Unread Chapters

If you had driven past our house about a month ago, you may have witnessed some unusual activity in our yard. Depending on your timing, you may have seen a girl running up the driveway like a chicken with its head cut off. You may have caught a glimpse of this momma smacking at that same girl. You may have even witnessed lil blondie flinging her hair back and forth in front of her. Depending on when you drove by, that is. In the midst of all this, you may have spied another girl standing there…motionless while watching the whole ordeal that I am about to relate to you.

One thing on our “to-do list” that Friday was to take down all of the outside patriotic décor. After removing the buntings off of the railings, I began to take a broom to the porch while the girls carried the red, white, and blue painted logs that were decorating the driveway back to the barn. I had just glanced to see Bethany carrying the red and white striped log when all of a sudden, Anna came running up our gravel driveway before making a right through the grass – darting back and forth in a zig-zag pattern as she went. It didn’t take me long to realize she was trying to escape some sort of angry, stinging insect. Somehow, she managed to holler out something about a “home” to a stunned Bethany. As it turned out, Anna had unknowingly disturbed a yellow jacket’s nest and one, in particular, was NOT happy with her. As I stood there on the porch watching my daughter trying to outrun her assailant, she suddenly stopped, flung her head over, and began swinging her hair back and forth while hollering,

“It’s in my HAIIRRR!!” 

After doing this for a little bit, she flipped her hair back behind her and just stood there.

“Is it gone?”

“No…I can still hear it!!”

She took off again – running, stopping, flipping her head over, and swinging her hair back and forth.

“Take your clip out!!” 

“I can’t!!” 

“Take your clip out…it may be caught!!”

By this time I began hurrying over to Anna while Bethany continued to stand there like a statue. Quickly, I began running my fingers through her long, overturned tresses. “Sorry!” I yelled, as my fingers got caught on knotted strands. “It’s ok!” Anna assured me. After doing this for a little bit and not finding anything, she flipped her hair back over.

“Is it gone?”

“NOOOOO…I STILL HEAR IT!!”

And there we went again…Anna flipping her head back over and me searching for a yellow jacket in all that golden hair of hers. After several rounds of this, I FINALLY spotted him and began doing what I could to give him a quick escort OUT of my daughter’s hair. Before the whole ordeal was over, I had pulled, jerked, and smacked – all in an attempt to save Anna from getting stung.

Although it appeared that Anna was handling it like a champ during the entire ordeal, her trembling body when she hugged me afterward told me differently. Thinking back on this throughout the afternoon made me both cringe and chuckle. Cringe as I wondered who may have been driving by; chuckle as I tried to imagine just what they may have thought of our strange behavior.

Simply driving past our house that day would not have revealed the reason for our unusual conduct. Pulling into our driveway before the ordeal began and watching the action from start to finish would have given a fairly clear explanation for the conduct of this momma and the blonde-headed girl. But what about the other girl? Why did she stand there motionless? Didn’t she care about her sister?

In order to better understand the seeming indifference of the other girl, one would have to go back about 17 or so years and read that particular chapter in her life – the one telling of that little redhead who lived up in the NC Mountains at the time. This chapter would give an account to its readers of the day that she was out playing and ran across a yellow jacket’s nest. It would relate in full detail the wall of yellow jackets angrily pursuing her as she ran screaming toward her 3 brothers. It would tell of her older brother grabbing her hand and high-tailing it through the woods. The chapter would not fail to include the details of that same brother jerking his ball cap off and frantically beating the yellow jackets off his terrified little sister. The chapter would describe the terror of the traumatized child who, when it was all over, had received 14 stings on her little body.

Watching Anna trying to escape the sting of one yellow jacket the other day had, without warning, opened up this very chapter in Bethany’s life – one that had been closed for many years. Anna and I both knew the reason for her unusual behavior…her apathetic response as it seemed. And later as Bethany repeatedly told her sister she was sorry for not coming to her rescue, we both assured her that it was ok – we understood completely because we were there when that earlier chapter in her life was written.

The Lord allows each of us to cross paths with many individuals throughout our lives. How often do we form an opinion of these people based on their behavior at that particular moment while forgetting that there are many unread chapters in their life stories? (I have both hands raised right now.)

It was the priest, Eli, who assumed that godly Hannah was drunk that day she prayed in the temple –

“And it came to pass, as she continued praying before the LORD, that Eli marked her mouth. Now Hannah, she spake in her heart; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard: therefore Eli thought she had been drunken.” I Samuel 1:13

Eli had not been there to “read” the previous chapters in Hannah’s life – chapters of barrenness coupled with continual vexing from “the other woman” – therefore he made a hasty assumption. 

In Genesis 45:1,2 we read,

“Then Joseph could not refrain himself before all them that stood by him; and he cried, Cause every man to go out from me. And there stood no man with him, while Joseph made himself known unto his brethren. And he wept aloud: and the Egyptians and the house of Pharaoh heard.”

Can you imagine what the Egyptians thought of Joseph as they heard him sobbing out loud that day?

One would have to go back about 22 years’ worth of chapters and begin reading to fully understand Joseph’s uncontrollable emotions that day.

We read of a time in David’s life where he displayed some very strange behavior:

“And he changed his behaviour before them, and feigned himself mad in their hands, and scrabbled on the doors of the gate, and let his spittle fall down upon his beard.” I Samuel 21:13

Anyone passing by that day would probably not have recognized the king but even if they did, they would no doubt have had second thoughts as to David’s ability to rule. Only those who were with David in the previous chapters would realize that, although this was indeed out of character for the king, his actions were a part of surviving. King David was running for his life!

Friends, I don’t know about you but I have often been guilty of drawing conclusions about an individual based solely on a brief meeting or observation. And, as I have written this post, I have been convicted. May we each remember that, just like ourselves, there is a whole lot more to a person’s life than the current chapter of which we may happen to catch a glimpse while passing by.