I wonder how many cards you’ve received this year. Will there be people who phone, email or text you a Christmas greeting today? Little notes that say that you matter and that you are loved.
I recently heard about Paige Hunter, a teenager from Sunderland. Paige has written over 1,000 small heart-felt notes and tied them to Wearmouth Bridge. She goes back regularly to check on them and add to them. Wearmouth Bridge is sadly a place where the lost and lonely go to contemplate suicide.
Her notes read like this:
“Place your hand over your heart can you feel it? That is called purpose. You are alive for a reason so don’t ever give up”
“Even though things are difficult, your life matters”
"Pause. Stop. Breathe. There are better options, and so many people who love you."
She makes each note personal by adding her phone number and with the offer to listen to anyone who wants to talk. If she’s a ‘snowflake’ then she is a bright, beautiful, unique one. Paige undertakes this ministry because she’s knows what it feels to be low and she herself was talked down from the edge by two passing strangers.
Last Christmas a stranger phoned her up and told her, “…that noise in the background is my baby playing under the Christmas tree. I wouldn’t be here, and I would never have met my own son if it hadn’t been for one of your notes”.
I believe that the child in the manger is God’s amazingly powerful small-note (which will of course grow to become a love-letter of good news) enveloped in love. Jesus understands our human condition from the inside out. In Christ, God sees us, tells us that we matter and that we are loved beyond measure. Once we acknowledge that how can we not, like Paige, share small but powerful notes of love of our own?
Merry Christmas Everyone,
Suzanne Nockels