Tuesday, 11 August 2009 20:22
A couple of months ago, I began playing keyboard with the Sunday morning worship team at church. Usually, I spend some time on Saturday going over the next day's music and making sure I understand all the words. Last Saturday, as I was doing this at home, I ran into a grammatical structure I couldn't make heads or tails of, so I decided to take it next door to Nina and ask her to explain it to me. Remember that Nina is a Communist who basically believes God is dead and thinks we're crazy for wasting every Sunday at church, so I was interested to see what her response to the song would be.
Her response, actually, blew me away.
She read through the lyrics which were taken right from Psalm 139: You hem me in behind and before; You have laid your hand upon me...Where can I go from your presence? Where can I run from your Spirit? If I go up to Heaven, you are there; If I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. She read the words through a second time, then a third and fourth and fifth time.
"That's so beautiful!" she told me. "Is there any more to it?"
I told her that yes, it was straight from the Bible and there was a lot more to it. I went home and got a Bible and brought it over, and for the first time in her life she opened it and we read it together. She read the entire Psalm twice to herself and nearly forgot I was in the room with her, so enthralled was she with the words. Afterward, she sat back and said, "I've never read the Bible before."
She wanted to read the words to the rest of Sunday's songs, so I brought them over and together we went through all 8 of them together. She was amazed. I gave her a Bible and explained the basic differences between Old and New Testaments and advised her to start in the Gospel of John, which is the story of Jesus: the love story of God making the ultimate sacrifice to buy back his people from slavery. She promised to read it.
A few weeks ago, I met a new neighbor, one I'd been interested in for awhile. She's a few years younger than me and her powder-pink car and generally glamorous appearance tipped me off that she sells Mary Kay. So one day, as we were both leaving our yards at the same time, I jumped out and introduced myself to her and told her I was interested in buying some Mary Kay (which is true). Today, she stopped by the house and came in and we had a great talk. She and her husband and daughter want to take English lessons from me (these are turning out to be a hot commodity.) Also, I bought lip gloss, which she's bringing over tomorrow. I think we'll be friends: we just 'clicked' like that. Her name is Lena.
The third neighbor I want to tell you about is a babushka (grandmother.) I've written many times about Babushka Olya, one of my first friends here in Krasnodar. She's the sweet old lady down the road: everyone meets in front of her house a few times a week on garbage day and waits for the trash truck to come by. Sometimes she has me in for coffee after garbage, and we show each other our photographs and tell our stories.
There's a second babushka on our street, who has not been nearly as friendly as Babushka Olya. For the first year we lived here--the whole year--she would not even look at us as we passed by. She just pretended we didn't exist. Around Christmas last year, she began to look at us and nod unsmilingly to acknowledge our presence if we walked or drove by. Then we went away to Austria for 3 months.
When we came back, to our surprise, this lady began to lift her hand when we went by--still no smile, but progress nonetheless. I began to go out of my way to say "Good morning" or to smile at her when we passed, and soon she was saying it back to me. A few weeks ago, I brought my trash bags down to Babushka Olya's for the regular Passing of the Trash Truck Event, and both babushka were sitting there chatting. So I pulled up a chair, and Lo! the other Babushka went right ahead and included me in the conversation; she smiled just as if she'd always thought the world of me, and when I admired some flowers in a nearby flowerbed, she promised to bring me up some. That evening, we found the flowers left in a bag just outside our gate. Tim and the boys built me a planter, and I planted them, and they are flourishing. Just before we parted ways after the Bearing Away of the Garbage Ceremony, I told her my name and asked for hers. Her name is Babushka Luba, and she is my new second grandmother on the street. She's not unfriendly, just extremely, painfully shy, and probably a bit suspicious, but who can blame her?
So little by little, we're coming to know and love our neighbors and to bloom--like my flowers from Babushka Luba--where we're transplanted. Pray that God will make the harvest a beautiful one.
