George

I have mentioned in an earlier blog my time spent on the farm with my great aunt and uncle. I visited for a week or two for a couple of years when I was about six or seven years of age. The memories are vivid. My second cousins, all of whom were adult males, loved to allow me to experience new frontiers for my age. I actually drove a Model “A” coup on the farm roads with the assistance of a cousin beside me in the passenger seat. I was placed on a very large work horse and rode him to the farm boundaries and back. It wasn’t until I was older that I realized that the horse was taking me on a very familiar route that the horse would have completed whether I was on his back or not. The speed was an extremely slow walk. I still remember the height and shear size of that beautiful and powerful animal. As long as I hung on to the mane there was no danger and indeed I did hold on. Only now can I imagine the amusement of all the adults around me to watch me being handled and babysat by that beautiful animal, when I actually believed that I was in control.

Within the farm house was another very edifying and humanizing experience. Housed in a large, clean and bright back bedroom was my second cousin George. George was severely developmentally delayed. Institutionalization was an unthinkable alternative to my Great Aunt. Indeed she cared for George every day of his life until she died. Not surprisingly, as so often happens to the handicapped, he died shortly after her passing. He lived into his thirties. He was bedridden and except for being carried to a chair, never left that room, at least during my visits. He required assistance to sit up in bed. His speech was unintelligible baby talk coming from an older teenager. At first I was somewhat fearful about entering that room. Over time I was encouraged to pay visits to George in his room. I became accustomed to his verbalizations and gestures and indeed spoke to him in response. I do remember that he seemed to enjoy my visits. I often marvel at the early education the Lord gave me in interacting with handicapped individuals. As an educator, I was destined to work with severely and moderately developmentally delayed students for a period of six years. They are my best remembered students.

I have over the last several years thought more and more about who I would like to greet and speak to in heaven. I cannot begin to assume that such will be possible, but with so many other fantastic experiences confirmed by scripture, I can at least enjoy very much the prospect of meeting others who have gone before me into heaven. I believe that the vast majority of us will get into heaven for not our good works but because of our faith and our belief. A certain few like George will be there by default. Since he was, over his short life, unable to profess his faith, a graceful and merciful Jesus has welcomed him into eternity. In 1Corinthians 15: 42-44, we read these wonderful words.

42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption.
43 It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power.
44 It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.

The natural body that failed George on this earth is raised in incorruption, in glory, and in power. I will meet him in his glorified spiritual body and he will be perfect in every way, as I will be. I will greet him, not in this weak and failing body, but in a glorified body designed to last into all eternity. I marvel at what he will be able to tell me. I marvel where my faith has taken me.

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