Here I am, Lord, send me

I know I still need to do the second installment of my “driving in South Africa” tale, but I recently received a letter from my aunt that contained such a powerful story, I just could not wait to reprint it here in my blog.  45 years ago last year, my aunt joined VISTA (Volunteers In Service To America), which is now a part of AmeriCorps.  It was and is essentially a domestic version of the Peace Corps.  The letter I received from her relates a story from when she was just about to leave for VISTA service regarding an interaction with her dad, my grandfather, who I unfortunately never got the chance to meet (he passed away a few years before I was born).  The story really speaks to me because, not only does it give me insight into a great man I have always wished I could have known, but it also tells of a time in my aunt’s life that was very similar to mine.  Regardless of whether you are religious or not, I think the story adequately conveys the attitude we should take towards service, and I would say it does a pretty good job at explaining my take on things in that regard.  I have included the excerpt from the letter, unedited, below:

Before leaving for VISTA training in Cincinnati in 1966 (wow, 45 years ago next week, October 30!), I had a memorable conversation with my Dad in the west room at Lone Oak.  A couple of years before that, I had become (very tamely) involved with civil rights efforts, through my activism in ecumenical conferences, where there were a few black students and some activist ministers.  I was at such a conference at Mo-Ranch in the Texas Hill Country on the day of the August 28, 1963 March on Washington.  People went around with transistor radios (high tech!) listening to what was happening and to MLK’s speech.  Dad had complained to me, as was usual at that time, that “those people are trying to move too fast.”

Some time after that, he repeated his remark, saying “Those people are a hundred years behind us.”  Without getting into slavery and Jim Crow, I said, “You’re right, Dad.  That’s why it’s so important to move as fast as possible.”  He appeared startled, then said, “you know, I never thought of it that way.”

At the time I went into VISTA, I had finished a year of a largely unsatisfying job in Dallas after graduating from college, and I was in Huntsville getting ready to leave for training in Cincinnati.

Dad, as you may have heard, was a very traditional male.  Womenfolks were to make the coffee and bring it to him.  But on the day I was to leave, he woke me up early, bringing me (and himself) coffee that he had made.  And he said, in his inimitable Texas accent, “Ol’ Nance, my Sunday school lesson this week was about Isaiah.  And when there was something that was hard to do, that nobody else wanted to do, Isaiah said, ‘Here I am, Lord, send me.’  And I thought of you and Isaiah, Nance.  You just said ‘Here I am Lord, send me.’”  I still get teary (like I am now) thinking of that conversation.  He had come to an understanding of what I was doing, on his own terms.

So thank you Aunt Nancy for that, and thank you Granddad Spencer for continuing to remind us, so many years after your death, what service is all about.