Day 24 | Jenny’s story

Reflection

Jenny never bigs herself up.

She’s worked in a variety of jobs, brought up a family, is involved in church, and enjoys a potpourri of enthusiasms: daily dog walks, political podcasts, good chocolate, and, in recent years, making jewellery from glass beads. She loves the design process, thinking about colours, size, and spacing. She loves the stringing– the concentration it takes that clears her mind of everything else and brings a certain calm. And she loves the result: something lovely, made with her own hands. She does it because it brings her joy.

Sometimes one thing leads to something else entirely unanticipated. For Jenny, this was an invitation to teach beading in the local women’s prison. They had everything except a teacher. Would Jenny do it? Would she go into one of Her Majesty’s women’s prisons and sit in a room for three hours, twice a week, with women who’d committed a variety of crimes from murder to white-collar fraud? For no money? Really?

Quite quickly, the prison noticed a dramatic improvement in the mental health of a number of the women: the rhythm of beading, the atmosphere, the chat in the room, and the outlet for frustrated or never-exercised creativity all contributed. Jenny’s gifting, as it happened, extended way beyond beading. She was a bringer of peace and a community builder.

Here she was, open to God, with what she had in her hands. ‘Just a hobby’, but she was willing to give it back to him.

What, I wonder, is in your hand that the Lord might thread onto the bracelet he is crafting, bead by bead, deed by deed, word by word, person by person, day by day?

Jesus, please help me to use what’s in my hand to tell the story of your great love for all people. Amen.