Table Salt: The singing servant

Sitting in a pew at my grandma’s church, at least twenty years ago, I cupped my mouth, holding in laughter. My grandma climbed the stairs, taking her place behind the podium on the stage. She adjusted the microphone, the organ music commenced. The congregation flipped through the hymnal book to the selected number. Grandma opened her mouth and out came the first dry, raspy, off beat note. The scratchy noise spilled off my grandma’s lips the entire song. Being a teenager, this performance may have been funnier to me than others. I scanned the church to see if the pew’s occupants found my grandma’s crackling voice as amusing as I did. While I attended my grandma’s church often, this was the first time I had experienced her leading the singing of the hymns. The small congregation appeared to be fixated on the words printed in the hymn book as I noticed I was the only one busting at the seams. When service was over and I was assisting my grandma in the church kitchen, I asked her about her new role. “When did you start leading the hymns?” I absorbed her response but truly didn’t process it until years later. “I didn’t want to lead from the stage, but I felt like I was supposed to,” she mumbled, as she rinsed out the coffee pot. She then proceeded to ask me how badly she sounded, and I lied through my teeth, “not too bad!” What I didn’t understand then, but I do now, is that my grandma was serving Christ, not the congregation.

Over fifteen years after the sour singing began, my grandma showed signs of Alzheimer’s. As the disease progressed, it stole my grandma’s ability to talk. While she no longer had conversations, she still sang with her kids, grandkids, caregivers and visitors. When Grandma heard someone singing or music playing, she would join in. Grandma’s sister, Evelyn, visited her and while grandma had no words to speak, her and her sister sang and shared tears.

I believe that grandma sewed God's word in song in her heart. Dementia reveals the true essence of a person. All layers of etiquette and social skills are stripped away. What you see is what you get. Who grandma was in her final years showed exactly who she was. She was a faithful servant, willing to be transparent by leading the songs at her church, even when she knew it wasn’t her strength. Serving God through denying ourselves comfort and subjecting ourselves to new territory is where we will meet God. Showing up when God calls us is the wisest investment we can make. The return is out of this world!

Even though my grandma didn’t feel that she was good at singing she heard God’s call to serve and obeyed.

Serve with your whole heart as if serving the Lord, not people.” Ephesians 6:7

Contact Ashley at ashley@tippgazette.com

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Tippecanoe Gazette

Attn: Ashley Spring McCarroll

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Tipp City, Ohio 45371