It was a quiet evening and I had just made myself a cup of hot chocolate. I was pleased with myself and my day until I mistakenly laid my hand on the hot burner on the stove where, moments before, the milk for the hot chocolate had been. I was startled and began to strongly berate myself. But I immediately reined this in, saying, “No!”—not to myself, but to the situation and to fears that were flashing through my head. And I also said “No!” to the sudden onset of sharp pain in my hand.
What had preceded the evening was the visit of a dear friend with whom my wife and I had had a particularly inspired conversation. Among other things, we had talked about the stillness that comes before healing. This stillness is not empty, but filled with listening to God that is entirely free of personal expectations, and so leaves room for infinite possibilities. Our friend had described how, for her, this listening is rewarded with creative inspiration. So, in the moment after I’d felt pain in my hand, my friend’s joy in telling us about this resonated in me. I became quiet and immediately knew that I was uninjured, because I could not depart from God’s infinite presence. The pain stopped instantly.
As I resumed what I had been doing in the kitchen, I tried to understand what had just happened. My hand had been on the burner long enough that, physically, there should have been damage on my skin, but there was none, and I was able to freely use both hands to empty the dishwasher.
