Nancy Franklin reports:
On the last week of summer vacation Gentry Ward of Laurel visited her grandparents, Bubba and Nancy Franklin. She spent her time swimming, forging and cooking with her cousin Cross. She even made a pet rock!
I have been thinking this week on things that inspire. It can be a person, a thing, a song, book or an idea. Of course, the greatest inspiration of all is God. Everything I am or hope to be comes from my Saviour and Lord. And His Word inspires me with each reading of it.
My mother was my first inspiration. We lived through some terrible hardships, but she stayed strong and true to God, Dad, and devoted to the six children she bore and raised. My father was a carpenter and worked away from home a lot.
When all six children were single and at home, mostly we ate beans, country fried potatoes and cornbread. Whatever food she had in the house she “made do” with it. None of her family ever went hungry, but I am not sure she didn’t. Feeding and taking care of her family was the most important thing to her, even if it meant going without for herself.
Mom’s only dream was to have her family in Heaven with her someday. She didn’t get to see all of us walking with the Lord, but the life she lived in front of us, and her prayers for us all those years kept on being answered after she went to be with the Lord. One by one, her children all came back to the fold. Even the youngest in the family, our brother, Jim McCoy, who was an atheist, finally started to seek the Lord, who was waiting, of course. Jim’s experience was strong and miraculous. He has a part-time ministry and published a Christian book, “Stair Steps.” He is now the one his siblings go to for spiritual strength and guidance.
Pastors who have shepherded my own family as part of their flock come to mind. Rev. Danny McIlveene of Monroe, La., was there when my husband and I needed encouragement to hold our family together when our children were young. He and his wife Rae Ellen traveled to Jackson at a crucial time to pray for our son, Travis, Jr and with me. He had been badly injured in an accident. Doctors gave us little hope, but God did, and so did Danny and Rae Ellen.
At the time, my husband, Bud, had just gotten home from the hospital after surgery and could not take care of himself. Family and church members helped out until Bud was able to go from and into the bed, with the borrowed wheel chair, and all over the house in it. All of his meals were supplied by church members and often mine, too.
The pastor of that church, Dr. John Coffer, of Liberty Baptist in Flowood, was with us through many struggles, too. He was the constant lifeline during the time we were raising two teenage sons.
When Travis was in the hospital, there were times the strong faith the Lord provided me was attacked by Satan in his sneaky, small ways. When I called the church for John, he was promptly on the phone. “I need prayer. Satan is shooting his fiery, little darts at me and I feel a pinhole in my faith bubble.” John would pray with me right there on the phone. Minutes after Bud lost his battle with lung cancer, John and his wife Brenda were by my side. Bud’s funeral service was in Louisiana, so Brother Danny was the one to officiate the service in Louisiana. But John would have cancelled his family’s Christmas trip to Georgia to help with the service had I let him.
Shortly after I lost Bud, I had to have some surgery. John’s face was right there among those of my family when they wheeled me away. Two years later when I had to have a mastectomy after a breast cancer diagnosis, again he was right there with friends and family.
Another man of God, the area Tyson Chaplain and fellow team member, Marcus Mann, also inspires me. He sends out a devotional every day, and I am fortunate to be on his mailing list. With a different scripture verse and a new teaching each day, his writings remind of God’s love, even during times when I might not can feel it. Many tough days I am uplifted and inspired to keep on keeping on.
Brother John labeled me a survivor when I was a member of his church and church choir. He always reminded me my strength came from the Lord. A basset hound that lives at the mill where I work reminds me that survival strength is not only for humans. She has been there longer than any I’ve asked can remember. Even those with the longest tenure there do not seem to know when she arrived.
Some who have been there 15 years say she was already having puppies when they arrived. We call her Mill Dog, or Little Girl. She stays out of reach of capture, but she loves and remembers anyone who has ever fed her. She is so strong, her determination and instinct for survival beyond understanding. She has had many litters of puppies and teaches them how to stay safe. She has a new litter hidden away somewhere now.
There are many drivers who come through the mill delivering corn or other feed ingredients, and we also have day and night shift feed delivery drivers. The puppies always find good homes. But Mill Dog is at home right there at the feed mill.
May the Lord bless you all this week and remain with you until we meet here next week.
Please get your news/items of interest to me as early as possible at gingersnapwelch@gmail.com or leave a voice mail for me at 769-222-7055. There is a Sunday, 6 p.m. deadline if you want it to run the following Wednesday.
