Grandma Ruth's Piano..

  In the middle to late '50's I spent a lot of time with my Dad's mom, Grandma Ruth. I think she had 11 or 12 children. You can imagine the sheer chaos that ensued as those teenage girls fought for that tiny bathroom trying to get ready for the bus after getting up late! Grandma tried her best to referee the fights between the girls with occasional comments like "merciful heavens!" or "Lord of Mercy!"

     I have so many memories connected to those days. You can imagine her work load trying to feed and clothe that many children with the often meager resources they had. But

Grandma Ruth was a fine Christian woman. My most vivid memory is that of her always praying beneath beneath the stairs in the back room. We would tiptoe through the room,

sensing even at our young age that this was a personal conversation between her and God. Her prayers were intense and often emotional as she poured out her heart to her Savior. She worked so hard, yet at one point she had acquired an old upright piano. It was

terribly out of tune, many of the ivories were missing, and she occasionally had to shoo a grandchild away who was walking on the keys. But later in the day, if she worked hard, she could make time to sit down and learn to play the piano, trying to learn the old shaped notes in the hymnal. She never became very proficient at playing the piano, but left ruts so deep in my life (thank God) that I've never been able to escape.

She had a stroke in her early 50's I think, and Dad said "You'd better go see your Grandma while you can". I was only 16 or so, but I piled in my old '59 Volkswagen with my friend Mike and headed for Grandma's house, now about 5 hours away. I pulled into the yard that spring day, my mind reeling with childhood memories, and stepped inside the front door. There on my immediate left was Grandma Ruth, lying in a hospital gurney with an I.V. drip over her head. Grandpa Bill was sidled up against the old wood heater that was perpetually out..

     What does a 16 year-old boy say to a dying grandmother??

She pulled me down to her breast, weeping. And then I realized she was PRAYING. . for me. I must have spent a grand total of 5 minutes in that house, and I was gone. As Mike and I started the long trip home I began to cry, even though I didn't know why.

     That was the last time I saw Grandma Ruth. And I'd like to think that the Great God she loved and sought deliberately brought me to her side, so that she could pray for me, and He could answer those prayers.

     I hope you had someone like that, a grandma or grandpa or uncle, someone in your life that modeled Jesus and not only told you the old, old story of Jesus and His love, but loved you.

     Anyway, this CD is now posted on my website (click here) below "Blue Sky" and honors her memory and influence in my life and in the lives of so many others. I hope you enjoy it.

And I hope you tell someone else about it..