This print hangs in my kitchen.It holds some of my daddy's favorite words. He loved to memorize and quote poetry, and this one, from the pen of Myra Brooks Welch, was a favorite. It's the story of an old beat up violin that was being auctioned. No one wanted it until a man stepped forward, took the instrument and its bow and began to play. And then the bidding went high, higher and highest!
Of course, the value of the violin increased because of the music that came when a Master took the bow to its strings.
We all loved it when daddy quoted a poem or scripture or sang a line or two from a song from his youth.
This is the week that we remember what to me might be the most precious experience of my life....when the pain got unbearable and daddy called for a nurse, when I gently encouraged him that the medicine that I was placing inside his mouth was to help him relax, when his minister, Rev. Kevin Pound repeated the words of the 23rd Psalm and put the name Earl in rather than saying "MY" and daddy's sweet spirit just sort of wafted out the window to dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
There are four children and three spouses of those children, 11 grandchildren and 7 spouses of those grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren, who in addition to the love of his life, Iva Lou, sisters, brothers in law, nieces, nephews, and many friends - miss him still.
We all miss different parts of him....Gator football; golf, Gospel music, and the fact that he really understood that he had a better life because he gave his life to Christ as a young man.
I thought of him this week when I read these words in a devotional, Practicing His Presence which is a compilation of some letters written by Brother Lawrence and Frank Laubach, a missionary to the Philippines.
Laubach wrote that he had a mind bent to explore and to respond to Christ as a violin responds to the bow of the Master.
I think that's what my daddy did - I believe he knew the value of the Master's hand on his life - and we all are better for it!
May your life be filled with enough Sunshine...
...to make you appreciate the Shadows
