Benjamin is kind of vulnerable to teasing. Not that he cares what you think of him but he has limited social awareness about how to stay out of harm's way. Fortunately, (a word he likes to use when he can fit it in) he has six older siblings who are often right behind him. Even if they do not need to intervene, the presence of a six foot older brother or eyebrows furrowed sister are enough to deter a would-be taunting ten year old who does not understand autism. Benjamin does not even realize it but they have his back.

 

I will admit it right up front. I believe those stories about angels and miracles, interceding in ordinary life. I have three copies of Where Angels Walk by Joan Wester Anderson and I know many of the vignettes by heart. 

 

In one of them a woman was working with inner city teenagers and was locking up the door late at night. A crowd of surly kids surrounded her and she was scared. She prayed. Then the crowd dispersed suddenly and she could hurry safely to her car. 

 

Later she asked one of the kids why they had left her alone.

 

"When those big guys in white showed up we were not about to mess with you." Huh? What guys in white? Was there... could it have been...

 

Sometimes we are fooled by thinking that the only things to be seen are the things we can see. It reminds me of when no one bought the notion of germs because they were invisible to the naked eye, or Galileo was arrested for saying that the earth revolves around the sun, which was not how it looked to the average 16th century astronomer.

 

But I believe with everything in me that there is more going on than my two blue eyes can tell me about. On occasion the veil lifts and we glimpse the splendor of substances that are infinitely more lasting than the clutter in front of me. I may have my attention locked on the problem which looms large in my marriage, but even if I am inadequate to the task... there are angels hovering just behind me that are. I am too slow to whip around and catch them, but if I keep very still I can hear their soft murmuring.

 

 

"Do not fear, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them."  And Elisha prayed, and said, "LORD, I pray, open his eyes that he may see." Then the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw. And behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.

-2 Kings 6:16