For many, many years, my friend has prepared a homemade Sunday dinner as her gift of love for her family. The list of possible guests has grown from children to grandchildren and now great-grandchildren.
Not all can make it every week. Some live farther away than others, but every week, she prepares a family dinner – and, in recent years, most weeks at least 15 sit down to a meal that includes homemade rolls and desserts.
Although she is past the official age for retirement, she still works every day of the week and then turns around every Saturday and works in the kitchen, fixing a Sunday dinner and thinking about all her babies – young and old.
She lives humbly, embracing the old maxim “Use it up. Wear it out. Make it do. Or, do without.” And wear it out she did with her 18-year-old sedan. Besides a worn interior, a decorative panel had fallen off the side, the transmission – fixed a while back – works if it isn’t pushed, the absentee radio antennae negated in-car entertainment, the air conditioner quit working and, to top that off, the windows refused to lower.
Nonetheless, the car still ran well enough to get her around town, to carry her and a family member without a car to work, to church, and to the store to buy groceries for Sunday’s feast.
After a recent Sunday dinner, her sons meandered outside to see if they could fix the windows. It was possible, but with summer heat pressing, the car really needed a working air conditioner. Parts alone would cost around $600.
“I told them I’ll be all right. I’m used to the heat,” their momma said, preferring to do without rather than spend that much money. “They told me they were going to carry it to Smackover to see if they could fix it.”
Wednesday, a son called and asked “Are you still in town?”
“I said, ‘I am just fixing to leave the office, Baby,’” she recalled.
“Well, run by here and we will have something you can drive.”
She stopped at his place so he could take her car to be fixed.
He indicated a shiny, new silver sedan off to the side, “We are going to let you drive that one there.”
She reached for the pillow she uses to brace her back while driving and tossed it in the car.
“Is there anything else you need from your car?” he asked, “Cause you aren’t going to get back in that.” He explained that the 2008 sedan was hers to drive – a gift from family members.
“Momma’s are supposed to provide for their children,” she protested.
“We just thank the Lord we can help you,” he responded.
She got in and drove home. “I got cold going home. I’m not used to air conditioning,” she grinned.
She returned to town in time to attend Bible study and prayer meeting, where she voiced her praise that she had a new car with a working radio so she could listen to a devotional on her way to work.
Her daughter called later that evening and asked, “Did you drive around in it all night?”
“No, I just floated,” her momma said.
And the car she used to drive? Well, she will pass it along to the relative she has been carrying to work every day. It may not be fancy, but she will tell them, “you just have to pet it and drive carefully, but it will get you to work and carry the baby to school.”
Her unexpected largesse calls to mind the Biblical promise of Luke 6:30, “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
She has given abundantly, freely, regularly, welcoming her family and pouring out her love for them and last week she found her lap filled in return.