Love Is Kind

This Week's Story

Christopher was three weeks old when I met him, in a sea of cribs at the Sisters of Charity Home for Sick Children in Port au Prince. Tiny fingers with tiny fingernails. Eyelashes so long they looked purchased. An oxygen tube, an IV, and a face the masters would have painted.

Standing at the end of his crib was Nathalie, his grandmother. Not quite five feet tall, sadness hanging over her like weather. Christopher was born on the dirt floor of her one-room home. His mother, Nathalie's only child, died shortly after giving birth. When the baby stopped taking the bottle, Nathalie carried him for miles in the Haitian heat to get him help.

She was afraid to touch him at first, with all those tubes and needles. So I held his little hand, and then she reached out and did the same. We spent the day loving that baby together, two grandmas who couldn't speak a word of each other's language.

Nathalie was barefoot. So when it was time to go, I gave her my sandals. I didn't think about my own feet for even a millisecond, and I knew I'd never see those shoes or that sweet woman again. That's the day I finally understood the difference between doing kind things and kind love. Kind love doesn't check the receipt. It doesn't wait to see what comes back. Nathalie shared her only grandson with a stranger during the hardest season of her life. She gave me far more than a pair of shoes.

This Week, Day by Day

My Prayer This Week