Site
Contents
 |
Imagine Indiana Transition Team Information
General Information about the Area Office
North Indiana Conference Office
South Indiana Conference Office
Area United Methodist
Foundation
Prayer Guides
(Courtesy of the NIC Prayer Team)
For resources to assist your congregation in welcoming guests,
click here
Seashore District Volunteer Center VIM project -- Completed
Hoosier United Methodist News Archives
| Hoosier United Methodist News |
May 2001 |
My Leahs
Dinah tells the stories of her mothers, Leah, Rachel, Zilpah, Bilha -- the four wives of Jacob. These are intimate stories of a Cananite family tribe. Tales, ancient yet familiar, of kinships rich with feeling and conflict. And also great tenderness.
As I read the Red Tent, Anita Diamant's novel, Dinah's mothers appeared in my imagination, peering out from their veils with eyes I knew. They looked very like those of my own mothers: Virginia, Dorothy, Verna, Mary.
We each have many mothers in our lives, if we're lucky. Aunts, grandmothers, mentoring women of all sorts, each bringing her own irreplaceable gift.
Like Dinah, I carry these accumulating gifts, unconsciously most often, but always close to me every day. They are simple but important: trusting; whistling; the art of pies; a quiet, goofy humor; what to do for a lost dog; the value of disappointment; comfortable entertaining; tending the faith; keeping promises. These are gifts that will always be mine. Gifts beyond counting, beyond price.
My Leah, my Rachel, my Zilpah are mothers by blood -- and also by circumstance. There are women who enter our lives for only a short time, but each comes as a mother bearing love and lessons, if we have the heart to receive them.
The old, aching spiritual "Sometimes I feel like a motherless child," was born out of an earlier time -- one of separation for many from the emotional tap root all humans must have to be fully human. It is those who have felt like a motherless child at some point in their lives who undoubtedly have the sharpest appreciation for the thing that was missing.
Like Dinah, I've never had to feel motherless, a blessing for which I can only be amazed and grateful. But I know there are countless souls whose story that song still tells.
My own mother is with me still in sprit and always. She is reminding me that I must become someone else's Leah. Someone in need of gifts only I can give.
Keep reading …
Last updated January 14, 2004