Glimpses of Grace: Smashed Fingers

Tony and I have what we call, "Blessing Rocks".  They are rocks that are things in our lives that only God has orchestrated.  The other day I was unpacking them and reading through a few when it dawned on me--most of those rocks are BIG items.  Yes, it's quit obvious that our daughter, my protection after her birth, Tony's numerous jobs over the years, and this house could only be done by God.  However, what about the little things.  What about those day to day ways in which God shows us His face (such as locking my keys in the car).  Since, then I have been on the look out for God's day to day glimpses of his unfailing Grace in our lives.  Yesterday, he answered that very clearly.

Tony had just left ten minutes earlier for work.  I was working on peeling old paint off the walls in Sweet Pea's new room (after Sweet Pea requested that we do the "WALLS").  Sweet Pea had gotten bored with helping and was standing next to me looking out the window.

Our windows.  Oh our windows.  They are old (as in 95-old).  Some are pulled up by a visible pulley system (like modern day windows had except bigger and much more obvious).  Others those very old cords have snapped, so they must be propped up to stay up.  Still others have rotten bottoms and we try not to touch them at the moment.  Our windows are also heavy.  Our glass is thin and rattly but our wood is super heavy and they are HUGE, making the windows heavy.

Back to the story.  This window had a broken pulley system but would stay up with some propping.  Because we were stripping wood in that room Tony had done so with a thin metal rod.  Both of us were thinking of ventilation, not safety.

Somehow Sweet Pea had knocked that rod and the window came crashing down, onto her little fingers.

Her finger's a couple of hours after getting smashed.  They continued to get worse for a couple more hours before the swelling started to subside.

Worse, they sat under there for an eternity about 30 seconds because I could not get the window to go back up.  She ended up yanking them out herself.

Through out the day we had the debate, doctor or not?  The nurse said because we couldn't get in till later the day to wait it out and suggested IB Profen (which I think everybody but I thought to do).  The swelling went down and by the evening you would think nothing happened to the child (unless you studied her hand closely).

When he got home, Tony and I took a trip up the room.  The whole day I had been concentrating on whether her fingers where broken or not.  When I revisited the window my focused changed.  I realized that the reason I had not been able to get the window up was the the bar had fallen towards the room and lodged itself at the bottom of the window.  It ended up taking the bulk of the weighty window on itself.  If it had fallen backwards, to the side, or completely out Sweet Pea's fingers would of taken the whole weight on themselves.

Tony lifted the window to half the height had been and let it drop.  It made a rather loud thump sound.  I about burst into tears.  God had been watching out for my little munchkin.  As unpleasant as seeing her hurt was it was nothing compared to what would of happened.  She would of definitely had broken, if not shattered fingers.  The ledge and the window are not flush and would of bent her hand at an unnatural angel and that heavy, heavy window would of been resting its full weight on the tops of her little fingers.

Yes, God could of kept her fingers from being smashed all together.  But would I of even realized it?  Would I have given Him credit for it if I did realize it?  Probably not.  I would of thought, "that was close" on our ways we would of gone.  I know there are a million times in life that He doesn't receive the glory and credit He deserves.  Sin, hurt, sadness, pain are all a part of life but God uses them to help us better see and understand Him.  I pray that you see the glimpses of Grace he has for your life today and give Him praise for it.