Click here to go directly to the video study.

For seven years I have visited Tilly*. Tilly no longer participates in society, she is nursed in a nursing home. When I started my visits, I took my guitar and we sang together. When we sang “Abide with Me”, it was not uncommon for her to use the second voice in the last line. She sang in a beautiful, clear soprano.

From my thirteenth to my seventeenth, Tilly gave me music lessons; first th flute and later the guitar. She was very musical, she could play many instruments and she gave music lessons to half the village. She loved animals and she had more than ten cats. She also loved people very much and she was a strong, sweet and cheerful woman.

I still visit her every week. She has deteriorated in recent years and now we no longer sing, but I help her with eating. She often looks fuzzy. Occasionally she speaks, but I don’t know the words she uses. It sometimes seems as if she is no longer there.

But still, with great regularity, there are times when Tilly is there again. A few weeks ago, for example, when animals came to visit the nursing home. Tilly made contact and she visibly enjoyed it. She also responds alertly and enthusiastically to beautiful music. And she is still her sweet self. Everyone, from nurses to fellow residents, loves her because her soft character is still visible.

Then there’s that one time I’ll never forget. Tilly had been very tired for months and almost always when I came, she slept. She said nothing and if she ever said something, there was no way to understand it. One afternoon when I was with her, I was a bit gloomy. Just like that, out of the blue, she opened her eyes, looked straight and clear at me and said, “You are a good girl.” I have no idea where she got that from, but it was exactly what I had to hear at that moment.

When I think of Tilly, I often think of Psalm 92.

They will bear fruit / for the Lord’s sanctuary
until their old age, / until their gray days.

Even if it is different from what we normally think, Tilly still bears fruit in her old age. She’s still there and I’m glad she’s still there. Her illness has taken away a lot, but not who she is at the bottom. It is created in the image of God.

* Tilly is a fictitious name.

Here you will find a video study about the Hebrew word צלם.

I wrote this blog in Dutch in september 2018. In the spring of 2019, Tilly passed away. I believe that we will meet again in glory.

 

 

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