What Will She Remember

Sending teams of volunteers out to do service work is challenging. People drive two days to work two days and they want something to tuck away inside to remember – some success. That is not their motive for coming. Love, altruistic love, is what brings them, but they want and need to feel useful.

Sending a team of university students to a flooded, muck-filled house to clean it out all the way down to the wood is not what the stereotypical university student may expect. These kids are not the usual university students. They are my Father’s children. They march to His drum, not theirs.

Katie was a college girl with all the lovely features that attract the attention of the college guys. When she arrived at Long Beach after 1:00 a.m., she looked about as tired as the others. The next morning, she had on work clothes.

People who “gut houses” aren’t a pretty site when they drag back in late in the afternoon. They don’t smell very good. They have “hat head” and their clothes make strong garbage cans cringe. The last thing they expect is for the guy who sent them out with a prayer that morning to greet them at the door with “You guys are nasty and you smell awful!” Their next surprise is the big hug they get from him – nastiness, vile smell, and all. Somehow it breaks the tiredness and makes the filth a kind of badge of honor. That’s how she reacted for a moment but then she was down again.

Part of sending out teams is bringing them back again. She needed something. Sitting together, she and he began to talk about her day. She knew she was supposed to be “up” but it just wasn’t happening. The old lady was a widow. Her house had flooded way deep and most of her life’s stuff was ruined. She had forgotten to take her wedding ring when she evacuated.

A sensitive girl, the university student decided to find the wedding ring. All day, she hunted, much of the time on her knees. She found an emerald ring and a necklace. Still she hunted. The wedding ring was never found. Bummer.

“What will the old lady remember? What will she tell people about today?” he asked.

“That we worked in her house, that she had lost so much, that we tried to save things for her.”

“What will she tell about more than anything else?”

A tiny, choked whisper, “That her wedding ring is lost.” Then the muck on the college girl’s cheeks ran and smeared with the big tears.

“Yes, she will tell that. But every time she tells that story – every time – she will tell of the girl who crawled in the muck all day trying to find the wedding ring. The look of loss will change to a smile as she moves the story from the lost ring to the sweet, young girl who hunted for it.”

The heart of a servant, the heart of God’s kids, understands that it is not about the thing or the success of finding the thing. It is about the touch of love.

Wedding rings are about love. Long ago, when the proud young man gave his bride that ring it was the symbol of his love. He didn’t know that his ring, even though lost, would again symbolize love for his bride – love a college girl would shower on her.