This one is about Clifford's youngest sister, Auntie Grace, who was in her fifties at the time this story took place. She awoke one night, to find a strange man standing over her bed with a knife to her throat.
"I want your money," he said gruffly.
"Honey, I don't have any money, but I bet you're hungry, so I'll fix you some pancakes." Yes, I know there was a lady in Atlanta in recent years who made pancakes for an escaped prisoner, but Auntie Grace did it in the 1960's.
She got herself out of bed, took the startled man into the kitchen, and went about making him pancakes, all the while telling him about how much God loved him, and how Jesus had died for him. He was either so shocked she was not afraid of him--or actually hungry--that he went ahead and ate the pancakes. She bid him good-bye and he left without any money.
Over the years, she told her friends and relatives about how she had fixed pancakes for the robber, and how she never knew what became of him. What a surprise when a story appeared in Reader's Digest about a man whose life had been turned around when a humble woman he was trying to rob had made him pancakes instead! He said he had no way to thank her for sharing the Lord with him.
The rest of the story is that Auntie Grace had two adult men who rented rooms from her, also in the house that night. If she had called out to them, they might have helped her fight off the robber, had she chosen to use human strength to fight him. Instead, she took her own inventory and turned to God for help in her childlike faith.
Obviously, there are times when God wants us to use the human strength and resources that are available to defend ourselves, but for that night, God used Grace's compassion and pancakes.
What are your resources? Recognize what God has given you to use today.
"How much food do you have?" he asked. "Go and find out."
Mark 6:38
Great story! And yes, it is a 'story'. Being a 'story' doesn't mean it isn't true. C.S. Lewis called such writings "True Stories". And at least for me, they help me see God at work more than a thousand of Aesop's Fables.
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting your family's stories. As far as I can determine I was the first person of faith in my family. All my ancestors were, it appears, merely "good people". I find it somewhat sad that they never found the true and living God.
When did Auntie Grace pass on?
I'll check with my father and get back to you, Larry on the year Auntie Grace died. The last time I saw her was in 2000, at Clifford's 100th birthday celebration. Although he had died in 1969, we were celebrating his life and legacy as his surviving family.
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