What To Do With Angels

What to Do with Angels

When the house we grew up in was sold to my parents’ neighbors across the street, my sister and I began the weeks-long, heart-tugging process of removing decades of memories hidden in ordinary things.

Two nieces who were (thankfully) still in the nest-feathering stage received tables and chairs, lamps and mirrors, cookware, linens, and a myriad of smaller treasures. Other things we gave away, glad that they could be used; still more we donated to a local mission. The most comfortable and familiar pieces furnished a new apartment for my dad and, even transported elsewhere, looked familiar and lovely reassembled. Still, we were left with much that no one claimed.

Nearly four months after my mother’s funeral, three final bulging bags made their way to my own home. They were filled with Christmas decorations, including one tiny golden angel with a painted plaster face, pipe cleaner arms, and wings and a skirt of tulle. I remembered she had once held a songbook propped open on those outstretched arms—and she topped our family Christmas tree for more years than I can count. (I imagine she was benched when the tiny songbook went missing—or maybe when her right wing frayed and slipped its wire frame. Mother favored perfection.)

What to do with imperfect, aging angels? With those mementos whose luster has been lost? This one I chose to keep. I remembered her as the beauty she was once, and I could not part with that. I carried her from room to room, photographed her once, and tried to imagine what use she could possibly be in Christmases to come. Even now I can’t quite assign her to service. Not yet. For the present, she simply acts as an odd portrait of myself: worn, frayed, song lost, wing wounded, unproductive but open armed, with maybe a bit of hope still hiding under her tiny, tired skirt.

What to do with angels? Hold on to them and hope. They may yet herald a brand-new coming with an age-old song.

He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.

Matthew 24:31, NASB