“We knew your father was inside. What should we have done—gone out to your pa’s tool shed to find a sledgehammer to break down the door?
“No, we wouldn’t even have wanted to go in unless he himself, the head of the house, invited us in and opened the door to us. As it was, we went in and enjoyed a day of hospitality, good food, and wonderful fellowship, because your father invited us to come and opened his home to us.”
She paused a moment to let it all sink in.
“That’s how God is, Corrie. He wants to come in and make His home with us. But He waits patiently and never beats down doors. You see, there’s only one key to the door of every heart, and we’re the only ones who possess it. God may be all powerful, but on the other hand, that’s one thing God can’t do—force open our doors.”
She paused, and the most peculiar smile came over her face. I could tell that the words had sparked some memory in her own life. She said nothing for another moment, and I sat silently, feeling like I was watching her relive some time in her past—a happy moment, but one that carried with it a certain pain as well.
“So to answer your question,” she finally went on, “God wants to live in everybody’s heart, and I hope someday He will, I don’t know. But for now He only lives where the doors have been opened from the inside.”
Again she stopped and the same odd smile returned to her expression. “Opening the door can sometimes be very painful. I can tell you that from personal experience. I did not always see things as I do now, Corrie. God had to put me through some heartbreaking disappointments, and I resisted for a long while. Perhaps one day I shall be able to tell you about it,” she added rather wistfully.
“I would like that, ma’am,” I replied.
“But not today . . . to start on that story would take all afternoon!”
She laughed. It was good to see the joy return to her face. It seemed she had put her memories back into the closet of the past once again.
“Again, from my own personal experience, I can tell you that after God has come inside, everything changes. He helps our inner selves to become more like Him. God’s desire—in my heart, yours, your father’s, your uncle’s, Rev. Rutledge’s, or anybody’s—is to make us become like Jesus—not just in outer actions, but inside. With His Spirit living inside us, gradually we do become more gracious and forgiving and loving and unselfish and considerate on the inside.”
Even before she was finished I was crying again.
“And that’s what you want, isn’t it, Corrie?” she said gently.
I nodded.
“You want to be more like God wants you to be, but with everything making your life confusing right now, you realize you’re not at all like you think you should be, like you want to be? Is that something of what you’re feeling?”
I nodded again.
“I know that feeling, Corrie,” she said. “I know what it’s like to feel like you’re bad, to feel like you’ve failed, to feel like you’ve disappointed the people you love the most. And you see, that’s why Jesus wants to live in our hearts. He can help us!
“He can not only help you face your uncertain future, He can help you become the person you long to be deep inside. None of us is what we’d like to be. The Bible says we’re sinners. But God can help us. That’s why He wants us to unlock the doors of our hearts and let Him come in and live with us there.”
“That sounds too good to be true.”
“It’s just so good it must be true! Oh, Corrie, God is so good to us! He loves us more than we can realize and has such a wonderful life to give us! Yes, I’m a sinner, just like the worst man in Miracle Springs. But inside my heart the Spirit of God lives. And He is slowly remaking me, and teaching me to live and think and behave differently than I would if He were not helping me.”
“Oh, I do want to be good, Mrs. Parrish!” I exclaimed. “I want God to live in my heart, too, and to help me like He is you! Do you think He is there?”
“I don’t know, Corrie. He may already be there, drawing you toward Him. One never knows when that little invisible door opens and He slips in. I truly believe that the door of some people’s hearts’ open before they are ever aware of it, and God’s Spirit finds an easy and natural entrance, perhaps in the early years of childhood. Some hearts seem open to God right from birth.
“Others are born with great resistance, and it may take years and years of God’s patient knocking before they finally hear Him. For some persons there is an exact moment when they consciously open their heart. For others it is a gradual process. In your case, Corrie, I suspect that God has long been with you without your even knowing it. I sense that your heart is open toward Him, and that you want to be His daughter.”
Even as she spoke, I could feel my eyes filling with tears once more.
“I do, Mrs. Parrish!” I said. “I do want to be His daughter and to live in a way that pleases Him—down inside, like you said, not just on the outside!”
She tried to say something, but hesitated. I could see a tear falling down her cheek. At first I didn’t understand why, but I did later.
“You . . . you can’t know what joy it gives me to hear those precious words, Corrie,” she said at last, and her voice was husky with emotion. “And they please God far more than either of us can possibly realize. I sensed when I saw you in church this morning that the day had finally come when you would want to know these things and were really ready to begin living in a deeper way as a Christian.”
She paused, then looked into my eyes with the most wonderful smile on her face.
“Corrie,” she said, “I love you, and I know you are dear to God’s heart . . .”
She stopped, then reached across and took both my hands in hers. Then she closed her eyes and started to pray.
“Oh, loving Father! How I thank You for this dear friend you have brought to me! Show her, Lord, more and more of Yourself every day. Nurture her dawning faith, and let her reflect the image of Your Son. Strengthen her heart’s desire—”
She stopped. I opened my eyes to glance at her. She was softly weeping.
