A Lesson in Trusting

Firstborn grandsons are probably as wonderfully important as firstborn granddaughters, but I will never know. I had a grandson first, and his name is Eliot. After the writer, T.S. Eliot I've been told, so as to spell it correctly and indicate to all who observe such things, that his parents are well read. Eliot is already well read and he is only 6.5 years old.

After Eliot's birth, a grand affair of excitement and anticipation, his life fell neatly into place behind other major crises in the family. For example, his maternal great-grandfather died suddenly on the exact day he arrived home from the hospital, and his maternal grandfather left his family on that very summer when he was experiencing the texture of grass on his belly and smelling flowers for the first time.

Then came more grandsons, one by one quickly and annually. Granddaughters followed and then, of all things, TWINS! two different times with the grand total of 6 babies from 4 daughters in the year 2006! When I speak of emotional overload, I am not exxagerating in the least!!

Back to Mr. Eliot , however, because it is of his latest experience that I want to comment on here. Sunday evening, after son Andrew's spectacular and successful 20th birthday party, my daughter,[Eliot's never- easily- ruffled mom] called to say he was on his way to the Emergency Room to check out a thump,bump on his head. He had been sledding the day before and the lump was still bothering him as was a throbbing headache. I knew he had missed morning church along with his sickly brother Simon, an unusual event in that family's life. "If you want to join me and wait, it is probably nothing," quipped my daughter.

"NOTHING??" I internally screamed, "EMERGENCY ROOM?" "FOR MY GRANDSON?" "ARE YOU JOKING?"



This could be the "big one" , the "I have waitied and dreaded moment " in every grandmother's life, the "I trust God but really this is beyond belief" time we all hold our collective breaths for. Of course I am coming to wait with you, and if a really good doctor isn't called in to examine him, I personally will make an utter fool of myself demanding the chief neurosurgeon be called from his bed,no matter the hour, to officially and thoroughly examine this thump,bump to make certain my baby is fine!

Upon arrival at this overcrowded, teeming with germs from young children, Emergency Room, we waited. And waited and waited and waited and during that long wait was when it happened. I decided God was God-again and still. HE was perfectly capable of allowing us to fear, Eliot to hurt, mommy to doubt her sanity at being there,the doctors to be overworked and under-appreciated by the exhausted parents and grandparents, the thump, bump to be -this time- just that. All of my imaginations in the world cannot change for one nano-second the outcome of a grandchild's life. I know this because God has carefully, lovingly, Sovereignly plotted my life course already with nary a bit of help from my worries and stresses. Hospitals have been visited, my baby Danny has died, my darling husband has disappeared, my daddy is with Jesus, my dreams have been rearranged and revamped, my children have produced children and now my baby boy is flying out of this tattered and falling apart nest.

God has never needed me. I, however, must exclaim, I need Him! I need Him to be in charge of my firstborn grandson, my 9 other baby grandchildren, my future grandchildren, and all of my many wonderful children and spouses and even Adam. I need Him to be loving and Sovereignly ordering the world and it's intricacies so that I can go to work and come home and pay my bills and love my babies and rest assured that all is well, with my soul and His world.

The next time I wait in the ER(and there will be a next time ,of this I am certain)I will spend less time imagining and more time trusting. I believe that is the point of it all.