Jayne Slawson

Scripture Text: Acts 9:36-43

As parents of teenage children, you tend to have 4.7 close friends. Usually our children have more friends than we do. Retired persons average 6 close friends, which is higher than the parents of teenagers. I'm not sure where she got those facts from but my friend, Val Marshal, came up with them once when we were discussing the duration of friendships.

I hadn't thought much about her facts until she called me to let me know that Mark, her and the kids were moving to Swift Current, Saskatchewan. What? How could she do that? My friend—moving away! It felt like a death in my family. There was so much more to our friendship than some boring statistics.

Our friendship started out as categories to each other: "new grad" and " co-worker." Then we became " Hot stuff" and "Pooh Bear." Not sure how the nick names came to be but there they were. At change of work shift we often would review the world, our lives and exchanged little tidbits of wisdom. We became mirrors, confidants, confesors, therapists, and companions in an odd sort of way. We went through being twenty-two years old and then thirty-two, together. We discussed and bantered back and forth, we joked, but always with a certain thoughtful respect for each other.

I found out that her father was a farmer, she was the youngest of 6 children, graduated from Medicine Hat High School and was raised Catholic. She found out that my dad worked for the railroad, I was the eldest of 4 children, graduated from Crescent Heights High School- rival schools- and that I was a Protestant. Our kids were the same ages and we both were going through the same stages of parenthood together. We shared husband stories and children stories, financial worries and shopping tips. I found out that she volunteered at a food kitchen in her spare time, and she found out a few good things about me, I hope.

I was only ever at her house once, never went out for tea or lunch, our children did not play together, and our husbands did not know one another. We never worked the same shifts together. If she was coming off evenings I was starting the night shift. If she was doing day shift I was coming off nights. Yet she had become a very important part of my life. Perhaps a lot more important than if we had been next- door neighbors.

You see, anyone who knew us would have thought that we had been close friends for years! The quality of our relationship was partly created by a peculiar distance. There was a real sense of loss in her leaving. I felt like not wanting to ever invest any more time on making new friendships, though I knew that would not be possible— me being a somewhat of an extrovert: I have 69.9 close friends– or at least thats how many came to my 50^th Birthday!

Robert Fulghum wrote: "Without knowing it, we fill important places in each other's lives. It's that way with a minister and congregation. Or with the guy at the corner grocery, the mechanic at the local garage, the family doctor, your barber/hairdressor, teachers, neighbours, co-workers. Good people, who are always "there," who can be relied upon in small, important ways. People who teach us, bless us, encourage us, support us, uplift us in the dailiness of life. For whatever reasons we seldon ever tell them. I don't know why, but we don't. And of course, we fill that role ourselves. There are those who depend on us, watch us, learn from us, take from us. And we never know. Don't ever sell yourself short. You may never have proof of your importance, but you are more important than you think"... to someone—maybe even to someone here— (Robert Fulghum, All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten. Ivy Books. New York 1986, pg.77-78.)

It sounds like Tabitha (or Dorcus) was such a person. She was clearly a meaningful leader in her community. Luke who had a tendency to be dismissive about the women in his church, interupts his headlong dash through the creation of the early church in the book of Acts long enough to notice and record the death of one otherwise unremarkable widow — the woman Tabitha. Luke calls the men "saints" and "disciples", but the women, merely "widows". As if women who had the misfortune of being left behind mattered too little to name, even to name "saint."

How often do we grieve the lives of children we have never met, lives cut off too soon; we mourn our own losses, naming in thanksgiving those saints who were among us just yesterday, who graced our lives and enriched our ministries. How strange and wrong that these small saints, children and elders, who mattered so much to some of us, should pass away almost unremarkable, their work and their spirits unknown by the world, or so soon forgotten. In a busy world, too rushed, too distracted we tend to not give notice or we disregard the little lives around us or even sadder yet we regard our own lives as being of little consequence. We do not see ourselves as "saints" but merely something else, beneath naming- existing in the category of "Other."

We all have Saints in our lives and we all have Others that we don't acknowledge. My Others may be different from yours, and yours from mine. Sometimes we make Others of one another. Others whose faith, or habits, whose culture don't matter to us; whose ways of believing or living, are so different from ours; who sit beside us on the airplane, on the bus, at work, at the park, even next to us in a pew; but whom we have not acknowledged. They are "widows"— Others—and most days, that is the end of it. But some days, God slips by our defenses, and it's not the end. One day, there was something about that woman, Tabitha, that Luke couldn't dismiss. Something that forced him to call her a title reserved exclusively for the most significant of men: he calls her Disciple.

Dorcus stands out in the Bible as a woman of good works and charitable deeds. She appears to be a wealthy woman, for her charitable deeds are numerous yet she prefers to be associated with a little band of Christians, most of whom were poor and from where she had been taught the concept of service to mankind by the evangelist Philip.

Dorcus proved herself to be a real "doer" of the word of God, not just a mere "hearer." What is significant about the account of her life is that Dorcus not only thought up ways of relieving the needy, but she carried out her plans. She knew what she could do and she DID it! Among her charitable deeds was making clothes for widows and the needy with her own hands. She was not only willing to give money to a cause, but she was willing to invest herself in the works of kindness... she was willing to know their names.

While Dorcus was greatly loved and respected by her community, apparently she wasn't conscious of the affect her work was having on people. She didn't strive to be a leader, but was content to stay in her own home and do all she could to serve God in her sphere of influence. Yet because of her faithful service, she did become a leader in philanthropic causes... a fine example of benevolence.

No wonder the women wept, and the men sent for Peter. No wonder Luke had no other name for such a woman except Disciple. No wonder the women stood when Peter entered, tears streaming down their faces, showing him the many garments and the mute testimoney to the value of a life that had been lost. That whole scene touched Peter's emotions and he was overcome.

I remember when I was pregnant with my first child and people would ask, "Are you not afraid to have a baby after working on the labor and delivery ward? Surely that must fill you with fear!" My reply was "no." I was fortunate to have had a number of wonderful women to learn from, who were mentors, examples to me of how to go through this wonderful experience and sometimes not so wonderful an experience without knowing that they were my teachers—my Others. The same could be said of my experience as a Home Care Nurse and being present during a persons last days, hours.

Mother Theresa tells this story:

One evening we went and rescued 4 people off the streets. One of them was in a desperate condition. I told the sisters, "You take care of the others. I will care for this one who is worse off." I did everything for her that my love could do. I put her into bed, and I saw a beautiful smile light up her face. She squeezed my hand and only managed to say two words, "Thank you." And then she closed her eyes. I couldn't help but ask myself there beside her body, "What would I have said if I had been in her place?" My answer was very simple. I would have said that I was hungry, that I was dying, that I was cold. Or I would have said that this or that part of my body hurt or something like that. But she gave me much more. She gave me her grateful love. And she died with a smile on her face.