Saturday in the Third Week of Lent
Lord, you have been our refuge
from one generation to another.
Psalm 90:1
She was a formal woman, a matriarch, proper and thus somewhat stiff. She had a role to play in her small town that was all about being genteel and strictly courteous. But I remember visits with her when she would provide medicine in the form of red hots or chocolate chips to my poor ailing stuffed animals and pull me into the refuge of her lap and rocking chair.
I wonder now about her prayer life. Did she rise early in the morning to read the psalms? Did she cry out to God in times of distress or lift her face to the holy in gratitude? By the time I was a young adult, her mind was consumed with anxiety. I never got to ask her about her faith.
But the small church in her midwestern town still carries her legacy. A legacy of faith that is present in children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren. Faith that carried her through two world wars.
In God’s time, she is here with me now, offering strength and resilience in place of red hots. Extending her refuge of love, which of course is an extension of the sanctuary of Love itself.
