Mama Polly in her favorite dress, with her two favorite people (and yes, I mean favorite!), eating at her favorite fish restaurant in Thomaston, Georgia. My mother-in-law Polly is an original, one-of-a-kind woman, devoted teacher, pianist, cat lady, and character in the truest sense of the Southern phrase. She is beloved! Here’s the plain truth (according to Elise). If Mama Polly doesn’t get into heaven, there’s no hope for the rest of us. This special woman has a servant's heart that leads her family with her undeniable faith. Mama Polly’s childhood stories continue to teach us, they enchant us, and they remind us to pray. Today is her eighty-sixth birthday. I would like to share one of my favorite stories from Mama Polly- the story of her tree. _____________ It was Friday, a beautiful spring morning in 1941. I was six years old. A yard swing hung from a tall walnut tree in the front yard of my great aunt’s house. I stayed with Aunt Bessie while my mother was working. Aunt Mattie and Uncle Ben lived across the wide hallway on the other side of the duplex. A large “L” shaped porch framed the front. They used to live in my house. When I was a baby, they decided to switch houses with Mama and Daddy so I would have a room. Family was a big help to us.The two houses were in sight of each other. Mama was at the mill and Daddy was working at the grocery store. Uncle Ben was still in the fields. He stayed there until long after dark. Sitting on the yard swing, I kept an eye on my dirt road and my house on the other side of the road just down the way. I began to pray. Even though I did not understand the idea of sin, I knew how to talk to God. I knew how to ask God to keep me from doing wrong in my life. I whispered, God help me. The next morning from my bed, I continued to pray. I still felt the same conviction of my prayer from the day before. God help me. Mother was there too, and I heard her quietly working around the house. She always kept a clean house. No clutter. Everything had a purpose. If she thought an item was no longer of use, out it went. Mama was always mopping those floors, keeping them so clean. Our house was like so many country homes in Georgia at that time. We didn’t have sub-flooring or linoleum. We didn’t have a telephone and had to walk the store to use one. We didn’t have a car until a few years later. Mama’s sister Rose and her husband Theodore agreed on a price with Mama and sold her our first car. Vegetables came in summertime and we always did have plenty of corn. The hogs were for November. Fall also meant that the fire would burn hot for the cane syrup mill that Uncle Ben had on his farm. I could watch the process but was not allowed to help. That was some real good syrup. I can still smell the strong coffee and crumble biscuit covered in thick syrup. Getting out of bed, I decided what I needed to do. I got some hope and headed outside. I located a shovel and walked across our dirt road to a ditch. It had rained the night before; this earth was soft. It didn’t take me long to find a tiny sycamore tree. It was only about two feet tall. I carefully dug it up and took it back across the road to my yard. I planted this tree near my house. I was hoping it would live. I prayed, God help me. Using the tree as a symbol of commitment, I asked God not to forget my prayer. I asked him to keep me from doing wrong in my life. My old country home has since been torn down. The road is paved. Undergrowth clutters the landscape. The tree remains. Times may change and how we are provided for may change. But God- He looks after His people. He is faithful. Happy Birthday, Mama Polly! You are loved! We are grateful for your witness on our lives. Thank you for teaching us to pray… God help me_________________! (She says we should fill in the blank for ourselves. God will hear.) He is faithful and Mama Polly is always praying for us.
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It’s kind of like the week after Christmas. I have celebrated. I have worshipped. I have been with family. There’s a routine to our holiday with traditions of Watergate salad and pineapple sandwiches. For me, Easter is now part of Spring Break, and it gets harder to focus on Easter when I begin thinking about taking a vacation. This year, I did both. Easter on vacation. Bob and I had big, beautiful plans for sunrise service on the beach, but we didn’t bring jackets for that unusually cold morning. Next, we decided to visit a local church, but my kid didn’t pack Sunday clothes because we said we would be on that beach for the sunrise service. We did remember that FBC was live streaming the service, so we worshipped with our church family. No pineapple sandwiches, but I’m pretty sure there was fried grouper. One tradition I did uphold: I reminded my family one more time about Luke’s Easter story. As a little girl, I would sit in church each Sunday and flipping through my Bible. I was not allowed to snuggle down in my mom’s arms and nap. I was not allowed to draw on the attendance register. I was not allowed to sneak to the bathroom during service (we went before it started.) I could however count the stained-glass windowpanes and tall, imposing organ pipes as many times as I wanted, or I could spend an hour in worship. Many times, I would open my Bible to the Easter story in Luke. It’s my favorite. It is where my name is found. Lots of people I know are given fine Christian names from the Old and New Testaments. At that time, I didn’t know any people with my name, so I felt special to share it with such an inspirational person. Always afraid of "that hush-up look" from adults in church, I quietly turned pages, searching for Luke’s words about Joanna who went with Mary and the other women to the tomb of Jesus. Since this was long before the age of Google, I felt compelled to reread the other gospels, fact checking the Easter story to make certain it was only Luke who mentioned her. The other gospels mention the women. Luke- the well-educated physician and writer that he was- named a few of them. Like Joanna. Joanna is introduced as the noble wife of a steward