Ted gave blood today, to help with a specific need.  The patient is in a coma, all her platelets being cut by some dread virus.  But there is still hope, God’s purpose for each of her days.  At least a dozen missionaries have donated for this sick girl.  Ted gave until the bag almost burst.
I tried but failed.  I filled one quarter of the bag from my right arm, but the left arm was more generous.  It donated its quarter more quickly.  The nurse saw no irony in saying tightfistedness would prompt better giving.  I squeezed my hands into fists in time to the music, trying so hard to relax, to help speed the slow flow of life into a bag.  But that next “quarter” I was actually pumping into my own arm as the needle had backed out of the vein.
Giving even a quarter bag leaves me emotional.  But emotions can be a good thing, deepening any experience, helping me to know more, appreciate more.  Jesus gave it all, ransoming sinners.  He was giving again today, giving Ted and me and the others the chance to be a real family, buying us back from the consumptive smallness of worry or self-absorption.  Letting us carry to varying degrees our sister’s burden and the Lord’s hope.

-Liisa