Butterfly Showers

This blog is a tribute to my dear friend, Sandy, who died of a massive heart attack Friday evening. All of us who are left here, mourn her passing, but I can imagine her big smile lighting up whatever corner of heaven she finds herself—and enjoying butterflies.

Sandy shared this story with our Sunday School class several years ago. It’s about God’s miracle of butterflies in her life. She gave me permission to revise it slightly and submit it to Guideposts. They didn’t buy it, so now I am free to share Sandy’s story of  “Butterfly Showers.”

It is a 300+ mile trip from Reno to Elko, Nevada and I was driving it alone.  I had been told that morning an angiogram revealed an aneurysm and I needed open-heart surgery.  The fear and uncertainty of that diagnosis finally got the best of me when I reached Emigrant Pass (still an hour from home) and I began literally crying out to God.

I began hearing bug-splats against the windshield and through my tears, I saw that they were butterflies.  (I love butterflies.  They are uniquely beautiful and they furnish such a graphic picture of transformation as the worm becomes butterfly—just as a sinner can become a child of God). 

There were hundreds and then thousands of butterflies – A BUTTEFLY SHOWER!  God showed me His presence on that mountain pass.  My tears were replaced with His peace and His presence was manifested through those butterflies.  His grace, peace, and healing remained with me from then on, and I came through the surgery, recovering in record time.

However, that is not the end of the story.  Within a year’s time, my husband, Jim, had become seriously ill and was in intensive care with septic shock.  The doctors were having great difficulty coming up with a definitive diagnosis and they couldn’t determine or agree conclusively about what was causing him to be so ill.

On the second day of his hospital stay, I had gone home briefly and was on my way back, over the Lamoille Summit, when again, I cried out to God, telling Him that I was scared and didn’t have any peace.

I said, “Lord, a butterfly shower sure would be nice…”  After I said it, I thought, “That was dumb!  How arrogant of me to ask for that special blessing again!”  When I got back to Jim’s room, I began looking through all the  books and cards his visitors had left.  I was overwhelmed as I realized that most of the Get Well cards had butterflies on them.  Truly, A BUTTERFLY SHOWER!

Isn’t God good!

Compared to those of us left behind, Sandy now totally understands all that metamorphosis means-- what a butterfly is compared to the caterpillar it once was. I miss you, my friend, but oh, what a glorious “butterfly” you have become!

It’s All About Me--Not

When Galileo began studying planet Earth in the 1600s, the understanding of most learned men was that the earth was the center of the universe. After all, Aristotle had declared this to be so back in 4 BC and Ptolemy, the Greek astronomer,  confirmed the idea 600 years later.

I am reading Galileo’s Daughter which is actually a biography of her father. His older daughter, Virginia, was a nun in an abbey near Florence and father and daughter carried on a voluminous correspondence during his lifetime. Unfortunately, all his letters to Virginia were apparently destroyed upon her death as Galileo was in deep do-do with the Inquisition fellows because of his scientific ideas, specifically that the earth moved around the sun. Hence, the title Galileo’s Daughter because much of what the biographer was able to deduce about Galileo came from the comments in his letters to which she answered.

All the above is chasing a rabbit trail but functions as an introduction of how I want to explore this earth-centered, me-centered idea that permeates our culture. Much better writers than I have written books and articles on the idea of “it’s all about me.”. But it all boils down to one word: Selfish.

At an earlier date I wrote about selfishness, but I ask you, tongue in cheek, could not this very ugly trait be blamed on that learned philosopher, Aristotle and his idea that the earth was the center of the universe? If this statement became ingrained in human intellectual DNA, would it not then be plausible that I am the center of my personal universe? (This is another disgusting characteristic of our culture: the Blame Game, but I’m not going there today.)

I think self-ish-ness could almost be classified as instinctive behavior per this example from my two-year-old son. He came home from the church nursery one Sunday morning proudly announcing, “Me seffish!” Apparently, he declined to share some toys and was reprimanded by the nursery worker. 

Unfortunately, self-ish-ness doesn't disappear along with  childhood and it goes beyond sharing our “toys”. I can remember my mother telling me I was selfish (this comment emerged during those dreadful teenage years) and I remember mentally shrugging off her words thinking “I don’t remember not sharing anything.” Obviously, I hadn’t matured enough to realize that self-ish-ness really means to be self-centered, not considering others. In other words,it’s all about me.

Jesus Christ, our Creator, our Savior and the One who loves us unconditionally, wants us to realize that our first priority is to worship Him. He tells us plainly in His Word, more than once, that He wants us to love Him with ALL of our heart, soul, mind and strength. That would mean total surrender and obedience, totally focusing on Him, leaving no room for self-ish-ness. 

So, swimming up the stream against a strong current of modern culture added to my personal self-ish-ness, I tell myself, once again, “It’s not about me. It’s all about Him.