The Wind Chime Lady

The Wind Chime Lady

Theology in the Trenches

by Kathleen Kjolhaug

It all began one day by turning my thoughts into an article about the pile of “stuff" in my basement which needed a home. In no time, contact was made with one who had read that article and together we planned to meet up. I was to bring a treasure from the pile, and she would bring one from hers. It was all on a whim and it was all just for fun.

In the middle of a town up north, we made the exchange. She received a wooden chest of my mom’s, and I received a wind chime she had made by hand.

It was a dandy and I treasured my treasure. I had not the heart to place it out of doors in the elements so kept it tucked within a sacred space where it dangled. Through the years much more was placed upon it than the driftwood which was her trademark.

The wind chime has taken on a form all its own cause along with the beads and bells now hung a Christmas ornament reminding me of a congregation I’d promised to pray for. A religious medal loops round wood as the heat register below helps it find rhythm reminding me that the former owner is now a caretaker of many near and dear. A bit higher hangs a small pair of sandals sported by a five-year-old some thirty years back. They are reminders to lift him up where he now trods. Everything hanging upon it serves as a reminder to pray.

One day, as I took note of the chimes before me, her orange business card dangling in crooked accordance caught my eye. I dialed the number upon it, and invited myself down to spend time with the Wind Chime Lady. She responded with grace as a date was chosen when I would be able to enter her sanctuary of craft.

When I arrived as a novice wind chime maker, I was met with kindness, a gentle spirit, patience and long-suffering. Her basement held the goods and as we made our way down the steps and into the desert of learning, she shared her back-story. She had poured out and into many…for many a day, and today was no different.

She allowed me to pick through her piles of driftwood for just the right one. The beads were many, and as each called in color, texture, or in the form of a memory jogger, I placed the sacred selection upon my wind-chime.

Her gift of art turned healing that day. She healed by giving of self, she healed by demonstrating love, she healed by offering back to me that which she had.

Broken and poured out for many was He, and I suppose if we want to get real, it’s the only way to be real. Breaking bread took on new form as we worked together sister to sister.

I pray that the loaves be multiplied and multitudes are fed from the bread broken that day.

May you, too, find a Wind Chime Lady in your life so the miracles of friendship might multiply.

In her book, Be the Gift, Ann Voskamp writes, “We are each singular threads in the world. If I am tied to the thin thread of my own life…my life’s a hopelessly knotted mess. The thread of your life becomes a tapestry of abundant colors only if it ties itself to others lives. Let threads of your life break away to let Christ, who is in us, weave around other threads.”

Tim Keller writes, “To do justice is to go to places where the fabric of shalom has broken down, where the weaker members of societies are falling through the fabric, and to repair it. Reweaving shalom means to sacrificially thread, lace, and press your time, goods, power, and resources into the lives and needs of others…”

Micah 6:8 summarizes it best. “What does the Lord require of us? To do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God.”  

Thank you Wind Chime Lady for walking your faith in Walker, Minnesota.  Amen.