Pieced Together

Wednesday in the Second Week of Lent

Your faithfulness remains from one generation to another;
you established the earth and it abides.
Psalm 119:90

Pieced together with one-inch squares of faded fabric, the quilt spreads a swath of gentle color across the end of the bed. It comes from my grandmother’s house, and I do not know exactly whose hands stitched all those pieces together. If I look closely, I will see the small, careful stitches underneath the border. Hand-sewn. How many stitches, I wonder, encompass that border? And could she who patiently framed this coverlet with needle and thread ever have imagined this room in which I sit? Or me?

Along with this quilt, my inheritance includes the faithfulness of generations of women. My grandmother. My godmother, her sister-in-law. A great-great Aunt whose stories I heard even if I never met her. A white wooden church in a small prairie town. Black and white photos of solemn-faced matriarchs.

My life and my journey of faith are also pieced together, and I like to imagine these women who are part of my legacy patiently holding me in their hands and stitching a framework of love around my life. And all of us held together in the loving arms of God who called us each into being.

For the moment, this quilt abides, although it may not last for my daughters to contemplate it years from now. But the love, patience, faithfulness, hard work, creativity, and expertise it encompasses endure from generation to generation. And if any of these fail, if it all falls to pieces, even then nothing is lost. For God is ever faithful, and Love abides.