Lessons of Love - The Story of Bertha Griffith

We just started a small group at a friends house. We'll be meeting with some people from church for several weeks and doing a study on the subject of love. One of the first things we talked about was identifying a person in our life who is very loving and talking about what we can learn about love from them.

This led me to the story of Bertha Griffith. It's not really my story and I'm sure that I have some of the details wrong. It's a story about a very important lady in my Dad's life and what her story taught me about love. The story of Bertha Griffith is in two parts. Each part has taught me something different about love.

PART 1

My dad was about 16 when he became a Christian. It was the late 60's and he was a bit of a long haired misfit. His parents got divorced when he was 14 and he moved with his mom to a new city in northern California. So aside from looking different, he was in a new place. He's not really a gregarious type of person who jumps quickly into a new group even now. I'm guessing he was a lot more shy then. He started going to church because two cute girls at school invited him to come sing in their youth choir. They needed tenors. Long story short, after spending a little while around the kids in the choirs, my dad became a Christian and started going to Sunday services regularly. 

After a few services some of the "elders" of the church pulled him aside to "straighten him out" about his appearance. From what I've been told, they were giving him a hard time about his appearance in general (his hair was too long and too bushy, he wasn't especially well groomed, etc.) and his style of dress (much too casual for church). In the middle of this conversation a very well respected woman in the church, Bertha Griffith, stepped between my dad and his accusers. She physically stood between him and them. She gathered up all 4 feet 10 inches and 70-some-odd-years of herself and said, "Now you leave him alone! The Lord and I have talked and he's going to be just fine."

Lesson #1 - Love accepts people as they are and sees them for what they have the potential to be.

While others in that church saw my dad as a long haired loser kid, Bertha saw his potential. But she didn't pull him aside to lecture him about how he was wasting his potential. She just accepted him as he was and let him decide to live up to his potential on his own. The truth was, my dad was a hurting kid who probably just needed someone to believe in him.

PART 2

Years later, after my parents had met and married, they moved to the area in southern California where I grew up. When they went to a nearby church (with tiny baby me in tow), who was standing at the door greeting but Bertha Griffith? Hundreds of miles away from where she first said that he would be "Just fine" she recognized that misfit teenage boy all grown up. She smiled and said, "I want to show you something." She pulled out her pocket book and produced a photo of my dad at 16. She said, "I want you to know that I've been praying for you ever since you came to that church as a teenager. I knew you would turn out ok."

Lesson #2 - Love follows through on what it believes.

Bertha believed in my dad's potential. As far as I know, aside from that one time she defended him, she never made any grand gestures on his behalf.  She didn't write him letters when he went off to college or even keep track of him in any way. She may never have known what came of his life, but she did what she could on his behalf. She just prayed. And lo and behold... that long haired misfit turned out just fine.

We all went to the same church for years until Bertha passed away. I think she was in her late nineties when she finally did. Every once in a while she would take me aside at church and tell me about how she prayed for my dad all those years. And she would whisper, "I still do. And now I pray for you too."

That's what Bertha Griffith taught me about love.

Nap Time

Today I put her in her crib to play hoping that she'd fall asleep. She was grumpy so after a few minutes Mark brought her sippy cup in with some waterjuice (2/3 water, 1/3 juice). This is how we found her about ten minutes later.

When she woke up she seemed very confused as to how she fell asleep when the last thing she remembered was playing and having a little snack. She also looked at me like, "Where'd my cup go!?!" She got over it though. :-)

Easter Photos Part 2

Here's a couple more just for fun. That day she happened to have a tuft of hair on the back of her head tat stuck straight up. My mom and I even tried Gel, but we couldn't get it to stay down. Oh well...

Easter Photos

I haven't even had time since Easter to load our photos onto the computer, much less post about it. My favorite part of Easter (besides having dinner and quality time with family) was Norah's reaction to her dress. 

