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Monday Meditation: Playing with Stones

February 7, 2011 By Sandra Heska King

Grace is uncommonly quiet.

But that doesn’t mean she isn’t busy.

I go in search of her and find her in the bathroom.

She’s washing stones.

With her toothbrush and my toothpaste.

Water ripples green and blue and rose and yellow and orange from polished pebbles with names like carnelian and amethyst and quartz and lace agate.

Along with a Petoskey stone and an arrowhead.

She never has enough stones. When we go to Gaylord, she always wants to go to the Call of the Wild, mostly to sift through the bins and choose favorites to fill a velvety bag.

She scoops them from the basin and lays them carefully in a towel, blots them dry. She counts them. We roll the cool and smooth in our hands, run a thumb along flat cradled in palm.

We wonder how many weeks each had to be tumbled in the dark with grit to produce its brilliance.

I bought her a tumbler for Christmas, and we talk about how much fun it will be to hunt for stones around the house this summer. To see what beauty we can uncover from common rock.

She dumps them all back in their shoebox. I survey the floor for strays. I’ve stepped on them before with bare feet.

Bruised soles.

Later I dump them back out, sit cross-legged on the floor, and play with them.

In chapter 4 of Stone Crossings, L.L. tells  a story about Salvador Dali and how he painstakingly created a stone sky painting by gluing tiny rocks to canvas.

His parents supported his creative efforts and hung his stone sky painting in the dining room. Every once in a while, a pebble would dive to the floor with a tap. Salvador’s father assured people, “It’s nothing; it’s just another stone that has dropped from our child’s sky.” ~p. 33

And although Salvador went on to bigger things, I think about the hopelessness of gluing our hope to man-made canvas.

But even if we’ve pinned our hope on the One who made the stones, it seems like we still find ourselves tossed in tumblers.

Sometimes it’s a result of our choices to follow stony paths, like the prodigal son. Or Israel broken by Assyria.

What looks to us like God smashing rocks off our painting is actually the natural outcome of our chosen medium. If we paint with stones, gravity will pull them into our path–sometimes violently so. ~page 38

Sometimes we suffer as part of His plan to polish and smooth, to expose hidden beauty. We tumble, it seems, alone and forgotten.

Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. James 1:2-3 (Message)

I gather the stones and place them back in the box.

Sometimes grace is uncommonly quiet.

But that doesn’t mean it isn’t busy.

Celebrating with L.L. Barkat and Laura Boggess today.

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Filed Under: stories and reflections

Comments

  1. Brenda says

    February 7, 2011 at 4:27 pm

    I’m guessing Dennis would not approve of this use of toothpaste??? Great post. Love it.

    • Sandra says

      February 8, 2011 at 9:30 pm

      I won’t tell if you don’t.

  2. Carol J. Garvin says

    February 7, 2011 at 5:26 pm

    This is wonderful, Sandra! The analogy and the writing. I’m sure Grace didn’t realize her play would provide such a vivid truth.

    (I also collect rocks, but I can’t say I have a rational reason for doing so. I just like them.)

    • Sandra says

      February 8, 2011 at 9:32 pm

      Grace provides a lot of grist. 😉

  3. L.L. Barkat says

    February 7, 2011 at 5:35 pm

    Beautifully poetic. And those stones… I want to see them in person! 🙂

    • Sandra says

      February 8, 2011 at 9:32 pm

      I will bring them when we meet . . .

  4. laura says

    February 7, 2011 at 6:27 pm

    I’m so excited to have you playing along, Sandra! You know what? I’m with Grace. I cannot. Resist. Smooth. Beautiful. Stones. My youngest is the same way. Trouble is, there’s no where those stones seem to gather. He has them all over the house. At least I don’t find them in the dryer anymore.

    This story about Dali stuck with me also. I wonder about the time when he decided, “hey, this just isn’t working.” Seems I’ve had a few of those falling stone seasons myself.

    This is fun, journeying together!

    • Sandra says

      February 8, 2011 at 9:36 pm

      I love doing life–and this book–with you.

      I’ve been through some of those seasons, too!

  5. S. Etole says

    February 7, 2011 at 7:24 pm

    Such beauty in grace …

    • Sandra says

      February 8, 2011 at 9:36 pm

      🙂

  6. violet says

    February 8, 2011 at 1:13 pm

    Lovely! I will take this line into my day: “…how much fun it will be to hunt for stones around the house this summer. To see what beauty we can uncover from common rock.”

    • Sandra says

      February 8, 2011 at 9:37 pm

      Thanks, Violet. So glad you stopped by.

  7. Scott Couchenour says

    February 12, 2011 at 8:03 am

    Absolutely the best post I have read in a long time. No question.

    • Sandra says

      February 15, 2011 at 1:08 pm

      Wow! Thanks, Scott.

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