Isn’t it great when a vision comes together?

For a few weeks I’ve had my eye on framing these two photos and then keeping them near each other. On Sunday, the deed was done. I am a happy chappy.

May I tell you about them?
Like the stereotypical preacher, I’ll use a few few words beginning with P…

The people
The photo on the left emerged in the days before the funeral of Barby’s father, almost two years ago. I had never seen it before. The photo captured the family, who then featured it in the funeral service bulletin. It is a photo of Dad sharing the gospel with a young shepherd.

The photo on the right is of Barby. Just a few weeks ago. A cook, with his cooking ‘n eating space in the open-air beside a cluttered street, is sharing the secrets of his success with Barby.

The place
Barby’s mother was born in Kolkata and then, as a young teenager, she remained behind in the USA for her schooling. She didn’t see her parents again until she arrived at the Bombay docks, almost a decade later, with a husband alongside her and a baby in her arms. The little family had come to join her parents in the work, way back in the Himalayas, in what is now known as Uttarakhand – in a village ten days’ walk from the nearest bus. The first photo is from that time and space.

Barby is a long way from the Himalayas in this photo. The rural scene has been replaced by an urban one. The nearest bus – and car and motorcycle and cycle – is now only ten steps away. The quiet, open spaces have made way for noisy, crowded spaces. Hovering sheep have been replaced by assorted pots and pans. Yes, Barby is sitting streetside in that same Kolkata, a few days before the start of the 100th year since her mother’s birth.

The posture
This is what I love so much about these photos…
Here, take a closer look:

Both father and daughter are seated and both are seated below those with whom they are in conversation. Both photos have a hand as the focal point. In one, the hand is outstretched with a tract offered to a younger man; in the other, the hand is up-and-animated with instruction from an older man. A Warren family likeness are the wrinkles that gather around the side of the eyes. With Dad, his youthful smile sees them just starting to form. With Barby, some twenty+ years older than her Dad in these photos, they are fully formed in all their beauty but, sadly, hidden in the shade cast on her attentive face. There is a gentleness evident in both photos, especially in the way Barby is leaning forward to capture every detail in the instruction.
[NB: I was just clicking photos. None of these comparisons dawned on me until much later].

The purpose
You will see a caption under the photo of Dad. This is because the church with which he was associated for decades (pastoring them on multiple occasions; sent out as m-workers from them, as were Mom’s parents in 1913) has an enlarged copy of the photo mounted on the wall, with a caption underneath:

You can go see it for yourself! Ebenezer Mennonite Church in Bluffton, Ohio. ‘A shepherd telling a shepherd about the Good Shepherd’. Dad did this for more than 60 years. This was his purpose in life. He was the first shepherd-feeder to whom I ever listened. When I trained to be a shepherd myself he was the reference point for the shepherd-carer and has remained at that point to this day. In fact, I experienced his shepherding myself because he loved me as his own. His absence, as is the case with my own father, as a shepherd-pray-er and a shepherd-cheerleader has left a big gap in my life.

With Barby’s photo, the shepherd may give way to the chef but that is a mere glimpse of life’s purpose. In this culture so much is evoked by the making of food. It is hospitality. It is welcome. It is home. It is generosity. It is openness. It is warmth. It is love. It is kindness. It is Barby. Truth be told, I suspect she had little to learn from this maker of chapathi and subzi – but you’d never, ever know it from the lean in this photo. That captures so much of what I love about my Barby.

nice chatting

Paul