Who Knew?

Although I take almost all of the photos on this blog, I didn't take this one. I feel like I'm old enough to have been around in July of 1888 when this photograph of 8-year-old Helen Keller and her teacher Anne Sullivan was taken- but I don't remember ever having been in Brewster, MA so it couldn't have been me, right?

But it struck me as an interesting reminder of how little we know about the future, and how much the Lord knows. Duh!

Who could possibly have known when that photograph was taken of a blind, deaf girl sitting with her doll and her tutor, that Helen Keller would go on to become one of the most famous Americans in history? Certainly not the photographer who tucked it away in a family album where the photograph languished for nearly 120 years. And certainly not Anne Sullivan or even Helen Keller herself. And perhaps least of all her parents, who just hoped that their daughter might not end up living as a vegetable, tucked away in a dark room with a nurse.

None of us knows the end of the story when we're in the middle. None except the Lord. We would perhaps shrink away in fear if we had any idea of what the future holds- good or bad. Mr. and Mrs. Keller had no more idea than Mr. and Mrs. Moses, or Mr. and Mrs. Saul of Tarsus what the future held for their child.

I suspect Mr. and Mrs. Jesus had more of an idea... but surely they didn't comprehend the horror that would precede the glory.

Our job is to simply put one foot in front of the other, one day at a time as we raise our children. Loving them, teaching them and surrounding them with patience, wisdom, honesty and grace. The rest is up to God. At least, that's the way Boompa sees it.