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I hope you enjoy
this story!
The brand new pastor and his
wife, newly assigned to their first ministry, to reopen a church in
urban Brooklyn, arrived in early October
excited about their opportunities. When they saw their church, it
was very run- down and needed much work. They set a goal to
have everything
done in time to have their first service on Christmas Eve.
They worked hard, repairing pews, plastering walls, painting,
etc., and on Dec. 18 were ahead of schedule and just about
finished. On Dec. 19 a terrible tempest -- a driving rainstorm --
hit the area and lasted for two days.
On the 21st, the pastor went over to the church. His heart sank
when he saw that the roof had leaked, causing a large area of
plaster about six
feet by eight feet to fall off the front wall of the sanctuary
just behind the pulpit, beginning about head high. The pastor
cleaned up the mess on the floor, and, not knowing what else to do
but postpone the Christmas Eve service, headed home.
On the way he noticed that a local business was having a flea
market-type sale for charity, so he stopped in. One of the
items was a beautiful, handmade, ivory colored, crocheted table
cloth with exquisite work, fine colors, and a cross
embroidered right in the center. It was just the right size to
cover up the hole in the front wall. He bought it and headed
back to the church.
By this time it had started to snow. An older woman running
from the opposite direction was trying to catch the bus. She
missed it. The pastor invited her to wait in the warm church for
the next bus forty-five minutes later. She sat in a
pew and paid no attention to the pastor while he got a
ladder, hangers, and all the material he needed to put the
tablecloth up as a wall tapestry. The pastor could hardly believe
how beautiful it looked, and it covered up the entire
problem. He then noticed the woman walking down the center
aisle. Her face was as white as a sheet. "Pastor," she
asked, "where did you get that tablecloth?"
The pastor explained. The woman asked him to check the lower right
corner to see if the initials "EBG" were crocheted into it
there. They were. These were the initials of the woman, and she
had made this tablecloth thirty-five years before, in Austria.
The woman could hardly believe it as the pastor told how he had just
gotten the tablecloth. The woman explained that before the war,
she and
her husband were well-to-do people in Austria. When the Nazis came, she
was forced to leave. Her husband was going to follow her the next
week. She was captured, sent to prison and never saw her husband
or her home again. The pastor wanted to give her the tablecloth,
but she made the pastor keep it for the church. The pastor
insisted on driving her home; that was the least he could do. She
lived on the other side of Staten
Island and was only in Brooklyn for the day for a housecleaning job.
What a wonderful service they had on Christmas Eve. The church was
almost full. The music and the spirit were great. At the end of
the service, the pastor and his wife greeted everyone at the door, and
many said that they would return. One older man, whom the pastor
recognized from the neighborhood, continued to sit in one of the pews
and stare, and the pastor wondered why he wasn't leaving. The man
asked him where he got the tablecloth on the front wall because it was
identical to one that his wife had made years ago when they lived in
Austria before the war, and how could there be two tablecloths so much
alike? He told the pastor how the Nazis came, how he forced his wife to
flee for her safety, and he was supposed to follow her, but he was
arrested and put in a concentration camp. He never saw his wife or
his home again for all the thirty-five years in between.
The pastor asked him if he would allow him to take him for a little
ride. They drove to Staten Island and to the same house where the
pastor
had taken the woman three days earlier. He helped the man climb
the three flights of stairs to the woman's apartment, knocked on the
door,
and he saw the greatest Christmas reunion he could ever imagine.
True Story
--- submitted by Pastor Rob
Reid ---
Have a
great week!
In Jesus'
name, Amen.
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