Allowing Love

I've been reading the book 90 Minutes in Heaven by Don Piper. Don Piper was in a car accident, died, saw heaven and returned to life 90 minutes later. That's a fantastic story, but it's something much more ordinary that I want to talk about today. If I had to guess, I would think that no one reading this message has died. Am I right?

What most of us have experienced, though, is a reluctance to accept help from anyone. Piper faced the same problem. He was in the hospital, with a contraption on his leg to lengthen the bone (he lost 4 1/2 inches of his femur in the car accident). He was unable to go about his normal life. He is a pastor, and many of his parishioners came to visit him in the hospital. All of them were praying for him; all of them wanted to help.

Whenever someone offered to do anything for him, he refused the help. One day a retired minister came to visit him. Watching his refusal of help with so many people, the minister told him that he needed to get his act together. He made Piper promise to let someone do something for him. He told his friend that he was denying all of these people the ability to love him in the only way that was open to them.

Don't we do that? Don't we hesitate to accept help because we feel like allowing someone to do something for us is a bother to them? Do we consider it an admittance that we can't do everything? A weakness? Do we feel as if we are being a burden?

I was working on a one day church retreat a few weeks ago. I had decided that it would be a nice touch to have coffee in each room for the afternoon meetings -- nine rooms located on three different floors, and I had 15 minutes to get the coffee in carafes and then taken with cups, sugar and cream to the rooms. I had to get all of this done before I stood in front of the group and explained the afternoon activities. As I was working in the church kitchen, my sister-in-law came and stood beside me. "What can I do to help?" I had an automatic response. I almost said, "Nothing, I'm fine." I stopped myself, and realized how much I needed help, and how great it would be to HAVE the help. Together, we got coffee prepared and taken to all of the rooms. She's a loving woman, and I stopped myself before I denied her offer of love to me.

In his book, when Piper described the moment he realized what he had been doing, he writes, "This is their ministry," I thought, "and I've been spoiling it."...When I finally did open up, I witnessed a drastic change in their facial expressions and in their movements. They loved it. All they had wanted was a chance to do something, and I was finally giving that to them."

Do we let people love us?