I closed my eyes again. I couldn’t help being a little nervous.
“God,” I prayed out loud, “I really do want to be good like You want me to be. And I want to be kind and loving like Mrs. Parrish talks about, on the inside. I want to be Your daughter, and I don’t know if that door to my heart’s open or not, or if maybe You’re already there. But if You’re not, I’d like you to be, and—”
Suddenly I couldn’t say anything more. I felt a rush inside me, like the breaking of a dam on a stream, like something was being pulled out from the very depths of me. My voice cracked and my eyes were full, but I struggled to get out the words—
“Help me, Lord. Help me to live like you want me to. Help me not to resent Miss Morgan’s coming. Help me to know what I’m supposed to do.”
That was all I could say for a minute. It was already more than I figured I could pray out loud in front of anybody.
But then almost without thinking, I added, “And I pray for Pa too, Lord, that you’d help him to do the right thing. Amen.”
Mrs. Parrish added a quiet Amen after mine.
I opened my eyes. Mrs. Parrish was looking at me with a radiant smile. Her cheeks were wet with tears.
Chapter 23
The Ride Home
I felt better after that.
It wasn’t so much that now all of a sudden I figured all my worries would go away. But riding back to Miracle, Mrs. Parrish explained that once I had really given myself to God and asked Him to help me be a person who was more like He wanted me to be, then my whole outlook could change.
“You see, Corrie,” she said, “when a person desperately wants to walk closer to God the Christian life begins to be so much more thrilling. Most people are content with their lives as they are. They don’t think about growth, change, about developing new habits and attitudes. They just take every day as it comes and aren’t really trying to
be any different from one day to the next. Growth and development toward more godly behavior isn’t what they base their lives on. But then from out of nowhere comes some trouble that they don’t know how to handle. And then they finally begin to realize that they need some help. They see that they need to open the door and invite someone else into their house, someone who can help them become the kind of person they now see that they want to be. But until that time, they feel self-sufficient and satisfied and content with the way they are, and feel no need for growth and change. It is very difficult for people to be close to God if they are perfectly content to remain locked inside their houses all alone.”
“And that’s why you waited until today to tell me about opening the door of my heart to let Jesus live there?” I asked.
“Don’t misunderstand me, Corrie,” replied Mrs. Parrish. “I truly believe you have loved God for a long time. You and I have had many good talks together about being Christians. I would not have you think that I consider all that meaningless. It’s just that now—now that some of these hurts and frustrations and confusions inside you have awakened a hunger to grow and be better—now you can really begin sharing your life with God more deeply every day. It’s not that what came before wasn’t good and valuable, but now that you realize your need, you can begin depending on God more, and trusting Him for more and more things in your life.”
“Trusting Him—how?”
“Trusting that He will take care of you, trusting Him to work good for everyone out of Miss Morgan’s coming, trusting Him for your pa, trusting Him for your future—for everything, Corrie! If you’ve given yourself to Him as His daughter, then you can trust Him to be a wise and loving heavenly Father, and to take perfect care of you!”
“So I shouldn’t worry about my future, or whether Pa will think I’m in the way in the kitchen? Sometimes I just can’t help worrying.”
“It’s all right to be concerned and to think about things. But remember what I told you a while back, about how God can turn everything and make it into good? Corrie, your whole attitude toward life slowly begins to change when you realize that God is with you every moment, helping you grow, strengthening you, helping you know what to do. Pretty soon all those worries don’t look so big, because you realize He knows all about them too and has the solution all figured out ahead of time.”
“But what if I can’t?” I asked.
“Can’t what, Corrie?”
“Can’t do all those things—trust God better and be nicer and not worry so much. What if God being with me doesn’t change my attitude and make me strong like you said?”
“Oh, but it will, Corrie! There is no what if to it. When God lives in a heart, things do change. He makes sure of that—He helps!”
She stopped, and her enthusiastic look suddenly turned thoughtful. I could tell she was reconsidering what she’d just said.
“Well,” she finally said, still with the serious look on her face, “there is one if to it, now that I think about it. Not all people do grow and change and get to be strong Christians.”
“Why is that?”
“Well, Corrie, I told you that God doesn’t force His way into our lives. And He doesn’t force us to do His will either. We have a choice to accept Him and submit to the changes He wants to work in us. God comes into our lives, saying, ‘I’ll come into your heart, and I’ll give you joy and I’ll make you strong, and I’ll help you become more like Jesus, and I’ll gradually turn you into the person I created you to be.’ That’s His gift to us, His part. But we have to cooperate. We need to respond to His love with obedience. Our part is this: we have to do what He says. God will change us and make us better, but He won’t work against our will. He can only work the changes if we are holding up our side and doing what Jesus told us to do. We need to say ‘yes’ to Jesus—not just to His desire to live in us, but to His desire to rule our lives as well. Our obedience to Him makes it possible for Him to do the changes He wants to do.”
“Well,” I said slowly, trying to take in all she was saying, “I reckon that’s fair.”
