A Most Timely Rescue. |
|
From the desk of George Barnard- October 28, 2003 Written by Sandra Milton. Author’s Note: The stories of the 1,111 Spirit Guardians are very insightful. They are inspiring, and they remind me of the wider reality in which we live. I think sometimes they inspire me to go on when I start to feel overwhelmed by things I see in the work I do. The stories also remind me that I can go just about anywhere, because those Guys are still out there protecting me, and I figure they wouldn’t send me anyplace I couldn’t handle - or anyplace they couldn’t handle! A Peace Corps Volunteer. An old friend from Colombia told me a story of a most timely rescue. I’m calling her "Anna," and she came to Colombia to work with an international, non-church-affiliated aid agency. Anna had been a Peace Corps volunteer in Uruguay, and while there, she had gotten herself pregnant. She decided to have the baby, but chose not to marry the father. After her stint with the Peace Corps, she returned to the US with her infant son, and to finish her master’s degree. While back at college, she met a man who became an agency director in Colombia. So when a position in Uruguay she would have liked to fill didn’t work out for Anna, she went to Colombia to work with this agency. Unforeseen Poverty. Anna’s problem was that the agency hired her as a ‘local hire,’ which meant that they didn’t pay her much, and Anna had no money at all. Her family did not have any funds to spare either, so the young mother was quite on her own. The agency director and his family housed her and her little boy for a time, but after a while she felt it was too much of an imposition on them, and she moved out. She related to me how she would sleep on the sidewalks of La Paz, with her son wrapped in newspapers, and then go up to the Alto area to work during the day, and take her son with her. Since they were working in rural areas the communities would often give them food, and this is how the two of them survived for quite a while. Obviously, they could not last this way, but rescue was close. A Mystery Man. One day a man came to her while she and her boy were out on the street, and he said, "We’ve been watching you for quite a while, and we think that it’s time for you to move into your own place. You do not need to be out here in the street any more. Come I will help you." Anna told him they were just fine, and there really was no problem, but he said, "Come this way and we’ll find you an apartment." The man had brought a list of places to rent, and he asked her how much she could pay. Poor Anna did not have enough for first and last month’s rent, and, as well, there would not be a penny left to buy furniture. This man wouldn’t take her objections seriously, and they did find an apartment that she felt would do them just right. And this kind man paid for the first and last month’s rent. As If By Magic! Anna told me it was the weirdest experience of her life. There was not a stick of furniture in that flat, but all of a sudden, as if by magic, things would appear - a fridge, a stove, tables, chairs, beds, and more. Then toys appeared for her son, and pretty soon they had everything they needed. She thanked the man whenever she saw him, and whenever she asked him who he was, he just told her something like, "God loves you," or "You must remember that God loves you." Anna thinks he told her those things, because he might have known she was really angry with God when she couldn’t find work or a place to live, and she thought God had abandoned her. As time went by, and Anna and her son got more and more settled in their new home, she saw the man less and less often. Your Mother Is Worried. One day, however, her benefactor arrived at her door, and he asked how everything was. Then he told her that her mother was worried about her, and that she wanted to hear from her. He told her to come to his office, and she could telephone her mom from there. So she went to his office in a big building in La Paz, and called her mother to say all was going extra well with them both. A month or two later he came by again, and he told her that now she was completely settled in, he would not be calling on them anymore, and he wished her well and said goodbye. Anna said the man had that right. She said she found it was true, because just a little later she met the man she would soon marry, and her life became much more stable with her dear husband. An Unusual Awakening. Whilst all this was going on - the flat, the money, the furniture and the toys - Anna did not stop to think about what strange fortune had been brought to her and her little one. Finally, a few months after she last saw their kind sponsor, she sort of woke up to it all. She decided to go and look for him, to belatedly thank him again for his kindheartedness. Strangely, she couldn’t find him anywhere. She even went back to the big building in La Paz, where his office was supposed to be, and she found, of course, there was no office in the place! Their kind friend remained illusive all during their stay in la Paz. Finally, Anna decided the man had really been an angel, sent to help them by God. Postscript. It is probably the most interesting story I ever heard from a woman with a big heart and a blessed soul. I’m just amazed at how people interpret these experiences. She and her family moved back to Colombia and she’s working for a Christian group. And, seriously, when this was all told to me, she had become so "fundamentalist Christian," I was shocked. Although, I guess it must make sense. It seems that when these things happen we don’t know what to do with them, so we put them away in the "boxes" of the realities we’ve been taught. Peace and be well, Sandy Milton. Sandy Milton is the author of the previously submitted "A Timely Midwayer Rescue." © 11:11 Progress Group. |