Like a Child

I wrote this well over 2 years ago and posted it as a facebook note. It's a story I think of often, especially when I get caught up in the details of man's attempts to explain that which is beyond his comprehension. Also, I miss this little girl like none other, because even though she's only 45 minutes away, school and work suck up every available moment of time I have. It's been several months since we've played together. She's a real gem. Let me show you...

I am writing this in my bed. The dog is asleep on the floor beside me, snoring softly and twitching as she chases some imaginary creature through her dreams. My four-year-old cousin Allie is curled up by my side clutching my bear, Gustav von Teddy. In her other hand is a children's story Bible.

I treasure my time with Allie so much, but I was reminded tonight just how valuable the innocent heart of a child is. The stories she chose to read tonight were about Jesus's birth and the angels telling the shepherds. I never for a second thought when I picked up that book that I would learn something by reading it, but God has a sense of humor (and a way of humbling us when we need it).

True to her 4-year-old nature, she asks a TON of questions.

"What is sin?" (Have you ever tried to explain that to a kid? It's not as easy as it sounds.) Well, sin is when we do something we're not supposed to do. "How come Jesus died? Is he still dead?" He came as a baby, grew up, and then died on a cross for us.... Do you know what a cross is? (She made a cross with her fingers...) "It's like X-men!" ......Sort of. They made a cross shape out of big pieces of wood and then hung Jesus on it to die. But He didn't stay dead! He came back to life three days later! "How could he do that?" Because He was God's son. He was God. That made Him strong enough to beat sin and death (insert blank stare here). 

You know how when you do something wrong at home you get punished? Well, when we do bad things that God doesn't like, we should get punished for it. But Jesus loves us so much that He came and took our punishment for us. "So if he died on the cross then that means we don't have to be on a cross? I don't want you to be on a cross Meghan." (insert breaking heart here as this precious little girl begins to sob.) No sweetheart, Jesus took the punishment for us. "But what if there is another cross someday?" There never, ever has to be another cross. Jesus beat sin. "Oh wow, he won!" Yes monkey. He won. "So if Jesus already took our punishment then does that mean that God doesn't care if we do bad stuff at home?" No, God still wants us to do good things. It just means that if we do bad things and we ask Him to forgive us then He will... Do you understand what forgiveness is?.... Forgiveness is when someone does something mean or bad to you but you decide to not do anything mean back and not to be mad at them.  So if we do something bad and we're sorry for it, we can ask God to forgive us and He will. He won't be mad at us. (Again, freakishly difficult to explain...) "When Austin hits me, I always just hit him back!" (Apparently I'm not getting through...) But that's not what Jesus would want you to do. When He was on the way to the cross, lots of people hit Him and spit on Him and said really mean things to Him. But He didn't hit or yell back.  He just kept going to the cross because He wanted everyone to be able to be forgiven by God, even those people that were hurting Him. "But if Jesus is in heaven with God now then how will anyone ever know him?" If you ask Him to, His Spirit comes to live in your heart. And He gave us the Bible so we could read about Him and learn. You can tell people about Him just like I'm telling you! "Meghan, I'm glad that Jesus won." Me too, sweetheart. 

There is an interesting parallel between Allie and I. Both of us have heard these stories over and over again. Both of us need to be reminded over and over again. She forgets the details of the story; I forget the ending. He won. There never has to be another cross.  I am struck by the selflessness of her love, by her fear that I might have to bear a cross. And I realize, through my theologically shaky explanations of forgiveness and salvation, that I don't really fully understand them myself. I'm still learning too.



"Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it."

Marked

People have a way of marking you. Little people—tiny little newborn people, especially—are particularly adept at it. They mark you in a way that you may or may not realize. Sometimes they create a memory so powerful that you can vividly replay it in your mind for the rest of your life. Other times you may not even realize they marked you at all, or at least you don’t realize that you were marked by that particular instant.

I attended my first OB clinical last week. I held tiny little babies, less than an hour old. I watched a father hold his newborn daughter for the first time, and as the tears rolled freely off of his face, his three-year-old son reached up to pat his new sister on the head, whispering, “Hello. It’s nice to meet you.”

Marked.

The littlest baby by the door kept crying. It’s not a bad thing for a newborn to do. Screaming helps the lungs develop and can help clear a gunky airway. So it’s not a bad thing. But I’ll never be good at the “cry it out” method. So I put on a pair of gloves. His arms were waving around wildly. I slipped a finger into his hand, and he clung to it. His little fingers couldn’t even wrap all the way around it. Another finger caressed his cheek, and he rooted toward it. I stroked the roof of his mouth, and he latched on. Then he was quiet. So comfortably, peacefully quiet.

Marked.

It’s been a while since I’ve held a baby that small. Nearly 14 months. I thought about Jessie a lot that day. I thought about her when a nurse’s response to my question of what can be done to reduce risk of infection when a likely HIV, HSV, or HPV positive mother gives birth in an area where detection or treatment of those disorders is limited was a clipped and cold, “Don’t bother. Move on to someone you can help.”  I thought about her when that baby took my finger. I thought about her when that dad looked at his daughter and tried to wrap his mortal mind around the weight of beauty in his arms. I thought about her every single time a baby cried. I thought about her when one of those newborns scratched me with his little claws, because I had forgotten about Jessie’s fingernails, and about how cutting them was so unbelievably nerve-wracking.

I didn’t know that I had been marked by that. By little baby fingernails.

Sometimes even plastic little people can mark you.  In lab the other day, one of the baby mannequins had on a hat. Just a generic little hospital baby hat.


But I’ve seen that hat before.


So I stood there, frozen, in the middle of a lab class surrounded by my classmates, unable to move or catch my breath or even see clearly, because I have been marked by a little pink and blue knit cotton hat.

OB is a foreign land to me. On the normal med-surg postpartum floor that I was on, no one was sick. There were few if any complications. It’s not an area of nursing that I’m attracted to—not that I want people to be sick, just that I recognize that people will be. I want to be there to help when they are. I was so very thankful that the babies I worked with that day didn’t have a myriad of tubes and wires running off of them. I was thankful that they didn’t have IVs running into their fragile little veins, threatening to burst them. Because I’ve been marked by that too.



I think Marked is a good thing.  It could be bad, I suppose—if one let it be a distraction rather than a motivation; a token of fear instead of the foundation of courage; a definition when it should be a memory and quiet reminder.  But Marked can be good. Marked reminds you what you’re fighting for. It demands and allows more determined passion than you originally thought possible. It is both a symptom and a catalyst of love, both a cursed and blessed ability of the human spirit.

I have been marked.


I pray you are too.