A Faith Baptist "Senior Moment"

I don't have a special thing to write about today, but I do have a special SOMEbody to write about. I don't know if you ever talk to the Senior Saints in your church, but you would be surprised at what you can learn from them if you'll just take the time to listen to them. Most of the time they'll begin by telling you about their ailments and their eyes will sink just a little. But if you pepper them with quesitons about the times when they were young, their eyes grow bright and before you know it, they're spilling out their entire childhood.

One particular lady in our church is Mrs. Massmore. I hope I spelled her name correctly. She's a sweet little lady and every time you see her, she'll be wearing a hat. Does it match her outfit? Usually not. Does she care? Nope! She just likes her hats. I remember having a bag of hats that, I believe, my mother had given to me, and I thought to myself, I bet Mrs. Massmore would like these. So I took them to her the following Sunday and you would have thought she was given a gold mine.

Her health had begun to decline so she moved to a residential place where she can only come to church one service a week. She chose Wednesday nights. This Wednesday, I had my camera to take some pictures of our homeschoolers, and I decided I would take a couple of Mrs. Massmore before I got around to the homeschoolers. BTW, I never did get around to the homeschoolers because my batteries went dead....but not before I got a picture of Mrs. Massmore!!

She was telling me that her father was one of the last circuit riding preachers and how fun it would be traveling as a family in their open buggy to near by or far away camp meetings. And how her daddy would be preaching and if any one of the eight children were talking or making faces or doing anything they shouldn't be doing during a service, he would come from around the pulpit and scold them openly. "And if that happened..." she said, "...you could expect a good whipping later."

Then she told me about her hats. Apparently, she grew up wearing hats everytime she was outside. She said her mother would say, "Eber, (pronounced with the short vowel "e") get your hat on, girl. You'll catch your germ." So she doesn't wear hats just because she likes them. She wears them because her mother told her to. She's still obeying her mother long after she's been gone. What a sweet lady and what a great story teller.

And just so you'll know, Mrs. Massmore assured me that "Eber" is a Bible name, found in the book of Genesis.