Regular activities at Crescendo’s center resumed this week. After a month of summer closure, the participants returned, refreshed and full of stories. The morning was spent hearing each person’s account of their summer. There were trips to the beach and the country and visits with family and friends. I spent the month of February covering for the staff at the group home while they took their vacations. Everyone had their turn visiting my apartment – some for dinner or lunch, some for overnight visits.  There were trips to the movies and the mall, work in the garden at the house, lots of walks with the house dog, Patán (he loved it!). For those without family or whose family was unable to spend time with them during summer vacation, it included a trip to the beach.

The family of a Crescendo participant graciously provided their summer home in the community of El Quisco, near the seaside town of Algarrobo for our use at the beginning of February. Five of us arrived there one Saturday afternoon. It is practically a religion in Chile to go to la playa – the beach – during summer holidays and it felt like half of the country was there.

After spending one hot day at a crowded sandy beach in town, we decided to try something a little less stressful and spent a relaxing day at a less popular, rocky beach near the house. Adriana, Soledad, and my colleague Marianela sat for most of the afternoon under the shade of a beach umbrella.

Alain however, was fascinated by the water and the two of us stood at its edge for what seemed like hours. Occasionally we went up to our knees in the icy water making the appropriate squealing noises and facial expressions. Once we went for a walk down the dusty road to another part of the shore where we stood throwing pebbles into the sea. Something about it struck Alain as very funny and he laughed with his whole body after each throw. His delight was contagious and it made me laugh just being there with him. But the image that is etched into my mind is of him gingerly picking up long pieces of slimy seaweed and throwing them back into the sea.

I have always loved Loren Eiseley’s story, The Star Thrower. In it, he tells of beach littered with hundreds of starfish, thrown there after a storm at sea. A man quietly walked along the shore, stooping to pick up one stranded starfish at a time and throwing it back into the sea. A passerby stopped and watched curiously for a while. Finally he asked the man what he hoped to accomplish. He pointed out the futility of throwing a few starfish into the sea when there were so many, too many for one man to save. What difference could his efforts possibly make? “It makes a difference to this one,” the man said as he rescued another starfish from certain death on the sand and threw it into the life-giving sea.

I sometimes think about this story if I am tempted to become discouraged by the work I do. Perhaps it seems too small, of little value. There aren’t impressive numbers to report. Our work may not seem to some to accomplish much of “lasting” significance. But I know it matters to the one, to the Alains who God has placed in my life, to whom Jesus may have been referring when he spoke of “the least of them.” I believe it matters because each of us is “fearfully and wonderfully” made for a unique, beautiful purpose. I am grateful for the opportunity to do this work. We don’t know what long term impact our work will have, what eternal significance it will affect. We just pick up each starfish God places at our feet and return them into the life-giving water where they can be fed and thrive and in return nourish us with their gifts.

I thought of The Star Thrower again as I stood on the rocky beach with Alain, watching as he threw slippery ropes of seaweed into the sea and wished you could have been there to experience the gift of that moment.