There’s no possibility that anyone will know it…but i too will miss her.
You see, i was there even before she arrived.
Her stately father had painstakingly designed me and got me specially handmade from one of the finest craftsmen.
And i stood by the great arch window…it’s elegant drapes gently caressing me when the breeze drifted in…i would rock silently…and expectantly…for nine long months …until …the day a little squirming shrieking white bundle was lowered onto my soft feather quilts…the first cot ever for Jairus’ first little princess.
Suzanna!
She learned to sit up all too soon…And all too soon i could hear her gurgling laughter as she clambered into the courtyard fount and drenched herself wet…
Soon the dripping child was brought into the room…
she had been grounded for the day. After the great polished cedar doors with shiny brass knobs closed quietly leaving her alone with me…I could hear the little one say over and over, “ but I reelly wanted to huggie the little goldie fishie in the fwount.”
Oh Suzanna!
It must have been that day…something went wrong that day…
For after that she had many spells of fever…many nights I could feel her fever rising. I held her as she moaned and twisted in pain and discomfort. I rocked her as she coughed up.
One of her parents was always there…whispering…kissing her fever-dulled eyes…pushing away the dark sweaty curls from her pretty face…always applying damp strips of cloth to her forehead…the learned physician was called in often too…but she only got worse…and then one day she was gone…all too soon.
Oh Suzanna!
The weeping, heartbroken mother never left the room…she wouldn’t let go of the little girl’s body…The faithful old household Nanny never left her mistress’s side…grief was almost turning these dignified ladies mad… Abruptly…the massive doors burst open that noon… Now..now… Who do we have here? Jairus…two strangers…the Third…very familiar …hmmm…
What IS HE doing!!! HE takes my Suzanna by the hand…
AND WHAT IS HE SAYING!!!
“TALITHA CUMI.”
AND WHY !!!OH MY!!! SUZANNA !!!
SUZANNA RISES FROM THE DEAD!!!
Jairus gasps…The mother almost faints…The Nanny shrieks…The Strangers are wide eyed struck dumb…And my Suzanna! That gurgling laughter is rending into everyone’s daze!
“Give her something to eat”, HE says, ”and don’t tell anyone.”
Almost immediately HE was gone…like a whiff of lost fragrance…but HIS voice… it lingered on and on…there was something to it… haven’t i heard that same VOICE before?
Humming and chiseling away…uttering a fervent psalm and hammering away…roaring with laughter over a joke and a cup of pitcher cold water His mother had brought…of course I KNOW HIM!
HE ‘s the one Who hammered my woody chunks into a cradle!
HE’s YESHUA… the finest carpenter of Nazareth!
But…but…now i know something else…HE’s JESUS …the Life-Giver!
Three years have passed on since that miraculous day…
Suzanna grew too big for me. For a while i was stowed away carefully in the attic until the day a careless maid sold me off to the junk shop with all the other unused things…I’m sure my sweet Suzanna would have thrown a fit if she’d known! Anyhow i’ ve landed in this most unlikely place…it isn’t like the warm shed of the kind Carpenter nor is it like the stately mansion of the loving Jairus’ family…Why is this Roman thug-like soldier coming towards me? Why? He’s …Oh…chopping me up!
Here i am…not looking anymore like I used to…in fact i’m being carried…through the tumultuous streets of weeping and jeering Jerusalem…I’m being lugged by two men…one a Cyrenian…the other…weak and very very bloody…
It was an agonising crawl uphill…the bleeding man was crucified on me! Barbaric Rome! And as he hung there…he began to say some strange things…
“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!”
“Today you will be with Me in paradise!”
“My God! My God why have You forsaken Me!”
“It is finished!”
Why it’s that same VOICE again!
HE IS YESHUA!!! But He isn’t just The Carpenter or The Life-giver.
HE IS The Sacrifice for the sin of the world.
Stranger things happened that day. Darkness came upon us at mid-day!
Shattering earthquake!
And in a loud Voice HE said, ”Father into your Hands I commit my Spirit.”
And then HE lowered His head and HE died.
And I heard the centurion thrust a spear in His side and say,
“Truly this Man must be The Son Of God.”
I DO know HIM.
DO YOU?
Priscilla Priyadarshini.J, is a passionate Montessorian and is deeply involved in the Kids and Youth ministry of her Church in Mumbai