A Story from "The Furious Love of God"

I have heard Brennan tell this story several times, but I loved reading it again in his new book--

"Since moving to New Orleans, I've gotten deeply involved in the only leper colony in the United States.  It's found in Carville, Louisiana, about twenty miles southwest of Baton Rouge.  I've been there many, many times.  I go from room to room visiting the lepers, victims of Hansen's Disease.

On one occasion, as I was coming up the front steps, a nurse came running toward me and said, "Brennan, can you come quick and pray with Yolanda?  She's dying, Brennan."

I always carry the holy oils with me to anoint any who desire it.  I went up to Yolanda's room on the second floor and sat on the edge of the bed.  Yolanda is a woman thirty-seven years old.  Five years ago, before the leprosy began to ravage, she must have been one of the most stunningly beautiful creatures God ever made.  I do not mean just a cute, pretty, or even attractive woman.  I mean the kind of blinding physical beauty that causes men and women on the street to stop and stare.  In pictures, Yolanda had the largest most mesmerizing, most translucent brown eyes I've ever seen, set in this exquisitely chiseled face with high cheekbones, long brown hair down to a slender waist, and a perfectly proportioned bust.  But that was then.

Now her nose is pressed into her face.  Her mouth is severely contorted.  Both ears are distended.  She has no fingers on either hand, just two little stumps.  One of the first effects of leprosy is losing all sensitivity in your extremities, toes and fingers.  A leper can rest her hand on a burning hot stove and feel absolutely nothing; this often leads to gangrene and eventually demands amputation.  Yolanda just had these two little stumps.

Two years earlier, her husband divorced her because of the social stigma attached to leprosy, and he had forbidden their two sons, boys fourteen and sixteen, from ever visiting their mother.  The father was an alcoholic, complete with frequent violent mood swings.  The boys were terrified of him, so they dutifully obeyed; as a result, Yolanda was dying an abandoned, forsaken woman.

I anointed Yolanda with oil and prayed with her.  As I turned around to put the top back on the bottle of oil, the room was filled with a brilliant light.  It had been raining when I came in; I didn't even look up, but said, "Thanks, Abba, for the sunshine.  I bet that'll cheer her up."

As I turned to look back at Yolanda--and if I live to be three hundred years old I'll never be able to find the words to describe what I saw--her face was like a sunburst over the mountains, like one thousand sunbeams streaming out of her face literally so brilliant I had to shield my eyes.

I said, "Yolanda, you appear to be very happy."

With her slight Mexican-American accent she said, "Oh, Father, I am so happy,"

I then asked her, "Will you tell me why you're so happy?"

She said, "Yes, the Abba of Jesus just told me that He would take me home today."

I vividly remember the hot tears that began rolling down my cheeks.  After a lengthy pause, I asked just what the Abba of Jesus said.

Yolanda said:

COME NOW, MY LOVE.  MY LOVELY ONE, COME.

FOR YOU, THE WINTER HAS PASSED,

THE SNOWS ARE OVER AND GONE

THE FLOWERS APPEAR IN THE LAND

THE SEASON OF JOYFUL SONGS HAS COME.

THE COOING OF THE TURTLEDOVE IS HEARD IN OUR LAND.

COME NOW, MY LOVE, MY YOLANDA, COME.

LET ME SEE YOUR FACE, AND LET ME HEAR YOUR VOICE,

FOR YOUR VOICE IS SWEET

AND YOUR FACE IS BEAUTIFUL.

COME NOW, MY LOVE, MY LOVELY ONE,

COME.

Six hours later her little leprous body was swept up into the furious love of her Abba.  Later that same day, I learned from the staff that Yolanda was illiterate.  She had never read the Bible, or any book for that matter, in her entire life. 

I surely had never repeated those words to her in any of my visits.  I was, as they say, a man undone."

--Brennan Manning