Simply Girls
“Friendship is the only cement that will ever hold the world together.”
I met her at church one Sunday. She had a smile on her face, but as she shared her story it was a hard life. She knew homelessness. But she had a child and was fighting to get back on her feet. I was the opposite, I had just started my career for real. My job was being the worship leader at the church of my dreams. But in the hall, as life often does, our worlds collided.
She mustered up courage to give me a compliment. Knowing she was new I asked her name. She simply said, “Mary.”
There was something in the way she said it that pulled at my heart. There was a loneliness as if most had forgotten her name. There was a stirring within to extend an invitation. My brain yelled, “slow down Dianne!” giving lists of reasons I needed to move on… but she seemed so small standing there in the busy hall.
After a church service, is a strange time. People are buzzing around greeting each other, laughing at jokes and slapping each others backs. It seems so warm, like a Hallmark movie and yet each person walking the halls also carries a struggle, a list of questions tugging long and hard on their hearts.
Will life be better when I leave this place?
Did God hear my desperate prayer?
Does anyone else feel afraid or as doubtful as I do?
It is hard to hear or see these questions on the professional church goers face. They have conditioned themselves to look and act as pure and clean as a crystal vase holding a dozen fresh cut roses. I tried to join them yet deep inside I knew I was pretending. And in the Hall that day, I saw her, a young woman I will call Mary, standing most honestly alone.
“Mary,” I said. “Would you like to come to my house for lunch?” I knew that I wasn’t a very good cook, but I asked her anyway.
“Yes, yes,” she said then became uneasy, “but I have a daughter…”
“It’s okay, I have two. I am sure they will love to play together,” I replied quickly getting excited to have a guest.
She came that day. We sat on the couch as she rolled out her story. Her husband had bouts of depression and violence and was seeking help, but his struggles had forced Mary and her young daughter to fend for themselves. She was hopeful of getting out of the shelter to a real home soon.
I listened quietly, gathering her words. Like water draining from the tub down through the pipes I felt them resonating into my toes. I tried to put myself in her shoes, but I realized my focus had been a million miles away from the desperate road she had walked. At present I had been trying very hard to fit the role of perfect worship leader. I was obsessed with my hair, clothes, and make-up looking just so.
As I took notice of her blond hair pulled back in a ponytail and her faded sweatshirt and worn out jeans I felt sad. Sad that I had succumbed to a superficial lie. I held her hand as I prayed for her. A tear traveled up from that deep place her story had awakened. I could hear the little voices of our daughters playing in the other room. Effortlessly they giggled and played as if worlds never collided, as if we all were simply girls.
“Mary, what can I do to help you?” I asked.
She looked at her hands for a moment. Then she looked up at me, I noticed the clear blue in her eyes, pure and clean like water.
“You have done it,” she said. “I just needed to know that someone really cared…thank you.”
She gathered her daughter after giving me her phone number, then she was gone.
I looked out the door after her with a heart stirred and fully alive.
I wish I could say I stayed in that awakened space, but as life is so prone to do I was soon distracted again. I became friends with Mary from that day. The Lord was gracious to her and she was able to find a real home. Meanwhile, I continued to beat myself into an image I thought was needed. Slowly I began to notice the toll it was taking on my soul. I so desperately wanted to sit down with Mary, but life had become too busy and the noise in the Church hall drew me away.
Much later after my world started to crumble, I remembered the lesson I learned from Mary that day so many years before. Life had brought me to a humble place that no amount of make-up, good hair, or fine clothes could cover. It was in that place of brokenness that I came to God with the few belongings I had left. I felt like Mary in the church hall broken and afraid, wondering if any woman would venture to say “hello” as if we all were simply girls.
“Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.”
Life is hard. We need each other. Who has been a special friend in your life? Think back to a time when you felt alone and that special person helped you through. Take time today to reach out and connect again. Who knows how your words could be exactly the medicine needed to make a troubled heart happy again.
