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By James Toews
ONE SUNDAY, more than 15 years ago, she drove up in her little red car, walked
through our doors and introduced herself. “My name is Hilda. I’m an 85 year old widow looking for a church home.”
It was impossible not to like her. She had a spring in her step, her smile was
magnetic and open, and she always looked into your eyes when she spoke to you.
She told me she was going back to her roots. The church at which she’d been an active member for half a century had split, and then disintegrated
around her.
Her father had been a Mennonite pastor. “Are you the pastor? And you’re Mennonites, right?”
“Well . . . uh . . . yes. Maybe not the way you remember, but yes . . .”
The ambivalent answer didn’t seem to put her off. The answer was “yes,” and she settled in. She took the membership classes; we became her church home.
Mind you, the music was usually a little loud for her taste; but that’s when hearing aids do their best work, right? And she didn’t know some of the songs; but that’s what overheads are for, right?
She did miss the hymnal, but being able to look up and see the words – there was sense to that. When we sang ‘Count Your Blessings’ or ‘What a Friend We Have in Jesus,’ her face lit up the sanctuary.
As a Mennonite pastor, I was put on a pedestal. I reminded her of her father,
she told me, and he had been a saint. Somehow in her memory, I had a ponytail
in those early days – but that didn’t bother her. God had told her it was okay, and that settled it.
Every week, she squeezed my hand at the door and said something kind. She couldn’t wait to come to church on Sunday. She told me she carried my family when sleep
didn’t come. Praying was what she did, and her prayers carried us through some dark
valleys.
When she turned 90, the church put on a birthday party. “We’ll do this again when you turn 100,” we cheerfully declared to her and to each other, not really knowing what that
meant.
We did travel the road to 100 with her. I remember her sadness as she gave up
her driver’s license. Now she felt old, for her car was her freedom. She was dependent on
others in a way she had never been before.
Not long afterward, she moved from her neat mobile home with its garden, to a
community living apartment. We came to visit her, and were even guests for
lunch. “This place must be a preview of heaven,” she declared. “Can you imagine having a beautiful apartment and then being able to go down for
lunch and supper served by such polite young people?”
Not everyone at the table had such a gracious view of life. “They’re complainers,” she whispered to me apologetically.
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She rarely complained, but we never had the sense she was glossing over her pain
either. “You know, there are times when getting old is very hard,” she told me one Sunday.
“All my life I’ve been praying for others; but the other day I prayed for strength, and my
prayers didn’t get through. I learned something: when you can’t pray, others have to do it for you. I never knew that before. It felt very
strange.”
What do you say to that, in the 30 seconds you have before the service starts?
Not long afterward, her community living situation couldn’t do the job anymore, and an extended care facility became her new home. This,
too, was viewed as a gift from heaven to her. The nicest people in the city
looked after her. They helped her out of bed. They helped her dress. They
wheeled her into the dining room and then back.
When visitors came and a voice or a face sparked a memory, that same smile would
light up the room. She would reach out her hand and say, “You know . . .”
One day, I went to see her for what I suspected would be the last time. She
smiled and reached out her hand, and began to say something – but the words and thoughts passed each other, so she just smiled her signature
smile.
As a church, we completed our journey with her. Although she was gone, we
lingered a while at the door where we first met her. We knew that this time she
had really found home.
James Toews is pastor at Neighbourhood Church, Nanaimo. This article was first
published in the Mennonite Brethren Herald.
January 2010
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