Proud Papaw

 

My mother’s father, Papaw Epperly, was very proud of me.  I knew he was proud of me because he told me all the time, and he told anyone who would listen.  My younger brother Phillip and I would spend several weeks each summer in West Virginia with Papaw and Granny.  I learned to sing shaped notes, I processed chicken eggs, and I milked cows.  Papaw was a plumber, and often I would go to work with him.  One day, we stopped in town to talk with a stone mason.  Unknown to me, he was a bi-vocational evangelist.  And that afternoon, Papaw began bragging.  I thought he would tell this preacher about me taking algebra in the eighth grade, or about me playing in school the band.  But Papaw told this man about my perfect attendance in Sunday school.  Papaw told of my Sunday school pin that had thirteen yearly bars under it.  I had never been proud of my Sunday school pin before, but that day, I was.  My granddaddy was proud that I was faithful in church.  But my perfect attendance at church wasn’t my hard work; it was the hard work of my parents who made sure that I was in Sunday school each Sunday.  My parents took me to church, I took my kids to church, and now, they take my grandchildren to church.  Paul said in II Timothy 2:2, “And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also.”  That’s what it’s all about: teaching the next generation, and the next, and the next.  Hey, do you take your children to church?  Do you take your grandchildren to church?  What about taking a neighbor kid to church with you?  You may start a whole new line of church-going people!  Think about it.