Nanny

For five or six years I have worked with Barbados Grace Fellowship, developing their ministry model and outreach to the island community. When I am on the island, I stay with dear friends, which is where I am now, working from the veranda during a tropical rain shower. Nanny is originally from St. Vincent, a volcanic island to the West. Of course, Nanny is not really her name, but that is what my friends call her, primarily because that’s what their children know her as.

I watched Nanny prepare dinner yesterday morning in hopes I could emulate what she did when I get home. There was a recipe that Nanny followed in large part, but the large part is not the hard part, nor the really good part. I lost track after a while, gave up, and decided to look forward to dinner.

Dinner was wonderful.

When Nanny arrived this morning, we did our customary swapping of places in the kitchen as she cleaned up from the book discussion for “No Mercy” and I made coffee. I told her dinner last night was superior.

Nanny said she knew it would be okay (a favorite, island cliché) because she had prayed on the bus, prayed over the recipe, and prayed over her preparation. She said, “I knew Father was cooking through me. It was okay.”

As I conclude my writing, Nanny is alternating between singing and whistling, “Higher Ground.”

Here is another story—a longer one—about a man who trusted God to live through him even though it seemed irrational, unlikely, and unwarranted.