Thursday, January 24, 2008

Happy Birthday, Jonathan...January 24, 1984

Hi everyone...

This was a response to a person on Change.org who is active in working with the disabled in Horse Therapy...


Change.org has become something which allows those of us who desire to bless the whole earth, to find some mutual point of contact on some aspect of our broken world to bring us together to create change.

My involvement in Horse Therapy only lasted for sex months; but the memory of that experience has stayed with me for fourteen years...

Change is tapping into our hidden powers, to create change; we are becoming part of the change which we desire to create. This power is becoming global and infinite, and cannot be measured by our collective strength in material Things.

Most of my life I have been fascinated with the origins of words; my first book of word origins was an unabridged dictionary in our home, when I was about four years old. My desire to learn was strong enough to sneak out of our house and follow by brother to the bus and try to get to school with him...my mom went to the teachers' supply store and got me some books about phonics.

I would ask her for the meaning of the words in a book- any book- and mom would say: "Look it up in the dictionary". I discovered something more interesting than the definitions...the ancient origins of the compound words, and very quickly built a polysyllabic vocabulary; and learned to sound out words by syllables...

To make the story short, I read books like encyclopedias, trying to absorb everything ever written...which continued for several years, until I learned to focus on the best books; the ones we would consider to be sacred books...starting with the Christian Bible. I tried to internalize everything I read, and began to selective in my reading. I started reading biographies of great men; mostly great Americans.

When I met my wife, I discovered that we were both consuming biographies at the same age...she was reading about great women.

I would realize at intervals of down time, that reading was preparation; and that some of what I read was supposed to translate into actions. I had no idea what my role was to be, but I still had to grow up and sit in schoolrooms, and study things which did not fit as yet into my world view.

I found greater clarity from year to year, by practicing faith and good works; not fitting in with my peers, but seeking adult conversation in bible study groups and others who spoke openly about politics and religion...all the taboos for the children who get bored with adult conversations and run off and play cruel children games against peers who do not fit into the child mold.

When Jonathan was born, I had just applied for a job with the Corrections Department, and was making a choice to abandon my dream of independence, to go to work in the prisons!! When he was delivered by emergency C-Section, I could only see shock on the faces of the nurses, and their immediate reaction was to rush our baby from the room, after covering his face with a blanket; the doctor ordered my wife to be sedated/knocked out, and I had to rush out of the room after the nurses, demanding to see my son...

He was born with cleft lip and palate, which extended to the eyelids of both sides of the nose, which was above the level of his eyes; at first I could not determine if he had both eyes, until he opened them and looked at me, and stopped crying, as our eyes locked for an instant, and we both knew that we could help each other through anything in Life.

I was reborn that night; I was no longer trying to find my purpose in life...it was my firstborn! As the questions came from family on both sides, who were blindsided by this event, since no one knew the conditions prior to birth, and Jonation was the first child on both sides, the only one who knew that I was okay- that I was up to the challenge- was my mom. When people would hear about our son's "condition" they would react with negative,or pitiable remarks; such as, it will be okay...; after meeting Jonathan, they would be overcome with feeling of wonder, with love and compassion, and would come back to me with greater understanding of God's love for them, and would connect the love they felt from our son with the purest love of God, and they understood that personage to be, in all of its glory and splendor! I still marvel, as I remember how that first impression changed everyone who met him, over many years...

I can only guess how this must feel to read this; you will probably know better than I what message you are being blessed to receive at this time in your life. The chances we have in this life to experience non-judgemental love from others is extremely rare; most women know this from giving birth. I have never felt such love from anyone in my life, as I felt from Jonathan; as if the whole universe was sending their love to my soul, and I was prepared at that moment in time to receive it. I know that there were other people who were also changed forever by making eye contact with Jonathan...

I hope that your work with the disabled will help you to know pure love, and if enough people are changed, we will see the change spread to all of the families of the earth, as was promised to Abraham and Sarah, we do not know how many generations were also promised to be a blessing to all people; we know from Abraham's experience that his seed would bless all the kindred/families of the earth...Abraham was blessed with infinite love, and recorded that experience for our times.

Perhaps it is in working with the least of these our brethren and sisters that all families will be blessed with infinite love; the evidence of love is like the sunrise...someimes we can look at a photo, and think that the sunrise is actually a sunset in our life....

Thanks for listening, and I apologize for the looong post...

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