I got her dressed in the morning at my parents' house. We were hanging out with them because Mark had to go to church early for band practice. Once she was all dressed in her Easter finery I stood her up on the back of the couch so she could see herself in the mirror. She took one look, grinned as big as she could and then took both of her hands and patted her skirt as if to say, "I'm REALLY pretty!" It was one of those times I wish I could transfer my mental picture directly to video. I didn't catch that moment, but I caught a couple of other fun Easter memories. Here's a couple of the best ones:

Thankful Thursday

I know it's Friday, but I just haven't had the time to write! I am thankful for so very many things. This post has to be short. I have a later schedule today and I actually get to go to the GYM before work!! 

That's the first thing I'm thankful for. Before Norah and up until I was 32 weeks pregnant I went to 6 am classes about 5 days a week. That's just not practical with a baby. I'm thankful for a husband who helps out any way he can and encourages me in my goal to be healthy. God willing, healthy will include getting back to pre-baby size!

I'm thankful for family visiting.

I'm thankful for friends who invite us into their home for small group despite their limited knowledge of us, and with an understanding that we'll be coming with a loud, "busy" baby in tow. (that's you Linn)

I'm thankful that I am learning the lesson of being faithful with whatever I have, no matter how small. It's a lesson I've learned over and over again. I don't even want to share specifics because I think too many of us are tempted to see God as a giant vending machine. Let's just say that you can't out give God. That is a fact. He promises to give us everything we need. Not everything we want. But everything we need is ENOUGH. And for that I'm thankful!

Super Baby!

Norah's latest trick. This one is thanks to my dad. Enjoy!

Memorial Box Monday

I have been thinking all day about what to write for this MBM. One of the benefits of this excercise is really the opportunity to remember the Lord's faithfulness. Just as I was typing that last sentance the story of my ring came to mind! So here's a story of the way the Lord cares for even the little sentimental things.
When my mom was in kindergarden she was playing in the office after school (grandma was a school teacher there so it wasn't unusual). She found a gold ring in the bottom of the lost and found. The secretary said that if no one claimed it by the end of the year, Mom could have it. She claimed it at the end of the year and held on to it all through her childhood. She and Dad had it looked at before they got married. The jeweler said it was a wedding band from the 1920's. The diamonds in those are usually just chips, but these are real, faceted diamonds. By that time the ring was several sizes too small. She always meant to get it resized but never did.
I played with that ring in her jewelry box as I was growing up. I just couldn't wait until I "grew into" it. I started wearing it in late high school and took it with me when I left for college. It was always too small for my mom's hand but I was glad she never had it resized. My hands are MUCH smaller and though it was a little big on my ring finger I loved it. I always felt like it connected me to my mom.
After Mark & I had been married for a couple of years we moved from our first house less than a mile from my parents to about an hour away. On moving day when we were almost done I looked down and noticed that my ring was gone. It was hard enough to move from my family - even though we knew it was where we were meant to be - but losing that connection just broke my heart. I cried and prayed, prayed and cried, but I just couldn't find it!
For the next several days I prayed every time I thought of it. I just asked that the Lord would open my eyes and slow me down enough to see it. I just had this feeling that it was still around somewhere and I was missing it.
More than a week later, I went into the kitchen to take out the trash. Normally I would have asked Mark to do it but I kust decided to do it myself this once (hehe:-). As I was reaching down to pick up the can, I saw it. Right there under the sink tucked next to the trash can and the can of sink cleanser was my mom's ring! I probably used that trash can no less than 20 times that week. I don't know why I didn't see it. How could I have missed something so important to me in a place that I used so often? In the moment I picked up the ring I felt the Lord say that I may not have known where my ring was but he knew all along. Since then I've worn the ring on my middle finger. At the end of my pregnancy when I swelled up like an overcooked sausage, I was extra grateful to have a ring to wear on my wedding finger.
For this story I don't think I'll put my ring in our box. I'll put a fake in for display purposes. The real one will be staying safely on my finger!