Ms. Willie Mae
I met Ms. Willie Mae the first afternoon of my first day in my first appointment. All four feet and ten inches of her showed up at the front door of the parsonage with a smile on her face and a plate full of fried apple pies with the steam still rising from them. As I took the pies from her, she pointed to her home, directly across the street, and said, “I live right there. I’m sure we’ll get to know each other real well.”
Over the next few months, we did get to know each other well. I would go over to her house and we would sit out on the porch and swing in her swing. She was a snuff dipper and was proud of the way she could swing back and spit her tobacco juice into the shrubbery and never get a drop on her porch. I would learn that she had come to live in her little shotgun house when she was fourteen years old as the wife of a man over three times her age and that she had seldom been more than two miles from her house and the five acres of land it sat on. Quickly, I became amazed by the depth of her faith and the intimacy of her relationship with God. Early on, she informed me if I ever came over and heard her talking to someone I should not think it strange because she spent a lot of time talking to Jesus. I asked her if Jesus ever talked back to her to which she retorted, “Of course he does. You don’t think I’m crazy enough to keep talking to somebody who doesn’t talk to me do you.”
I eventually learned that Ms. Willie Mae had lived a life full of challenges and tragedies. After giving birth to four children at a very early age, her husband died leaving her with nothing but a little 800 square foot house and five acres of land. She went to work washing, ironing, cooking, and cleaning house for other people in the mill village. In addition, she raised vegetables, chickens, pigs, and a cow for milk. Somehow, she was able to take care of her children and see that they were educated and had a good start in life. She was proud of her three sons and her “baby” girl.
Her second tragedy came shortly after her oldest son had graduated from high school and joined the army. He had returned home on leave, gone out with some friends one night, and, on the way home, been killed in a car wreck. Ms. Willie Mae would often show his picture to me, talk about how much she missed him, and what a blessing he had been from God.
About a year after we moved into the parsonage, the quietness of a Saturday night was shattered by someone knocking at the door. As I opened the door, Ms. Willie Mae’s next oldest son stepped into the room and asked, “Can you go over to Momma’s with me? Sally is dead.”
I was shocked. This was Ms. Willie Mae’s only daughter. Her husband had just come home from Viet Nam and they had gone to the lake to picnic and ski and, in a tragic accident, she had drowned.
We went over to the house and knocked on the door. After a few minutes, Ms. Willie Mae came to the door, opened it, began crying, and immediately cried out, “Don’t tell me my Sally’s dead. Don’t tell me that.” Needless to say, it was a long dark night. The next few days were sad as we grieved together and had the funeral. Everyone was concerned as to whether or not Ms. Willie Mae would ever recover and if she would ever come back to church.
I went over to the house a couple of times and, each time, she was sitting in her rocker, holding her Bible, and just moaning. I began to wonder if she would ever return from the darkness of her grief. I wondered if we would ever sit on the porch again and laugh as she spat back into the bushes. I wondered if my sermons would ever again be interrupted by her uplifting, “Praise the Lord,” response to a point that resonated with her spirit in worship.
However, my worries were short-lived. The first Sunday after the funeral, Ms. Willie Mae was back in church to the shock and surprise of us all. She walked in, just as the service was beginning, with a smile on her face and a little nod to everyone. She opened her hymnal and began to sing as if things were normal. Two times that morning, she even interrupted the sermon with a clear and strong, “Praise the Lord.” We were all amazed.
Later that afternoon, I saw her in the swing on her front porch and went over to join her. We sat quietly for a while and she broke the silence. “Preacher, you know my life has not been easy. I’ve had to work hard. I never got an education and never had any money. There’s a lot I don’t understand. Two of my children are dead and I’m still here. It’s times like these that I’ve come to understand that, sometimes, you’ve just got to trust God. You just can’t get by no other way.”
I know, without a doubt, that God nodded and smiled as the swing went back and she spit back into the bushes.
Brother Mike
