Footprints

So we live in a shaky city with risks at every turn.

Don’t you ever get into the shower thinking, “I hope there isn’t a big one now!”

We went on the bus through the red zone and saw so much destruction, huge cranes taking down multi-storeyed buildings; mind blowing scenes. And that was before the damaging Christmas quakes.

Scenes that really get me thinking though are the places where there were previously big, long-standing buildings, bustling with people, living their busy lives day by day, earning a living, influencing their world and these buildings are now down and the area cleared to ground level. I look at such places, the New Nurses Home for example, and marvel at the small patch of ground now left vacant. It is called the footprint, the place previously occupied by that building.

As I drive around and many buildings sites are being cleared all that was previously happening on that site is gone, a comparatively insignificant space is left and I wonder at the seemingly undersized space left, the footprint.

Political parties talk about our carbon footprints, how much of the Earth’s resources are damaged, or replenished, by the way we live.

But now I see another footprint.

A godly lady with a servant heart shown in her many years of unassuming living left this life last Thursday, 23 February 2012. What is her footprint effect?

It is huge! Edna married while young and had 4 sons and a daughter. I have known her for over 50 years. At all times without exception she modelled to me kindness, gentleness, understanding and humility. I do understand that these qualities don’t come automatically but through working at refining the person we naturally are.

Her footprint is enormous.

When you look at the lives of her adult children and observe the effective influence each one has in the lives of their children, their colleagues, their friends you can truly say that Edna’s footprint has made the world a far better place throughout her years and for years to come.

I hope her footprint in the lives of her children & their spouses, her Grandchildren and all who have witnessed her life will live on to enhance the world we live in.

God speed you Edna to a place of honour in His kingdom.