Weekend Words

From A Year's Journey with God - Jennifer Rees Larcombe

 

The Old Teddy Bear 

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.  They lived in a land of shadows, but now light is shining on them.  You have given them great joy, Lord; You have made them happy.

(Isaiah 9:2-3a)

Several of us had been helping to clear an old lady's attic when I found him.  Squashed in a box full of rubbish, he looked so lonely and forlorn.  All the love he had received eighty years before had worn away his fur and during his years of banishment the mice and moths had wrecked him.  He leaked sawdust, his ears hung by threads and one glass eye was missing.

'Help yourself to anything you want, my dears,' the old lady told us, and while the others picked plates and vases I chose the teddy.  'These antique bears can be quite valuable,' I told them defensively.  'Not that one!' they replied.

On many evenings that winter I worked away at him, darning, patching, restoring and finally knitting him a colourful new suit and hat.  He spent so long on my lap that we grew far too close to each other ever to be parted again.  When I look at him now I often remember the promise Jesus makes to mend us when life messes us up (Isaiah 61:1).  He definitely does just that, but He does seem to take a very long time to do it sometimes!  Perhaps it is while He does the mending that we grow 'too close to Him ever to be parted again'?

When we have been loved once but then forgotten, like my bear, loneliness hurts!  But Jesus promises to be the sort of friend who never walks away (Hebrews 13:5).

He is our clothing; out of love for us He wraps us around, fastens the clasp, and enfolds us in His love, so that He will never leave us. - Julian of Norwich