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| This picture of my Grandmother was no doubt taken before I was born |
My maternal grandfather,
Matthew Levi Emanuel, was a Baptist minister and a school teacher. He died
within a year of my birth. My maternal grandmother, however, lived to see both
of her grandchildren grow into young adults. My grandmother was a devout member
of her church and she was a powerful role-model of faith for my brother and me.
The Bible was the center of her life. I never heard her raise her voice in
anger when we were around and I very rarely saw her lose her temper. She lived
a modest and orderly life. When she had a house, she kept everything in order.
As she got older, and moved into an apartment, she had few possessions, beyond
what she felt she really needed. She had a particular passion for the poor and
the unfortunate. Whenever we were with her and we passed a homeless person, or
someone with a severe disability, on the street she would say to us, “There,
but for the grace of God, go I.” She selflessly volunteered her time and energy
for service and outreach in her church.
My grandmother believed
in simplicity and was not wasteful. I think this grew out of her compassion for
those who were less fortunate. It seemed, to her, particularly sinful to waste
the resources that we had while others had to do without. One day, when my
parents were away and she was babysitting, I was playing in the attic with the
light on in the middle of day. I must have been in third grade at that time. My
grandmother came up the steps and turned out the light, telling me not to waste
electricity because the only light I needed in the middle of the day was “God’s
light”. I remember the sun shining through the window pane, flooding the room
with natural light, and thinking to myself, “But our light is better than God’s
light.”
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