What is the Something You CAN Do?
/“I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.”
what’s in your “tool box”? Can you paint, write encouraging cards, grow vegetables, bake, play an instrument?
I was very young when I learned about the power of the creative arts to stir and influence the hearts of people. At age four, my parents asked my full blood Creek babysitter to teach me how to sign the Lord’s Prayer in Native American Sign Language. I performed it at half-time of the homecoming football game at Riverside Indian Boarding School. Later my parents would take me to Native churches to sign the song and it never failed to move much of the congregation to tears. I am in awe when I think about how God’s plan for my life to inspire and motivate others to pray was laid out even before I was born.
Only He knew that I would grow up to have a daughter who was deaf, and that I would teach her to sign the same song. That I would publish her story and that her message of hope would touch millions around the world. Maegan was deaf and terminally ill, but it did not stop her from serving others and spreading hope.
Vanessa means “Butterfly” and this image reminds me that we can bring beauty and hope even in the midst of brokenness.
Jeff and I were residence hall directors at a college dorm that also housed the blind students on campus. Maegan was drawn to them and they to her, and it was always quite the interpreting experience. The blind student would talk to her and I would sign what he said. Then she would sign back and I would voice what she signed. And heaven forbid that we should walk into the lounge when a movie was on.
Blind students: “What’s happening now?” (I voice what is happening on screen)
Maegan: What did they say? (Sign to Maegan audio on movie and commentary by blind students)
Blind students: “Is that Maegan? What’s she signing?” Oy.
She loved to tease them. Once she was carving pumpkins with the resident assistants when Brent and his dog came in. He heard Maegan and reached out to shake her hand. She giggled and put a handful of pumpkin goop in his hand!
One of my favorite stories, though, is the time she and I walked into the residence hall lounge and saw Eddie drinking a strawberry soda. Maegan signed to me, “ask him how he knows which button to push on the pop machine since he can’t see.” I asked and he replied, “I don’t know, I just push one and take whatever I get.” Maegan was stunned by this because her favorite drink was Dr. Pepper. From that day on, she was relentless. It was certainly a lesson in intercession because she continued to petition the one who could do something about it (me) until finally I had braille labels placed on the soda machine buttons.
Maegan said that her main purpose was “to teach people about love and about Jesus”.
That incident taught me several things, but the main thing I learned was that no matter what challenges you are facing or how much you are hurting, it always helps to look around and ask how you can be a blessing to someone else. It’s one of those “opposite-world” Kingdom principles. You break the power of lack and greed by giving. You break the power of anger and bitterness by choosing to forgive. And you break the power of despair and hopelessness by offering hope and help to someone else.
Recently I was at the pool at our apartment and was drawn into a conversation with some neighbors. They had a one year old daughter and the mother was frustrated because her daughter was fussing but she didn’t know why. Was the concrete too hot? Was she tired or hungry?
I started talking with her about Baby Sign Language and the next day both dad and mom were encouraging me to teach an online Baby Sign course. To be honest, I could tell from our first conversation that we had opposing political views. But we chose to focus on what we could agree on—how we could help their beautiful daughter express her needs and communicate with her parents.
I created the Baby Sign Course so that I could help my new friends, but also so that I could use my own experience and gifts to spread some joy and hope to other families. It was the “something I could do” in the midst of these uncertain times. My neighbors helped to promote the course and now we are developing a beautiful friendship through the common goal of teaching their baby to sign.
You can enroll in the Baby Sign Language Course here: https://purposed-heart.teachable.com/p/baby-sign-language
A few years ago, I watched a short film that moved me deeply. You can look it up by googling “Isabelle’s Garden Sundance Festival” or watch it here. It is a story of how a little Choctaw girl in southeast Oklahoma battles the spirit of poverty by growing a garden and sharing the vegetables with her people. She writes encouraging words in Choctaw on the baskets she delivers, and because she chooses to do the one thing she CAN do, an entire community is nourished in body and spirit.
Short film video by Jeffery Palmer. You can watch it here.
“But when God, who set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles. . .”
What about you? What is your “one thing” that you can do to meet someone’s need or brighten someone’s day this month? Do you bake? Crochet? Paint? Sew? Write poems or encouraging cards? In Galatians 1:15-16, Paul said that God revealed Jesus to him so that he might “preach” or express Him to others. Paul used words. What will you use?
