“Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone?” — MATTHEW 7:9 (NIV)
I tasted hope today. It had a rich, luscious flavor, soothing as the rolling hills around me. It came in the shape of gnarled apple trees and grass.
Andrew and I were visiting a possible new school for our son John. This one was utterly unlike his current school. There was no asphalt basketball court, no chain-link fence, no yellow-painted cinderblock to lend false cheeriness to an otherwise dismal environment. It wasn’t the nightmare alternative we had visited the week before, filled with posters warning against guns and domestic violence. (“Things have gotten better,” the social worker there told us. “We don’t accept so many gang members anymore.”) Nor was it the sunny but overly sanitized school an hour’s drive away, where every door was locked, even the bathroom.
Here there was a pond and a swimming pool. The class size was eight students per teacher. The grounds were gorgeous. The admissions officer asked insightful questions. She had read John’s paperwork, understood his needs and thought this school could help him. My heart cried out, Yes! Yes! Accept him!
They did.
After the nightmare years of choosing among bad options, we finally had a good alternative. The city will pay for the school. A school bus will take John door to door. At last our son will be in an environment that is truly therapeutic. It may not solve all his problems, but there is tremendous joy in being able to give your child bread instead of a stone.
Father, thank You for being patient with me even when I’m not so patient with You.
