"Setting the Gospel to Music"
How On Earth Could That Happen! | Like Paul & Silas | A Salty Service
A SALTY SERVICE
That stump beside the driveway right there by the street was a thorn in my flesh.Every spring (at my request) Ray would try different methods to make it disappear. He tried burning it, it wouldn’t burn. He tried cutting pieces off with a chain saw, and all he managed to do was dull the chain. Nothing seemed to work. We just didn’t want to admit defeat and call a Stump Removing Service.
So, we started just trying to eliminate the brush from growing out and around it every year because the brush (little tree limbs was what they were!) blocked the view from traffic when you were trying to pull or back out of the driveway…just enough that it was a tad dangerous.
One year I looked out the window and saw Ray riding around the yard mowing the grass which couldn’t be done, of course, without his headphones and radio. He was working hard keeping the yard looking good
J. My gaze was drawn towards my “favorite” spot…The Stump.It stood there stoically in all it’s glory - arrayed with branches and weeds sprouting tall and bent on being taller. We’d been on a long tour and hadn’t been able to keep them trimmed like usual. With Ray working so “hard” on the yard, I thought, “I know what I’ll do…I’ll get a hoe and chop those weeds and branches off that stump. At least that’ll help him a little, plus I’m not about to let The Stump get the jump on us one more day!”
I went to the shed to get a hoe and couldn’t find one. And then I thought, I don’t need a hoe, I need an axe! Not finding one, I thought, “I’m not going to be denied my attempt at keeping that stump from getting the best of us. I’m in the mood to do this and nothing is going to stop me!”
I jumped in the car and drove to Ace Hardware and bought an axe. Back home in twenty minutes and ready to chop! I went into the house to “dress” for this occasion and Ray had come in for a drink of water. He said, “What are you up to, Babe?” I said, “I’m going to help you in the yard, Sweetheart! I’m going to chop the limbs and weeds on and around The Stump.” He replied, “Well, be sure to wear long sleeves and gloves because there’s a lot of Poison Ivy around it. That’s why I’ve had such a hard time getting at it through the years.” No problem, I said, and I was off to the chore!As I went upstairs to gear up for this event, I remembered when I was growing up and my siblings and I would go into the woods to pick huckleberries or blackberries. Mother would make sure we put on a shirt with long sleeves, socks, the whole works. I was reminiscing about all of that as I grabbed a long shirt from a hanger, then went to a drawer and pulled out some gloves.
The phone rang about that time and I answered it. When I finished the conversation, I tore off down the stairs, ran out to the porch and picked up my brand new axe. I was ready to work! 90 degrees and I was dressed for 50, but that didn’t matter. I was gonna have fun trimming That Stump down to size!
J. Well, as you’ve probably already noticed, after I hung up the phone I didn’t walk over and pick up my gloves! I forgot all about them! Uh-oh!The saga continues…
I chopped, I pulled, I wrestled, I trimmed, I wiped sweat continuously off my forehead, around my eyes, etc. Man, what a mistake! But I thought I was okay, because I thought I was keeping clear of the Poison Ivy.
When I finished, I had a sizeable pile of brush for all my efforts. I was soooooooooo proud of myself! I went into the house and shed the hot clothes, ran through the shower (made a bad situation worse is what I did, since water helps to spread Poison Ivy!
J) and fixed us something to eat. That was all done on Friday. By that night I was itching here and there, mostly on my arms and forehead. Ray said, “I told you so.” I thought, “Nothing to it, I’ll just put some Calamine Lotion on it and that’ll be that.” So, off my darling husband went to the storeJ. On with the lotion. Saturday we left for a ten-day tour into Louisiana, starting in Montgomery, Alabama on Sunday morning. By Saturday night I was a mess. I had Poison Ivy everywhere; especially on my arms and face.Sunday morning arrived much too soon. I was able to cover my face with heavy make-up and not look too ridiculous
J, but the Poison Ivy was very close to my eyes and I knew that as soon as we finished this service I would have to go straight to a hospital emergency room before my eyes would be swollen shut! It was all I could do to not scratch my arms to pieces; they were really bad. Calamine Lotion was just not working. What to do, what to do, we’re thinking… Ray came up with a neat idea for my arms (Bless his heart!J). He said, “Babe, I’ve heard of instances when folks got into the ocean with ant or mosquito bites, all that saltwater made them heal pretty quick.” Well, what do you suppose we did with that box of salt we had in the motorhome pantry! Ray mixed it with some water to make a thick paste, that’s what! We were carrying Christian T-Shirts on our product table at that time, so he took one of the white ones and cut it into large strips. Then he plastered my arms with the salt mixture and wound the t-shirt strips round and round my arms like a bandage. I wore a long-sleeved black blazer and skirt outfit. I felt like a zombie by the time we walked through the door.Of all things, this was the first time we’d ever been to this church!