“Completely fair! Everything God does is fair, though sometimes the fairness is hard for folks to see. And this agreement—God doing His part, us doing our part—explains why some people never change and others do, and why there are nasty, selfish people in the church who think they are good Christians. Being a Christian is more than knowing in your head who Jesus is—it’s surrendering your heart to His ways. The changes in our lives depend on whether we are obeying God, not on our religious talk or how much about the Bible we know or whether we go to church all the time.”
“So going to church and reading the Bible and praying and all that doesn’t matter?” I asked.
“Oh no, Corrie, I didn’t mean that! Those things are very important. But they’re only important if they help you learn to do more of what Jesus said. Otherwise, I’m afraid they are meaningless. Do you understand?”
“I think so,” I answered slowly. “If I open the door of my heart to let Jesus live there—and I think I have, haven’t I, Mrs. Parrish?”
“You have, Corrie! Yes, His Spirit is inside you.”
“ . . . if I’ve done that, then He will make me better and will help me have better thoughts and trust Him more . . . if I try to do what I’m supposed to—if I obey what Jesus said to do.”
“Yes, that’s it exactly! And that’s why it is important to read the Bible—especially the four gospels—so you can find out what Jesus said, and the kind of people He wants us to be.”
“I see.”
“And then there’s one last catch, Corrie.”
“Another one?”
Mrs. Parrish laughed. “I’m afraid so! But this is the last one, I promise. After this, I think you’ll have plenty to think about for a good long time!”
“All right,” I said, returning her smile. “But I’ve already got more than I think I’ll be able to remember.”
“Well, this last thing may be most important of all. Do you want me to tell you now or save it for another time?”
“Oh no. Tell me now. I want to hear it! But when I write all this down in my journal, I’m going to have to come and ask you lots of questions to help me remember everything you’ve said.”
“Agreed. Now, Corrie, we must remember that God’s work in our hearts takes a lifetime. The changes we’re talking about, learning to trust Him, obeying more like Jesus did, being more loving to people—none of that happens to us all at once. We’re still the same people. We still have the same bad habits. And though God wants to remake us—and does!—it’s a very slow process.”
“Because we don’t do our part very well?”
“Partly. But even when we are good and do what we’re supposed to do, it still takes a long time for us to get to be very much like Jesus. So try not to get discouraged if you get to feeling like you’re not the kind of person you want to be. It takes years and years of practice—of trying to trust God more, of trying to have better attitudes toward people, of trying to be unselfish—before you begin to feel you’re getting anywhere.”
“That does sound discouraging.”
“Perhaps I’m not explaining it very well.” She paused, thought for a moment, and then said, “If we are cooperating, then God is bringing about the changes. But they’re happening so deep inside us that we can’t see them for a long time. You are His daughter, a daughter of His grace and love. And He is gradually making you more and more like Jesus, but way down deep where His Spirit lives—in your heart—and the changes aren’t always visible on the surface. Do you see what I mean?”
“I think so. Kinda like when Pa and Uncle Nick are working in the mine, you can’t see them when they’re way down inside it. They may be digging out all kinds of gold, but if you’re standing looking at the outside, you can’t see it.”
“That’s it exactly, Corrie! God is mining for gold inside our hearts, but we can’t see how much He’s getting, and maybe won’t see it for years and y
ears.”
“And is it kinda like—from what you said before about it being something both God and us have to be working on—is it kinda like we’re doing the gold mining with Him, but can’t see it?”
“The great thing, Corrie, is that we decide how full of gold our own mine is!”
“How’s that?”
“Remember what I said about the years of practice in doing the things we’re supposed to do?”
I nodded.
“Well, every time you or I do some little act of kindness, even though afterward we might not feel any different, a tiny little change happens deep inside us. We’ve added a tiny piece of gold to the mine! Every time I deal fairly with someone in business that I could have taken advantage of, every act of kindness you do to one of your brothers or sisters, every gentle word, every forgiveness, every unselfishness, every time you or I lay aside what we want for the happiness of someone else, every prayer we utter on behalf of another, every generous act—they’re all little nuggets of gold, Corrie. Some Christians are filling their mines with rich veins, while other are letting opportunities pass every day, and their mines are filling up instead with nothing but dirt and worthless rock.”
“But when do we find out?”
“I suppose most people won’t know until they die. But once you’ve been walking through life for five or ten or fifteen years, every once in a while you begin to get glimpses of gold coming to the surface.
“You see, Corrie, the Lord is working away in the mine of our hearts all the time, from now until the day we die—all night, all day, every moment. And all those little specks of gold we fill our mines with, today, tomorrow, next week, next year, every little kindness and unselfishness for all the rest of our lives—they all add up together.
“In the end, our hearts are either rich with the gold we have put there for God to develop into a Christlike character, or else they are still empty, even though God has been picking away all our lives to find some gold to put to use. We don’t see this work going on, but every moment we are either putting gold in the mine of our heart or we are putting dirt and rock there.
Daughter of Grace Page 16