Sentence: Deportation

By Saturday, January 10, 2009, the last appeal had been lost. Her bag was packed, and the single 25-year-old mother of three was scheduled to be deported in a day's time.

Yes, the sentence was just. Although here in the U.S. legally with a valid green card, this troubled young woman had repeatedly gotten herself into all manner of serious difficulties, not only bearing three children out of wedlock to two different fathers by the age of 22, but breaking the laws of her adopted country over and over again, racking up tickets and fines and jail time, and finally accruing enough of a record for her visa to be revoked. She'd been incarcerated at the INS immigration detention center in San Antonio for months, while her case wound its way through the system.

The family had rallied around her, pooled their funds to hire a lawyer, done their best to help, but despite months of prayer, visits, hearings, and appeals, the judge's final decision had come down: she was to be deported, sent back to Peru from where she came, with no possibility of return for at least ten years.

Parmesan Provision

Last night God arranged a tasty little miracle for me and some friends. It happened like this ...

A friend of mine who has a ministry to the homeless (see the Spider! miracle) hosts a gathering most Thursday nights for anyone who'd like to help her in her work. We get together and share a meal, which she provides, and then spend the rest of the evening doing whatever work needs doing, which can range from packing bags of hygiene items for the homeless, to assembling cheerful purses of personal products for the streetwalkers, to sorting socks, or hats and scarves, or any of a variety of tasks. Our numbers vary but there are a handful of us "regulars" who usually make it each week.

We'd planned to gather last evening as usual and our host had prepared a spaghetti supper with salad and garlic bread, yum! Earlier in the day another friend had called her and mentioned her hope that there would be some Parmesan cheese. Unfortunately though, our host didn't have any Parmesan cheese on hand, and never did make it out to get any. So as we sat down to eat, the subject of Parmesan, or rather the lack of it, was raised by the disappointed friend who'd been hoping for it. Enter our little miracle.

Rainbow's End

It was on a rainy day early in 1977 in San Francisco. We were moving yet again, this time from Northern to Southern California, to a promised better job. It had been more than a year of challenges, of financial struggles, losses, moves. We'd gone from the midwest to the east coast to the west coast in a few months' time, and were far away from family and the familiar.

Though we were young and adventurous, the strain was taking a toll, and that dark, rainy day, even looking forward to the hope of better things, we were weary. Though we'd prayed for guidance and help, we were more than a little uncertain of what the future might hold and some days, though we believed in God's promise to be with us, still unsure of whether he was really guiding us or not.

Driving south in a drizzling rain in our battered but faithful old red Toyota station wagon, through a gloomy, gray industrial section of the city, staring bleakly at passing factories and fences, my husband, six-year-old son and I were feeling about as dull as the weather, when suddenly the sky broke a little and up ahead a rainbow appeared, bright and beautiful and very close, so close in fact that the end of the rainbow seemed to be resting on the highway itself just a mile or so ahead.

The Yarn Bin

This little miracle happened to my sister, Pat, who lives in the Phoenix, AZ area. I'll let her tell you in her own words (with some names changed). Also, the title of this blog came from the subject heading on the email she sent to tell me about this little miracle. Both used with permission, thanks! :-)

"I had the neatest little answer to prayer/miracle happen yesterday [Jan. 1] - just had to tell you about it.

Spider!

I'm going to start off this report by telling you about a little miracle that happened to me on Sunday, August 19, 2007 at Church Under the Bridge (CUB), a weekly church service offered as part of a ministry to the street people here in Austin, Texas where I live, which takes place literally under a highway bridge downtown, across the street from the local police station. In addition to regular attendance and other forms of participation, I help a friend who has a supplemental ministry that involves preparing and distributing, among other things, bags of hygiene items to the homeless for whom such things are an uncommon luxury. That day she'd planned a distribution and I'd promised to help. 

By way of a little background I should mention I have a serious spider phobia, have had it since childhood. I'm terrified of spiders. Terrified. Embarrassing at my age, but well, there it is. I know it makes no sense but then that's the nature of phobias. So that morning around 9:45 am, getting ready to leave for CUB, I had slipped into my shoes (the non-tie, easy slipon kind), which were by the back door, and started into the kitchen to head out to the garage when the middle toe on my right foot started hurting, then really HURTING!

"Darnit," I thought, fire ants," and impatiently pulled off my right shoe only to see a huge wolf spider fall out of it and scurry off across the kitchen floor.