March 2013
51 ~~~~~~~
Behind the Mystery: The Elephant Test By EE Kennedy ©March 2013 There’s an old morality tale, I believe it comes from India, about four blind men who inspect an elephant. One grabs the animal’s trunk. “It’s a snake,” he says. Another finds himself reaching about the large, round leg. “It’s a column.” The third finds its tail. “No, it’s a rope,” he says. The fourth feels along the side. “You’re wrong, it’s a massive wall!” Nobody has it right, because they’re not getting the whole picture. Life can be like that. In a way, we’re just feeling our way along in the dark, and our impressions of what we feel may not always be right. I remember, many years ago, being secretly bitter about the move we were required to make for my husband’s work. My parents lived in Birmingham; our friends and church were there. We had a house and good neighbors. Why did we have to move to a microscopically small town in Texas? If you see a photo of me on our last day there, I have a very sad look on my face. I definitely wasn’t seeing the big picture. I did one thing right, however. I prayed and asked God to help me learn to appreciate our new home. The funny thing was, He was already working to answer prayers I’d murmured in the dark hours of the night. The public school our children were assigned to in Birmingham wasn’t safe. There had been a child abducted from just a block away, there was some alarming behavior on the playground and the staff and faculty were distant to the parents and their concerns. We had put our girls in Christian private school, but it was very expensive and only went as far as the sixth grade. “Please, Lord, help us find a good, safe school.”
town where we found ourselves. However, it was the county seat and the public school turned out to be just the sort of place I’d prayed for. The classes were small, the teachers and principal were friendly and I was welcome in the school building any time. (The PTO meetings led with prayer, which is why I’m not giving you the name of the town.) Eventually, these teachers became good friends and I was invited to substitute teach in the junior high. Our girls were afforded far more freedom than we’d have been willing to give them in the big city and they had their chance to shine in extracurricular competitions, including art, drama and music. Most of their friends were Christian, or professed to be, and they had a happy, safe childhood. Our eldest daughter met the young man who was to be her husband in Texas. When the time came for us to move to another state, years later, I felt really sad again. Texas was home. I loved Texas now. But the Lord had taught me a lesson. I’d learned that He had the big picture, I didn’t. North Carolina may have been unfamiliar at first, but knowing that the Lord had this in His Hands made all the difference. This time, it was our younger daughter who happened to meet her future husband in North Carolina. He’d never been anywhere near Texas! And there was another prayer answered: “Lord, please let our girls find fine, Christian husbands.” “Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways, acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.” Proverbs 3;5-6
There were no private schools in the tiny
©March 2013 ~ The Wordsmith Journal Magazine
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