in the house of Herod. Some accounts also place her at the cross. She was a woman who had been healed by Jesus. Once restored to good physical and mental health, Joanna devoted her life to Jesus, helping in His ministry. Joanna surrendered to His calling and was willing to allow God to work in her life. She was prepared to do His work however He asked. She honored Him with her words and deeds. That’s a lot to live up to in a name, but then again so are the names Peter, Paul, and Mary. Oh- and John, as in John the Baptist. I think about this Joanna, this woman who traveled with her friends as a witness for Christ. I imagine how she approached the tomb with a heavy heart, perhaps still crying for her loss. I imagine her quietly resigned to the task of preparing His body but deeply grateful to serve Him one last time. I imagine her expression as she entered an empty tomb, perhaps angry or anxious to discover stones rolled away. I imagine her wonder at beautiful light and angel voices as she discovered that she could search for a living Jesus; she would not find Him among the dead. I did enjoy my vacation. I spent this week-after-Easter as still and quiet as possible. Those precious vacation days allowed me some perspective. I continued to think about this woman from the Bible, but then I questioned- what happened next? I wondered what this disciple of Jesus did the week after those amazing moments at an empty tomb. When she returned home, what did she say to her family? Was she terrified like the other disciples? Was she confused and anxious, choosing to just keep to her daily routine? Or perhaps she was still, creating quiet spaces for God to find her. Trust despite trembling. Faith despite fear. Wonder in the weakness. When doubt crept in, I hope she remembered His words. I hope she remembered His teaching and His commands to love. Maybe, she believed in His ministry just as she did before He died. Maybe, she made a choice in those quiet moments to continue to serve Jesus as his disciple. Maybe, she honored Jesus, remembering that love and obedience go together. Sitting as still as possible on a beach last week, I tried to create some of those quiet places for God to find me, to restore me mentally and physically. I tried to imagine how my weeks-after-Easter can be filled with His love and my faith. If I need to go back to a beach to think about it some more, I will. Did you know that some denominations even refer to this special woman as Santa Joanna? It does have a nice ring to it. Just sayin. Luke 24 On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” 8 Then they remembered his words. 9 When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. 10 It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. I thought I would be spending April 1st with my students explaining the origins of Poisson d’Avril- how the French recognize this infamous day. Instead, I gave instructions about being sneaky at school. The majority of these kids were in fact five years old. Somebody has to teach them how it works. I preached... Running gives you away. You can’t be quiet when you are running. You can’t stealthily make your way up to a teacher’s door with a paper fish if you are running. You can’t make a clean getaway if your voice and stomping feet echo in the halls. The French recognize April Fool’s Day as Poisson d’Avril, which literally means Fish of April. Basically, French kids try to tape paper fish to each other all day while yelling Poisson d’Avril and running away. My kids yelled everything but Poisson d'Avril. We kept practicing because this is not the easiest French expression for them to squeal. They eventually managed it quite nicely. Totally adorable. My kiddos did not care that I tied this lesson to history or to calendar talk or to awesome cultural standards sent out by the great folks at the American Council of Teachers of Foreign Languages (ACTFL). They only cared about the great sneak surprise we played on our principal. We initiated a covert operation from blue hall down a red hall and into a back door of our office. Seventeen tiny but very enchanted kids became a little concerned that we would get in big BIG trouble. We managed to tape all of 17 decorated fish to a door and scoot out of the office before a great giggle fest erupted. Third and fourth graders adventured down yellow hall and managed to cover their homeroom doors with lovely paper fish. Some were serious, some were silly, and some were well in touch their sneaky side. It was a morning filled with lots of laughter, paper scraps, and excitement. I loved it all. My fifth graders however had no trouble being sneaky. I give them kudos for pranking me into a scream so loud that they fell in the floor hooting. I never saw them go near my desk with the fake roaches. As I sat down to check an email, a large (plastic but I didn’t know it at the time) cucaracha cradled my coffee cup. Did I scream because of the roach or because I realized I might have to go the morning without coffee? We will never know. This happened TWICE within five minutes, and I fell for it both times. As these fifth graders ran down the hall to their room to cover their door with fish, I followed yelling, “Stop it, stop it!” To my amazement, they listened, and we creeped into the room where their teacher had her own surprises waiting. I ended this day with my own door covered in perfectly precious paper fish. I seriously need to practice what I preached today. Running gives me away. I need to slow it down. I can’t be quiet when I am running myself ragged. I can’t stealthily make my way towards retirement if I am running on fumes. My back and shoulders and my knees can’t take it. I can’t make a clean getaway if I’m complaining and stomping my feet in frustration when something doesn’t go my way. I’m hoping to channel some of that giggling and hooting and silliness of today to help me soar into spring break. There was a lightness to the day that was unexpected. And that’s no joke. |
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JoAnna Arnold
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