little haven, all is not serene. A short distance in any direction we find families living in squalor conditions. With no running water and open sewage, flimsy, bamboo-framed shacks try to shelter large families crowded into one-room huts. One corner is blackened by the coal burning fire used to cook their daily ration of rice. There are no closets protecting nicely hung garments. Instead, a cardboard box hides the few worn clothes to which the family clings, each carefully folded by a caring mother trying to bring order to their meager possessions.

Fathers struggle to provide for their children, competing for scarce jobs that offer long hours and low wages. Many fathers give up and abandon their families, leaving a scared wife who must depend on handouts from indifferent relatives. Added to their fears are the local spirits who they believe inflict everything from bad luck to sickness. Their religious beliefs offer no hope, as they will have to spend part of their eternity in intense suffering, paying for sins they can’t identify because they have offended a god they can’t see.

Into this world I minister, sharing the hope that can only come through knowing Jesus Christ, and having an all powerful advocate who knows our fears and pain, yet provides us the security of His presence and the certainty of eternal joy with him in the glories of heaven. Oh, how I long for the day when the clouds roll back and time shall be no more. But for now I mingle daily with the outcasts of this world and in the ugly places of this earth. It’s emotionally draining, but the promise of heaven renews my strength. I’m not there yet. But I’m so grateful for my little living room where I can sit in my rocker, close my eyes, feel the gentle breeze, and pretend a bit.