This morning in prayer I had a conversation with God.
Me: Thank you, Lord, for all your blessings. I love you.
God: I love you more.
Me: I know that’s true. Thank you for loving even little old me.
It has been over 4 years since my dear Mike died. Weeks before he died, while in hospice care, he came to faith and asked to be baptized. My friend and former pastor videotaped Mike’s testimony at his baptism. Mike said that reading Romans 6:23 had been the turning point for him, that he realized God’s gift of salvation is available for everyone, in Mike’s words, “including little old me.”
Mike’s use of the phrase “little old me” speaks volumes about the man. He was a big, strong man. He trained horses and climbed mountains. His sentimentality was entwined with gristle. I loved him but he could be so doggone uncommunicative, impenetrable sometimes that I became frustrated trying to maintain a relationship with him. He was a porcupine, quills positioned to protect his tender heart from hurt.
And I was a porcupine too. The deep hurt from my failed marriage kept me in protective mode, so afraid I would get crushed again.
In the final year of his life, we both let down our prickly defenses and just loved one another like there was no tomorrow. Because, for one of us, there was no tomorrow.
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