Well, everything went well while Ray and I were singing our first three songs together. I sat down while he sang three or four of his compositions, then he brought me back up to sing a few of mine.
Little did I know that - while Ray had been singing - the salt had been drying. Yep, drying. Just waiting for its grand entrance to the stage!When I stood up and walked up to stand beside Ray…a trail of salt accompanied me, falling out of each sleeve onto the dark carpet (my face was as dark as the carpet, though). As I reached out to pick up my microphone, salt just flew out from my arm. I was a walking salt-bomb going off
J. By this time folks had funny looks on their faces. They didn’t know whether to laugh or be afraid of meJ. So I knew we’d have to tell them about The Salt. About the Poison Ivy. And The Stump.Everybody laughed with us as I sang, walking to and fro across the stage spreading salt everywhere
J! We had a great service that day. I’ll never forget the compassion I felt from that wonderful congregation. Afterwards they directed us to the local hospital where I was given a shot and some medication and started to get better right away. We’ve had about every kind of service you can think of as we travel back and forth across this vast nation. Some have been kind of quiet and laid-back while others were hallelujah shouting, bench-jumping services. But thank the Lord we’ve only had one Salty Service.What about The Stump, you ask? I don’t want to discuss it
J!
How On Earth Could That Happen!
by Laura Lewis
Lewis & Lewis wrote feature articles for a Gospel Music magazine for several years, and in talking with different artists while preparing our stories, I was always amused when a member of a singing group would tell me that their bus driver "left" them in the middle of the night at a truck stop while they were getting coffee, or something similar. Even though I knew the incidents were true, my thoughts would always be, "How on earth could that happen?"
Well, never in my wildest dreams did I think it would or could happen to me.
But it did.
Yes, I mean that. It really happened.
To me.
Ray & I were on a tour into Oklahoma and were going through Ft. Smith, Arkansas where we'd stopped at a Waffle House to get some of their wonderful coffee.
A few days before that, just as we drove up to a church for the Sunday night service and came to a stop, the parking brake cable snapped. Some men at the church found a big rock to put behind the back wheel, to "scotch" the bus. Later, since there wasn't time to have it repaired, Ray got a big (Did you notice how that was spelled? B-I-G!) angled piece of wood to use until we could get back home from this tour.
Guess whose job it was to be The Brakeman! (Brakewoman, in this instance).
Yep, me.
Every time the bus had to stop for fuel or whatever, I had to jump down and put that twenty-pound (from my point of view) block of wood under the wheel. Can you just see this? I'm a dignified great-grandmother trying to be a professional Gospel singer, and here I am driving up to this awesome almost-million-dollar church that's never seen us, and I am jumping off the bus being a brakeperson J. However, I'm a trouper, so I just grin as I do it (in case somebody is watching me), and prance back on that bus as if somebody in everybody's bus has the same job.
Back to the coffee at Waffle House...It was in the middle of the morning when we stopped, and this Waffle House was located in a busy little shopping center. We finished our coffee, went back out to the bus and boarded. Since I had the cell phone in my hand, I walked up to the front (our bus is a motor home, and the door is in the middle) and laid it on the dash, then walked back, got off the bus again to wait on Ray to start the motor and pull up a little so I could get The Special Block of Wood.
He started the motor, pulled up and...up...and...up...and kept going! I couldn't move I was so stunned. I do remember the sensation of my mouth falling open. There he went up the highway, and there I stood in the middle of that parking lot---with that stupid twenty-pound block of wood (no, by this time it definitely weighed thirty!) in my hand and folks everywhere were looking at me!
Without blinking an eye, though, I reached down inside me and pulled up some pride (Where on earth did I find that?), raised my chin just a tad...and walked towards the Waffle House door to go in and ask if there was a pay-phone around, since I didn't see one anywhere.
I know what you're thinking...No, I did NOT take the Awful Block inside with me J. As I walked inside, of course it was I thought...Everyone was looking at me. I said with a tremor in my voice (Now where did that come from!), "My husband left me." Then I realized how that sounded, I continued, "But he didn't mean to!" (Some chuckles) Is there a pay-phone around here?" "No," they all answered, "But you can use my cell phone," one nice man said as he handed it to me.
