For the week of: Monday, January 22nd 2007

"Windows to the Soul"

I believe the quote is, “Eyes are the windows to the soul.”   If so, a few days ago, in a Dunkin’ Donut shop in downtown Tegucigalpa, Honduras I gazed into the most forlorn soul I’ve seen in awhile.  He is maybe all of 7 years old and his name is Rudy.

Jen first spotted Rudy and his dimpled 8-year-old brother, Brian, one day as the barefoot boys stood begging in the middle of the street.  She took them to a nearby Pizza Hut, fed them and tried to find out a little about them. The one obvious truth was that Rudy is a user.  He sniffs glue. 

It’s in a small bottle that he keeps hidden under his shirt yet close enough to the neck opening to be able to quickly and frequently lean down and take a sniff.  He begs money to buy more glue.

It’s a common practice for the street kids.  They’re starving and sniffing the glue deadens the pain.  But the pain isn’t all that’s dieing.  So is hope. 

These children live without hope.  I have a feeling someone reading this feels as though all hope is gone in his or her world, too:

~ financial burdens that seem to multiply faster than baby rabbits,

~ addiction to prescription drugs that were prescribed to ease pain but have brought hellish consequences,

~ a marriage that would take a miracle straight from heaven to save,

~ a spouse who explodes in rage at the drop of a hat,

~ a church that seems entangled in the suffocating throes of graceless doctrine,

~ a terminally ill child who suffers fear and pain that you would gladly take for them if only you could,

~ a deplorable job situation,

~ a secret sin that you want so badly to turn your back on but it seems to have a death grip on you,

Hopelessness.  It’s in Rudy’s eyes. You may see it in the eyes that look back at you from the mirror, or in the next office at work, or in your teenager or the cashier at the grocery store or your spouse.

It’s the overriding thought of those who choose suicide…”There is no hope that anything or anyone can change what I’m going through.” 

And in some circumstances, that could be the final truth.  Some situations are beyond the reach and scope of any therapist, any physician, any pastor, any psychiatrist. 

Into the light steps Divinity. 

What we are powerless to do, God is able to accomplish.  What the world writes off as impossible is what He delights in rescuing.  What we label as “hopeless”, He labels “Mine.” 

He’s waiting for you to ask to be rescued…sometimes from self.  There was a time when I asked to be rescued, but what I was really asking for was for God to supernaturally reach down, pick me up out of circumstances I was in as a result of my own decisions and plop me down somewhere where I was sure I’d be a lot happier.  It wasn’t until I realized, accepted and dealt with the truth of my own part in the ordeal and asked to be rescued from me that my hope was restored. 

In situations that are a result of the decisions of others or the result of living in this physical world of disease and dieing, we need rescued from our fears, doubts, insecurities, bitterness, resentment, and anxiety.   How desperately we need to be rescued.  How deeply we long for relief. 

Dear one, you have never been closer to a rescue than you are this very moment.  Lean on Him, call out to Him, ask Him.  He delights to bring you hope.  He lives to love you.  He died to save you.  He was resurrected to bring you assurance of the hope that can be resurrected in you.

Lovingly Rescued,