Cinderella

This week has been a tough one, because of stories I’ve read (or heard) or hurt children. As a mom, that really tugs at my heart strings and makes me hug my own kids a little tighter. The hardest story to handle is of 5-year-old Maria Sue Chapman (daughter of a great Christian musician - Steven Curtis Chapman). On Wednesday night, Maria was struck and killed by a car in the driveway of her home. The car was driven by her older brother and was a terrible, horrible accident.

Losing your child is any parents’ worst nightmare, but losing your child at the hand of a sibling is torture. That poor boy has to live with this for the rest of his life. The worst thing would be for parents to blame the sibling, because at that point they would be losing two children instead of one.

But I don’t believe Steven Curtis and Mary Beth Chapman will do that. I believe God doesn’t give you more than you can handle, and perhaps He has brought them to this moment “for such a time as this” (Esther 4:14).

If you haven’t heard it before, Steven Curtis Chapman wrote a song about little Maria a few months back. It’s called Cinderella. It was inspired by a bath time that Steven tried to “hurry,” but Maria and her sister Stevey Joy weren’t exactly cooperating. Listen to the song and be inspired by the lyrics of this special song. (Have some tissues handy if you have kids!)

Someone wrote the following on Steven’s blog, and I think it sums up the story perfectly:

The stroke of midnight came too soon.
The grand ball came to an expected and unexplainable close for your Cinderella. And like the story-book Cinderella, the magic came to an end, but in a different way.
Your Cinderella exchanged her beautiful gown, not for common clothes, but for a spotless, white robe.
Her glass slippers for a street paved with gold.
Her tuxedoed attendants for a host of saints and a chorus of angels.
Her distant prince for the ever-present Prince of Peace.
Her bejeweled chariot for a heavenly mansion prepared since the foundation of the world.
And she exchanged her gleaming white horses for the reality that she never needs to rush off again – she is now home.
Really, the grand ball came to a close for those left behind. But for Cinderella it is just beginning.