How to Maybe Heal the World {a Little}
It’s COVID Quarantine Day 25 for us. I actually went back and counted just now–I’d long lost track.
The scene is my girl’s bedroom, sun sinking in the early April sky.
It’s been a while since I heard voices from the room next door, which means my husband’s succeeded at calming our 9-year-old son.
My current charge is our nearly-seven-year-old daughter, and she’s still got needs. (To be clear, both our kids have special needs, but our girl’s needs for security tend to last longer into the evenings.)
The fan needs to be pointed this way; I need this blanket on me, turned this way, not that way. I need to change into shorts—my legs are hot. Can you cover me up again? I need clean water in my cup. Now can you turn the fan the other way, Mom?
I sorta wanna cry.
Except…
Ten minutes earlier, I did our “scratch my back and every limb to a different song” routine, in which I sing the same songs nightly, and have since Maia was two. She will not allow a change in the bedtime setlist.
But tonight, on COVID Quarantine Day 25, Jesus kinda—I don’t know. Showed up. Smack dab in the middle of Jesus Loves Me, when visions of the whole wide globe started scrolling through my head like on an old-fashioned slide projector.
I let the images of His heart roll by, one by one.
“Little ones to Him belong…”
Children at home endless hours while exhausted parents work at essential jobs.
“They are weak, but He is strong.”
Overflowing ICU’s. Individual lives, nuanced stories. The families represented. The hearts.
“Yes, Jesus loves me.”
More faces. Medical providers. First responders. Inadequate PPE…
“Yes, Jesus loves me.”
Nations. Refugee camps. The elderly. The lonely. The suddenly unemployed and afraid.
“Yes, Jesus loves me….”
I read about families in developing nations having to hunt through garbage dumps for their children’s next meal, handling medical waste with bare hands. Because of COVID. Because food supplies are cut off.
Commence song number two: “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world…”
My songs to her go on, the same bedtime songs my mom sang when I was tiny, the songs my grandma sang to her. And I find myself caught up in both the horror and the beauty of what is happening to our planet; the horror and the beauty—and the imminent nearness—of God’s heart in it all.
How He desires to make Himself known.
And maybe this is worship: to lay ourselves down for these ones right in front of us again, while we’re quarantined face-to-stir-crazy-face with no escaping one another. Or while we’re staying distanced and alone for day four million twelve, an act of honor for our community. Authentically showing up to our lives, again and again, however, we’re able, knowing God’s heart is moved by our wholeheartedness here, mess and all, and our attentive presence here can translate to presence to Him.
AND. Maybe if while we do all this showing up, we carry a tiny vision of His precious world in our soul—just holding it before Him as we love, serve, rest, lament—then maybe in all of it we’re also releasing His heart over the world. Over every reeling nation, every sick person, every precious one in need, every grieving family, every scared soul.
Peace, be still. Heal, loves. Heal.
Little ones to Him belong. We are weak, but He is strong.
Give praise to the Lord, proclaim his name;
make known among the nations what he has done.
Sing to him, sing praise to him;
tell of all his wonderful acts.
Glory in his holy name;
let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.
Look to the Lord and his strength;
seek his face always.
--Psalm 105:1-4
Dana Butler is a writer, musician, and mom living in Denver CO and she serves on the Board of Directors for Torn Curtain Arts.