I was going through some of my old text books and papers from a long ago college writing class and came upon a story I had written and I thought you might like the story too.

Bobby was a little boy in my Sunday School class. He was swinging a little too high on a swing close to our house and he fell off the swing and hit his head on a rusty tomato can. We weren’t as careful about getting rid of things as we are today! Someone came by and  saw him lying on the ground. It seems a bit strange that he was all alone at the time he fell as he was only four years old. He was taken to a hospital in the next town. There was no hospital in our little town, and, as I think about it now, I don’t think we had a doctor in town either! After a few days, Bobby died.

I don’t know how it came about but I was asked to sing for his funeral. I was only four years old too! I don’t even know how it came about but I wore a white dress, white stockings and white shoes! I never had such beautiful clothes. Mama must have borrowed them but I surely remember wearing them that day, and I remember standing up in front of the church filled with people ready to sing “In the Sweet By and By” which I had been practicing at home. This wasn’t home though, and I was scared. I was glad that Mama was at the organ that day.

I started to sing and the people started to cry! I imagine there were many people not crying, but it seemed to me that everyone was crying and I didn’t know what to do! I must be singing very bad, I thought. I sort of slid over  to the organ and I whispered to Mama,”should I quit singing? I made everyone cry.” Mama smiled at me and whispered “keep on singing, You are doing so well.”

So I finished the song and then ran out of  the church. Later, I asked Mama “Why did all the people cry when I was singing?” Mama answered,”Because you were singing so well. When you sing, always sing the words of a song clearly. You were doing that and the words went straight to their hearts and they were sad thinking about Bobby.”

Though I sang that song over eighty years ago I’ll never forget it, nor will I forget what Mama said. I have sung hundreds of songs since that day and I always sing the words clearly. Lately I have heard songs that don’t seem to have any words in them, just gibberish. What good is that to anyone who really needs a song?

 

The Book of Matthew in our Bibles tells us that there are two gates, one is very narrow and one is broad. Which one are you traveling on? It feels like the whole country of America Is going full speed heading for the broad gate. Yet there are some people walking steadily toward the narrow one. But we must not even mention Jesus in our conversations. We are told to say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas. We surely can’t pray in school, or read the Bible in  public.

Yet, we follow those who tell us those things. Are we afraid? Our Bibles contain rules too, don’t forget. Instead of those silly sayings there are other rules people in Congress have made which we should fight against. We should fight against killing our babies. I’m sure God doesn’t like that! We should fight against homosexual marriage, in fact, our Bibles states God says he is against homosexuality in the first place. We should use his name in praise, not the  way you hear it on the streets!

If we keep our mouths shut about these things we are walking to the broad gate and God says many will go in through that gate. If we stand up against these things we are walking towards the narrow gate and God says few are them that find it. It’s hard to find the people who will stand up but they are around. It’s only that they are silent. It is time to make ourselves known. And that goes for me too. Let’s fight, shall we?