Stones of Remembrance

Eighty-one years of life is a long time. God has packed it full for me. Old folks like me have many stories to tell if anyone would care to listen.

I have picked up stones memorializing God’s goodness. These are the stories of God’s blessings and dealings, which at times brought pain but were meant for my good. There have been many beginnings, milestones, turnarounds, meetings, and partings. There have been pain and healing, rejection and redemption, successes, and failures, but through it all, God kept His promise to me when I was a young college graduate in search of my place under the sun. “The LORD will keep you from all harm—He will watch over your life; The LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forever.” (Psalm 121:7–8 NIV).

This book is quite faithful to its original title: The Ode: majorraquelramblings. Altogether it is an ode to life in Christ, and the stories, indeed, are ramblings. These blogs are not chronologically arranged. I hope I don’t confuse you too much.

These days I have the luxury of having time to spend on the things I love to do but seemed to never have had time for. As I sit in my rocking chair, reminiscing, I am constantly reminded that I have more days behind me than before me. Like many of my age, I enjoy going back to the past and relishing the stories of God’s faithfulness and goodness, stones of remembrance I picked up as I walked with God through the years. They came my way through people who have profoundly touched my life, at places where God’s hand has taken me, and experiences I’ve lived through. I wish to pass them on to you.

I have learned a lot from the Old Testament story of Esther, a young Jewish girl. God seems to be undercover in this book of the Bible. It doesn’t even mention His name. But as one reads it, one becomes aware of His presence in the lives of His people. God met me at a young age, and though there were times when His presence didn’t seem evident, I knew He was always with me, directing my life.

I want to think that I have carried on an unceasing conversation with the Almighty throughout my many years. I have asked for wisdom, direction, protection, courage, or sometimes, just some word of assurance that I am not alone. I know it should not amaze me, but it does (because my understanding of His power and sovereignty is so limited) that this God who holds the universe and each life in it concerns Himself with every detail of my life. He keeps the heavenly bodies hanging just right and in complete sync with each other. He makes sure the ocean waves come back to the shore a hundred times or so a day. He has our precious earth at an axial tilt of about 23.44° in His hands. And yet He still has time and concern to help me when my computer freezes as I frantically finalize a lawyer’s brief for a 3:00 p.m. court filing or my request for a parking spot for my big station wagon on the busy Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco. He saw Don’s and my secret craving for some of California’s See’s chocolates on the second Indonesian Christmas of our missionary term. He had someone send us a pound. He knew that as good as these chocolates were, it wasn’t really what we wanted. We desperately needed a touch from home as we experienced the greater problem of loneliness and the isolation of Christmas in a Muslim country. Then there is the story on page 25. His message came to us loud and clear. We were starting our ministry in the city of Surakarta, away from our missionary friends, and apprehensive about it. As He provided us in a most intricate way the gamma globulin to protect the rest of our family from Don’s hepatitis, He let us know that, indeed, He had all our affairs in His hands. I take Him at His word when He says in Matthew 10:29–30 (NIV), “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.”

At times, His answers come through quickly, loud, and clear. At other times, He chooses to be quiet. We have intimate times of fellowship during the early morning hours as I read the Bible and talk to Him. But even during the times when He seems to be quiet, I feel His presence. I have learned that one bought by the precious blood of Christ has God’s constant presence. Sometimes we compartmentalize our lives. We split them into the secular and the sacred. But God does not cease to be present when I’m at a Starbucks and appears when I’m in church. My stories reflect this. I am no more or less a Christian as a pastor’s wife or as a legal assistant at city hall. I hope I have been a consistent Jesus follower, whether working with city hall politicians, making latté macchiato in a Christian library coffee bar in Germany, or teaching Sunday school. Each day my prayer has been that I would always be conscious of His abiding presence wherever I am and whatever I do.

For those of us who are now on this side of fifty, sixty, and beyond, I pray that as you look at these stones with me, you will savor once again your own blessings that God has poured on you and the joys He has generously brought into your life. I hope you will be reminded of those times when God’s presence was all you had, and hanging on to Him, He carried you through the dark and painful times. Held by the steadfast nail-pierced hands of the Savior, you’ve walked on till light broke through.