Published: April 15, 2009 09:13 am         

Easter is a good time to make old things new

By Sharon Randall



This is an Easter story, an old one. But Easter is a good time for making old things new.

In the town where I grew up, a lot of us were poor — poor as the red dirt beneath our feet — but we didn’t seem to know it.

Folks who were “well off” never flaunted their wealth or allowed their children to do so.

We all had about the same: Most of what we needed, some of what we wanted and little sense of anything we lacked.

The exception was Easter, when everyone went to church, saints and sinners alike. But some wore new shoes and some wore old, and any fool could see which was which.

On Palm Sunday, when I was 9, I asked God for two things: New shoes for me and a pulpit for my granddad. I wanted to ask for a chocolate bunny, but knew, if I got one, my cousin, Bad Linda, would eat it.

Two days later, with my prayers still unanswered, I decided to give God a hand.

The shoes were easy. I lied. I called my dad and told him my mother said I needed them. After their divorce, anything she said I needed, he’d try to get. That’s how I got the shoes. He dropped them off on Good Friday — patent leather, just like I wanted — two sizes too small.

The pulpit was harder. My granddad was a preacher, or would be, as my grandmother said, if he could find a church dumb enough to hire him.

The problem was his preaching — a bad problem for a preacher. He preached like a house on fire, never knew when to quit, kept at it until the congregation would lose its religion, so to speak, and send him looking for a new job.

“Granddad,” I said, “why did the angel sit on the stone after he rolled it from Jesus’ tomb?”

“Maybe,” he said, “he wanted to sit back and watch the fun.”

“Or maybe he was tired,” I said. “Even angels get tired of too much preaching.”

Don’t know if he got the hint, but my grandmother laughed so hard snuff blew out her nose.

Easter morning, he shook me awake. “Get dressed and we’ll go to the sunrise service.”

I rubbed my eyes. Bad Linda was snoring. Our Easter baskets sat on the floor, each with a chocolate bunny. I hid mine in the closet, and bit the head off hers. Then I got dressed and left with my granddad — he in his preacher’s suit, I in my liar’s shoes, sinners in need of grace.

Few things require as much faith as taking part in a sunrise service. We gathered on a hill in the dark, in the cold, praying, singing, waiting for the sun.

As the first ray of light found my face, my granddad leaned close and preached just for me:

“Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

Then the pastor in charge (a man with more heart than brains) called out across the crowd: “Preacher, come bless us with a few words!”

And there went my granddad, dancing to the pulpit, shining like the brand-new day. I sat on a rock and pulled off my shoes.

Driving home, he asked, “Did I preach too long today?”

“Yes,” I said, “but I liked it.”

He laughed. Then he told me he’d been thinking about my question on why the angel sat on the stone at Jesus’ tomb.

“Maybe,” he said, glancing at my shoes, “he told a lie and his feet were punishing him for it.”

There were several lessons I learned that day. First, salvation is like poverty, a matter of the heart. It’s not about how you look; it’s about knowing who you are.

Second, you can lie to your dad, but not to your granddad.

Third, if you bite the head off your cousin’s bunny, don’t be surprised if she eats your Peeps.

And finally, new shoes can’t make you feel new inside; but tight shoes can make you lose your religion.

     

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