Wayne

Our Thanksgiving table yesterday
(Wayne, far right)

"He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?" (Micah 6:8)

When I met Wayne, he was a married man, father of two, Sunday School teacher at Dawson Memorial Baptist Church, a deacon (I think), head  pharmacist at Montclair Baptist Medical Center, and my boyfriend's brother-in-law - qualities that weren't especially impressive to a fifteen year old. Just an ordinary American man in 1971.

As a teenager, I remember him bragging on my straight-A grades. I liked that. I also remember  Phillip and me promising his son, Tim, we'd come to a baseball games. Wayne pulled us aside and said, "Your coming to Tim's game means a lot to him. Don't tell him you're coming unless you mean it." (Needless to say, we drove from Ft. Payne to Birmingham and watched Tim play.)

As college students, I remember going with Wayne and Loretta to the young couples Sunday School class.

As a young mother of three, I remember Wayne and Loretta keeping our kids over night and giving Phillip and me a night to ourselves in a time when finances were tighter than bow string. They also took the kids to McDonalds, the McWane Children's Science Center, and the circus during that season.

When I began writing and teaching Bible studies, Wayne boasted. When the children's books started, he encouraged.

Forty-five years have passed through the hour glass since 1971. I've watched Wayne feed the hungry, clothe the needy, and faithfully walk justly, kindly, and humbly with His God - all with a sensational sense of humor.

Hmmm...

Fifteen-year-old Jill was most definitely wrong. Wayne's not  an ordinary man by any stretch of the imagination. He's indeed quite extraordinary and highly esteemed by God...

and me.