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She nodded.
He looked at Samantha again. “If you want me to, I can connect you to her. She’s a longtime member of our family here, and she is a sponsor for lots of people.”
And then Samantha knew who he meant. “Oh, I think I do know her. There’s a woman who sits in the back. I’ve seen her at meetings.” She didn’t add that when she saw her there, she either hid or left, scared of someone from church finding out that their flutist was a drunk.
“That’s probably her. Do you want me to connect you?”
Did she? Not really. She bristled at the thought of someone else rifling around in her personal garbage. “Yes, please.”
“Great. Okay. What else can I do to help?”
“I don’t know,” Samantha admitted. “But thank you for not being all judgy and ...” She didn’t know how to say it. “... you know.”
Darren leaned back in his chair. “Samantha, we all have our thorns. Yours is no worse than mine or Cindy’s or anyone else’s.”
She didn’t think that was true—Cindy’s thorn was probably a harmless addiction to romance novels—but she didn’t argue.
“Thank you for telling me. I can do a better job of being your pastor if I know you, the real you. And I’m excited to see what God’s going to do here. I think your recovery is going to bring him lots of glory.” He held both hands up. “No pressure and no hurry. When you are ready to share what he’s done and what he’s doing in your life, then it’s going to be awesome. Your story is going to magnify him in awesome ways.”
There it was. That cryptic message. “Magnify,” she repeated.
“You know, anytime I try to explain something by comparing God to something else, it always falls short. It’s hard to really describe God with words and even ideas, but that’s the only way I know to do it, other than shepherding people into experiencing him on their own. But anyway, I’ll try to explain what I mean. The moon is huge, right? But we can’t see much of it. It’s far away, but if you use a telescope to magnify that image, you can see it much better. More clearly, in more detail. You still don’t fully understand the moon, but you know a lot more about it than you did. And that information makes it more real to you.
“So God is obviously more exciting than the moon. But that’s the only way I can think to explain it. When you let God work in your life, and someone else sees that, they get a bigger, clearer picture of that part of who God is. They then have a better understanding, and he becomes realer to them.
“You’re not really making God bigger. That’s impossible. But you’re making him biggerto them. To their eyes.Imagine if all of his believers did that all the time. Imagine how big God would seem to everyone watching.”
October 10
Dear Frank,
I woke up this morning in a sour mood. It doesn’t happen often these days, but every once in a while, I just get stuck in this rut of feeling sorry for myself. Why did you have to leave me so soon? Why did our kids move so far away? I get lonely, which is stupid because I have God, I know this, but I am lonely, and I don’t want to do anything but eat ice cream and watch Matlock. And I’ll tell you, watching Matlock is nowhere near as fun without you. By the way, I almost always had it figured out before you did, but I always let you be the smart one. Ha!
So this morning was one of those times, and I really, really didn’t want to go to church. But I made myself go and seriously, thank God I did.
I had no idea, but Samantha just up and told me that she’s an alcoholic. I’ll tell you, she has hidden it quite well. Though now that she’s told me, I can also look back and see some signs. She sure has been sad and withdrawn. Almost secretive.
Anyway, I handled it well, I think. You would have been proud of me. I’m so glad she told me instead of any of the people in church she could have told who might not have been so friendly.
Frank, I am rarely grateful for those early years where we used to do some stupid, stupid stuff, but I was grateful today because I could hear the pain in her voice, and I understood it. Alcohol can be such a dangerous animal, and I’m so glad she told me because now I am praying up a storm. Pastor set up a prayer team for her, and we are on it!
In fact, I should probably be praying right now, so I’ll sign off.
Love you bunches, Frank. Thank you for doing life with me.
Love,
Cindy
