Pondering things...

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped

for, the evidence of things not seen.”

­– Hebrews 11:1: Bible

I had plenty of time to think about this. Although, to be fair, these thoughts were not solicited, but rather just bubbled to the surface. It’s twenty-one hours in the air from Singapore to Tucson, so with little to do, I gave myself to the memories and even did a little digging.

Another day past…

These people came from practically everywhere. There were Africans, Asians, Europeans, and South Americans to name a few.

They came for an education, but on these days, they were eating roast beef and Yorkshire pudding at the dinner table in a Baptist minister’s home with his family. The minister was my father. The Yorkshire pudding, our Sunday dinner staple, was courtesy of my mother. The audiences were visiting foreign students, my two sisters, and me.

The scriptures say that it is important to be hospitable, and my family showed it in spades to almost anyone who came within shouting distance of our home. In this case, Dad often invited these students from the local college to church, and then our home for dinner. I suspect, having been a student myself, they politely sat through Sunday services for the promised ‘breaking of bread’ and an opportunity to see what an American home and family was like.

These meals were NOT an extension of the church, where the students were put in an informal setting to share more of the Gospel. Rather, they were opportunities for us to experience stories courtesy of these visitors from distant lands. We provided the food and they provided the entertainment.

My parents were curious folk. Sometimes these events extended into the afternoons, as the students enthusiastically treated us to story after story of their homes and countries from which they came. My mother had a way about her that drew life experiences out of these young people. Some became friends, writing letters for years. In one circumstance with a Japanese student, my mother befriended his mother. While they never met, they exchanged letters and small gifts for decades, keeping each other up-to-date concerning their families and sons.

Seed sowing…

It was these occasions that planted in me the beginnings of interests about people of other cultures and belief systems. They helped me realize there were moral and thoughtful people from all over the world who did not share my Christian viewpoints or traditions. These afternoons cracked open doors of perception, later permitting me to experience things that were at the time unseen, and totally unexpected.

In addition to these visits, stoking the kindling of curiosity, my mother was a storyteller. From the time I was a child she took every opportunity to share the things she knew and her life experiences.  Her ability to paint pictures with words was a gift. Whether they were Bible stories (of which she knew dozens), or her family’s heritage, she brushed Technicolor images across the yet unrealized templates of my mind.

Hopes and dreams…

In the quietness of my heart, I held a prayer that someday I would have experiences that I too could share with others. As the decades drifted by living in the reality of a modest middle-class life, however, I began to realize I would never generate the kind of income necessary to see the world. Yet, that young boy, residing somewhere within the recesses of my mind, refused to relinquish the dream.

And then it began to happen. On the cusp of my fifth decade, I was invited to speak at a scientific meeting in Europe. Importantly, the conference paid the expenses. I could not, of course, believe my good fortune. A trip to Europe was more than I could imagine, and yet here it was. It was a grand trip, and one I thought was a once in a lifetime gift.

That was then…

Skipping the details, as I sat in the seat for those twenty-one hours, I was grateful that child had NOT been forgotten. By now, there have been twenty-four countries visited in the past twenty years, some several times. I have seen and experienced cultures from Europe to Asia, and each time thanked God for remembering the prayer that young boy kept and pondered in his heart.

A few years ago, I began to write a weekly blog, of which this piece is a part. The impetus for recording these brief life observations was not consciously in honor of the incubator of hospitality my parents provided. Nor did I think it was the result of the many stories my mother so lovingly placed within my mind. But I have come to realize that in my own way, these blogs are an homage to those guardians who so lovingly provided me these experiences.

While it has been a long time since I had roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, writing, these short entries are my way of inviting all of you into my home for a story or two.

You are on your own for the meal….

- ted