Value

A mother grasped the napkin and wrapped it around her shaking hand again and again.  She looked disheveled and beaten down and i could hear the soft rasps of her breath as she was talking to the friend beside her.

I could also hear the voice of my friend reverberating again through my head. The sad, hushed tones revealing the tragedy the story of a mother's broken heart.

A mother whose child had lost any sense of value of himself and his worth,  alas even the value of his own life.  A life he chose to end. It left the mother reeling with pain.

It was only through the good grace of God and His perspective on the value of this man's scarred life, that a medical team could intervene.

"He's lucky", continued my friends voice, "but he's not a nice man, the way he hurts his mother and takes advantage of her. It would almost be better for her if he had have...". Her voice trails off the track of my memory.

I stop grasping my fork, and put it down resolutely. "Aunty - can I pray for you?"
She lifts up her head and I can see her blue eyes shimmering: "Yes please! that would be lovely."

Then she looks toward her other son standing near the door, agitated, and waiting for his mother to finish her lunch.
"Yes, you can - after my dessert!" She declares, half sheepishly, half defiantly at her  son and grins at the bowl in front of her.

I sit,  poised,  ready to abandon my own dessert. She smiles and tells me to finish first.

When I get the signal from her, I take her aside  and pray for her and her family. I touch her shoulder and I don't remember what else I pray for, I just remember trying to control my shaking arms.  I am so new at this.

A few weeks later, this same mother waltzes into the kitchen, embraces me with a hug and says "He's home." She tells me through bursts of air how he was in a coma for 16 days, and how he is now back in town. She thanks me for the prayer because "I know that had something to do with it".

But I wonder if she was also thanking me for seeing him as she does, seeing some value in him that sometimes only God can see. If you can't see someone's worth and value perhaps, friend, you can't see your own.


Linking in at 5min friday

http://fiveminutefriday.com/2018/11/22/fmf-link-up-value/