I looked at it stupidly, trying to focus on who I was and what I was doing and what in the world was my own cell phone number with Ray at the end of it...Seeing that I was dazed, the man said, "Give me your number and I'll dial it for you." From somewhere I heard my voice (Was that me?) give it to him. He dialed it and handed it to me. I listened to it ring and ring...(When we're traveling down the highway I'm always the one to answer the phone while Ray's driving)...and ring...(If I'm not up front to answer it, then he yells for me-and that's exactly what he later told me he'd done)...and ring...Then Ray finally answered with an exasperated, "Hello!" I said, "Sweetheart?" There was a long pause...(I could just see him taking the phone away from his ear to put it in front of him---as if that would explain why it was my voice on it talking to him---and watch the traffic at the same time. After talking to him later, that's exactly what he'd done). I said, "You left me!" Another long pause (He was beginning to get the picture). Then he found his voice. "I'll be there in a minute." Yeah, right. It would be more like ten. I said thank you to everybody in general and made my way out the door, so I could keep The Precious Block of Wood company.
When Ray drove back up in a cloud of dust (Ha! He was worried!), I picked up my forty-pound (yes, it was!) block of wood and climbed back on the bus and closed the door. Then I started laughing...and Ray chuckled a little, not knowing if I was gonna be hysterical or what...and I couldn't stop laughing, so he got tickled, too. So we left that parking lot laughing together, both thinking, what a story! Did this really happen?
Yep, it did.
To me.
And the twenty (not even that much I don't think) pound Special Block of Wood.
Like Paul & Silas
by Laura Lewis
A few years ago before Lewis & Lewis bought our present motor home, we were traveling in our Lincoln TownCar. On one particular trip to Macon, GA, the car had started to just "cut out" while cruising down the interstate.
Almost to our destination, we exited into the parking lot of a Wal-Mart to grab a last-minute item that I needed. Wouldn't you know it, the car would not start when we got back in it, no matter what Ray tried! We finally had to call a garage that came with a tow truck to pull it in. We then called the pastor of the church where we were going, several miles away. He headed in our direction to pick us up at the garage. When he arrived, we loaded all our sound system, clothes, and everything we thought we needed into his van. We barely made it to church on time to set up.
As it turned out, it was to be one of the funniest trips we'd ever made...Back then we were just beginning to sing with our sound tracks on CD's with our new CD player, but we still kept our cassettes handy, too, because most churches had a cassette player if something were to happen to our CD player. Well...we were shocked to find that we had left the CD player sitting inside the garage where the car was. We'd unloaded it from our trunk, but set it down on something for a minute and forgot to load it in the van! No problem, we thought. We did remember to bring the cassette sound tracks case. Alas, the church did not have a cassette player! What a funny dilemma! We didn't miss a beat, though (no time for wailing and gnashing of teeth J, we just got dressed quickly (time to start already!) and sang with Ray's guitar and me playing the piano. everyone understood what had happened, laughed with us, and said they enjoyed that even better than the usual sound tracks!
Made it over that hurdle....We had a good night's sleep and the pastor carried us back to the garage the next day. "Fixed!" they said. "Wonderful!" we replied. We loaded everything from the van into the Lincoln, paid 'way over $100 for whatever was wrong and away we went. You see, we were due to sing that evening in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. No problem....normally, that is. What we didn't know was that our not-so-normal trip was just about to begin.
We traveled about twenty miles or so towards Atlanta, and all of a sudden the car started to jump and buck and cut off like it did before it was supposedly fixed! Man, we were stunned, surprised, aggravated, rattled, and whatever other adjective you want to think of. How on earth were we going to get to Tuscaloosa on time?
The story about old Paul and Silas came to my mind right about that time, how everything looked pretty dark, but they didn't let it bother them...They just started singing. Well, I thought, why can't we do that, too? I didn't know of a reason why we couldn't, so I said to Ray, "Let's just sing our way through this!" (He looked over at me like he thought I was crazy J) "We're not about to let the devil have the victory here!" Well, we started singing old hymns, whichever one came to mind. You know what? It worked!!! I mean to tell you if we ended a song and rested a minute, the car started to buck and jump. So, we didn't stop singing from then on!
We'd gotten a little past Atlanta and by this time we were getting hungry. Ray exited and we stopped at a KFC, both of us still singing. While he went inside to get the food, I was still singing and the motor was still running. He came back out and we left. He drove and ate while I sang. When he finished eating, he sang and then I ate J! What a time we had! You know something? We drove up to our destination in Tuscaloosa with time to spare. What a God we serve!!!
After that service, we did have to have someone else work on the car and find the real problem and fix it. However, that trip was a lesson for us! A lesson of how you can stand on the Word! I have a song called "Stand On The Word" that the Kindler's had on radio several years ago, Isn't it wonderful that we CAN stand on the Word and it won't let us down? "When it's out of your hands - and you've done all you can - just go stand on the Word!"