by Floyd Wilson

Created on: April 16, 2008

I can't actually say that this story is from an actual "sermon" but from a discussion of reflection with a former pastor of mine at a coffee shop. This pastor, always tried to urge me to attend his services and join in on discussions before and after his sermons. While I was not a "perfect attendee" to church services where ever I have lived, my mother was. She, like so many moms was a devout believer in her God and her reflections and ideas on religion have always had the greatest effect on me.

First, she came from a very poor Scottish farming family in East Tennessee. Most of the farming was to raise their own food and barter "a bit" for what little money they had. As a teenager, my grandmother and grandfather sent my mother to an Aunt because they could not afford to feed all the children living at home. You would think this would have made her bitter, but indeed it had an opposite effect and made her one of the kindest and most gentle people that I have know. Her poor upbringing made her as generous as anyone I have seen since and even enduring a marriage where the poverty was prevalent, did not dampen the Christian characteristics she exhibited. Through all of her adversity she clung to her God and his teachings and in her discussions with me she never made our poverty a negative, but would always tell me "how lucky we were." She use to tell anyone that asked her about how poor she grew up, that she was "so lucky to come from a family that believed in God and tried to live an honest, hardworking and Godly life."

My former pastor has asked me on a number of occasions if I prayed with my mother. Well, while a bit embarrassed, I did tell him the truth and said that I didn't and now I feel badly because my mother would have cherished those times. I did tell him this story though and I think he was as impressed as I have come to be... My mother asked me all the time if I prayed? Now, I will admit that I did give her a false answer of "yes" so she would not "hound" me about my prayer habits, but I don't believe she believed me. When I was in the fifth or sixth grade, she began writing prayers in my note books that I used in school. Not like you think, but around the margins of the sheets that I had already taken notes on. As usual she would not "waste" anything and when I asked her to please use clean sheets, she told me the margins gave her "plenty of room." I read everyone one of her handwritten prayers even when I had to turn the sheet of paper three full

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