Children of the Same Father

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” —Matthew 6:26, NIV

I met him on the beach. He was slim and smiling and at that age where he could easily be twenty-one or thirty-one. He was walking with his landlord, who, in an attempt to poach me from my own landlord, invited us to dinner at their place.

They were complete strangers to me, but my housemate knew them, so I went. They served us chicken biryani, and though I am vegetarian, I ate it because I can never seem to resist South Asian food. Then he shared his story.

He was from Pakistan and on his way to Canada.

He had been on a layover on the island for three and a half years. He was a refugee, evacuated from his country due to a threat of death.

Why? Because he is a Christian and because he worked for an organization that often succeeded in converting Muslims to Christianity.

He looked like a kid. And yet here he was, about to start life in a new country while desperately missing his old one. He showed me pictures of his home in Pakistan. It is nicer than my home in Canada. He showed me pictures of his mom and sister, both young and beautiful. He showed me pictures of himself —his old self.

The self that he used to be, flashy clothes, nice car, expensive haircut. I looked at the person he was now. The resemblance was faint.

But I did see the resemblance between us. Like him, I had come to this island for what should have been one month but had turned into three and counting.

There was similarity in our uncertainties.

However, he was doing much better with his unknowns than I was with mine. While he was keeping a positive attitude and not complaining, I was silently shaking my fist at God. I despise uncertainty. I much prefer knowing what is coming, even if it is unpleasant. With knowledge, I can prepare myself for whatever I have to deal with.

But not knowing means all I can do is surrender myself to the hand of God, believing that He will take care of it. Take care of me.

This is where I see again similarity between me and my new friend; even though we have no certainty about our immediate future, we do have a certainty that our common Father will take care of us both, no matter where we find ourselves.

And though I may not always like it, really, that is the only certainty that matters.

R. Bowen