Children love to ask why. When you answer why there is another why; But there are "whys" that can stir your hearts and minds.
A Child Screams
My neighbors are not exactly private persons, what happens in their house can be seen and heard by the compound. One afternoon, their only child (three and a half years old) was screaming, "Mommy, open the door." He was crying and screaming. He gave up and went to his yaya (nanny) and asked, "WHY don't they want to open the door for me?" And the nanny calmly replied, "There's NOTHING we can do if that is what they want." The incident, in itself, is heartbreaking. A well-off family. Both parents are practicing professionals in a reputable, high-paying eye clinic but can not heed the cry of an only child.
That moment stirs my heart because in life, there is sometimes a little child inside screaming. Sometimes, there are things happening around in life that I wish would just stop. I scream and cry out inside, "Why do they do the things they do? Do something." Sometimes, it feels like God's only answer is the same as the nanny, "There's nothing we can do, that is their choice." And yet there are moments when an action would be asked of me and I am that nanny who surrenders in defeat to the things of life and say, "There's nothing I can do if that is what they want."
In this tapestry of life, sometimes it is difficult to live with the choices of other people. Yet, me must respect them and can not force our choices on them. There are times it is difficult to make the right choice even though we firmly believe it is the right thing to do.
Still, there is that power given within us, that even amidst the choices of others, we remain to have a choice to respond to these choices. We can stand by what we believe in. We can guide others to other options. And even if we make a wrong choice in the process, there is always a CHOICE after a CHOICE. This "choice after a choice" is the manifestation of our loving God who never abandons us. He never surrenders in defeat. He gives us a chance to make the right choice again and again. In His grace and mercy, He gives us a chance to right a wrong choice. That is the beauty of God, He truly sets us free. He wants us to be free to journey in that inexhaustible richness of love.
A Child Hurts
One of the most disturbing why I had encountered was when a young girl of 10 asked me, "Why is my surname different from my father?" She was a child borne of her mother's relationship with a married man who eventually married the father she had come to grow up with. I answered it the best way I can, telling her the truth that the father she has is not her real father. She understood it and in some way, she must have already heard about it. She just needed to confirm it. What struck me with that incident is the child's face. The flood of tears and the visible hurt she must be feeling in her young life. It is difficult to see a child in physical pain, but it is so much harder to see a child in such emotional pain. It wasn't a screaming voice, it was but a quiet stream of tears. The eyes that lost sparkle of joy.This face of pain was inscribed in my heart, and it saved me from recklessly being involved in such relationships. It made me take a look at what love is beyond emotion because true love could not have caused that hurt in a child. It was a lesson to seek what true love really is.
God is love, and the opposite of love, then, must be sin. Sometimes we are not really in love, just in sin.
