Keepers of the flame...

She came out on the porch with a stack of folders and papers, sat down in a rocking chair and began to shuffle through the magazines, articles and typewritten pages. Our conversation, liberally laced with laughter, rolled on as she began to pass around different sheets of information. One sheet, a program from a weekend gathering of Baptist students, was covered on the back with our individual contact information… names and addresses(no zip codes) carefully written in our best handwriting… a record of our first meeting as a group. We passed the sheet around and remembered the flame of youth represented in those carefully inscribed signatures. Courting stories, marriage and divorce stories told with laughter and tears kept us rolling along on the conversational river. Another typewritten sheet was pulled out with numerous handwritten additions of spouse’s names, dates, new addresses and phone numbers. Stories of Tim’s death and funeral, Viet Nam, professional and personal pursuits were accompanied by saved magazines, articles, pictures and newspaper stories. Our lives since our first meeting were held in those black folders, those stacks of yellowed typewritten papers, carefully gathered together and saved for this moment. Mary Lynn is the keeper of the flame for our Cherokee work camp family. Even in the years when we were distant from each other, raising families, marrying and divorcing, working, living our lives, she kept the cards, letters, articles and pictures that came her way, gathering us together even when we were far from each other. And on that tin roofed porch with rain as a musical accompaniment, we warmed our hearts and souls around the fire of remembrance. Those not present were held in loving arms of unspoken prayer as we shared what we knew of their current stories… new marriage for Donna and Francis, spouse’s health struggles, retirement, family reunions in other places… and they were a part of us, absent in body but present in spirit. I look at the picture my sister Catherine sent me last night, six of us laughing, side by side, older and weathered by life, and give thanks for the keepers of our flame of family. I give thanks for Mary Lynn who keeps the memories of our lives together and apart bound up in folders. I give thanks for the God who brought us together all those long years ago and has kept us to this day. In Isaiah 43 I read… Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through the fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. This weekend I was reminded once again to whom I belong, to whom we belong. The God who was in our coming together as a family, the God who walked with us as we passed through the fires and rivers of life, has been and is even now the keeper of our flames. The One who loves us, has loved us all the days of our lives, sat with us on the porch this weekend and is waiting for us to come home. Thanks be to God for all the tender mercies, the saving graces, the memories bound up in folders and printed on yellowed papers, the love and laughter of my work camp family. A-men… A-she.