Silent Visits
May 10, 2014 1953
I visited my mum at the nursing home this week. She didn’t wake while I was there. She spends a lot of time doing that now, so I just sat with her by the bed for a while. I wondered at her now yellowed hands; how they had so often held me, and how now I could see every bone and every vein.
Other than her (very small) family, she has no visitors.
After a bit I got up to go, and as I was leaving her room I was met by a slim well-dressed lady who was coming into my mum’s room. She greeted me with a smile,
“Hello, Are you Maria’s son?”
“Yes, I am,” I replied.
“That’s great,” she said with a smile. “I’m from the local Catholic parish, and I pop in one or twice a week and sit with your mum and pray with her. Is she Catholic?”
“No,” I said, “She isn’t. But we serve the same God, and she has always loved Jesus.”
“How wonderful!” she cheerily replied, as we went into my my mum’s room.
This brief encounter impacted me at a very deep level. Perhaps it shouldn’t have done so, but it did.
I grew up with a lot of prejudice against other Christians who didn’t see things the way I did.
I am so grateful to God’s people everywhere, and to this lady in particular who ministers to my poor mother, whom she doesn’t know, for no real earthly reward. Praise God for chaplains everywhere.
That’s the gospel in action right there.
And I thank the Lord that he is still teaching me profound lessons about the gospel.
Eliezer Gonzalez
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