You can't judge a book by its cover

I'm not fond of using trite phrases for blog titles. It makes me itchy. Plus, I had to pause over the infernal use of "it's" in this case, for proper grammatical clarification. But now that we've got that out of the way, let's chat.

Sunday afternoon, my eight-year-old niece and I took a 20-minute stroll in warm, springlike weather. She pontificated; I shook my head in wonder. She philosophized and theologized; I asked myself what this little blonde creature had done with my firstborn niece. (All this from the little peanut whose diaper I changed in the hospital merely eight years ago.)

I have not the time to tell you of all of her musings, though I wished silently at the time that I had a tape recorder. She was waxing eloquent on the ways that good really does trump evil in our daily lives: for instance, my dad (her grandpa) died of cancer, but God was already providing another man in my life in the form of her Uncle David. Too true.

And toward the end of the walk, the literal met the symbolic as she chattered on about how she recently learned "you can't judge a book by its cover." Without thinking that she was talking to an aunt who used to market books for a living, she shared that she picked up a book from school with an ugly front cover. Still, she proceeded to read said book and it was really great; so, Aunt Suzie, she said, "See, you can't judge a book by its cover."

I can only hope, deep in the recesses of my heart, that this message, possibly shared by her schoolteacher, will continue to reach deeper, until it wipes away prejudice and allows her glimpses of true beauty in ways she would not expect. I hope that when she continues to search for the good God is working out of bad situations, she develops laser vision to see His hand protecting and guiding her, shaping her life message, refining her heart, making her fit to serve God and others in ways we can only dream about now.

The conclusion of said conversation went like this, as we evaluated the potential for good in things happening all around us.

"Like this walk, for instance," said the blonde eight-year-old. "We really needed some exercise. But we got more. We also got in some social time, too."

Just two years ago, I would hold her hand when we walked. Today, she swings her arms on her own. She's self-contained and loving, inquisitive and questioning, a helper and a friend to many. And I am glad, at the tender age of eight, that she's already developing a theology that allows for bad things to happen to good people. I'm glad, because until we get that right, we wrestle and rant, growing anxious and angry. 

But our God gives and takes away.  He also loves us more than we can measure, forgives and grants new mercies and fresh starts every morning, and is closer than close to the brokenhearted. He's a friend to the weary, and a righter of wrongs. 

And he loves a particular, precocious eight-year-old I know. I'm so glad she loves him back.