This article by Ray Spitzenberger first appeared in IMAGES, June 30, East Bernard Express, East Bernard, Texas.
We are surrounded by artifacts, which become symbols of who we are, — wedding ring, ordination ring, photos of your grandchildren, Grandpa’s plow, even scars on your hand where broken bones were wired together. The older you get, the more you want to be reminded of who you are.
That’s perhaps why I want to have my wedding ring (a simple gold band) and my ordination ring (Luther’s silver wedding ring) stretched to fit once again on my somewhat arthritic fingers. Also, why my iPhone is overloaded with pictures of my grandchildren, and I tear up when I see an old church bulletin lying on a box in the closet. They remind me of what I’ve forgotten about who I am.
When you are young, you don’t need a reminder of who you are, and, of course, many old people don’t either (but I do).
Going through some dusty boxes in the studio, and you come across a fat notebook you used to use in teaching English literature, you remember classes and class discussions from long ago, when you first started teaching in college. And you sigh and shake your head, wondering in disbelief, how you, a person from such a lowly background, could ever have been someone as significant as a teacher in higher education. Only by God’s Grace could you ever have been such.
You walk past the baptismal gown once worn by your wife’s father, and also worn by your two older granddaughters when, you, as pastor, baptized them. Now, the little white gown hangs ready to be worn once again by your new grandbaby who will be baptized by her father, also a pastor.
The gown reminds you how astonishing that God gave you the incredible honor and privilege to administer the Holy Sacraments of the church. This was indeed magnificent and humbling.
There, on the patio, stands the old crock in which my old-fashioned Wendish mother used to ferment pickles and sauerkraut. What a great cook and canner she was! What a Proverbs 31 wife and mother she was! The crock humbles me, because it reminds me of how undeserving I was of such a wonderful mother, but how God blessed me with her anyway!
Each time I sit in the much-repaired old captain’s chair in the studio, I am reminded of the kindest, humblest and most gentle man I ever knew. It was my father’s favorite chair, a railroad depot chair. I used it for my ordination into the public ministry, in spite of the fact a church member was disappointed I used such a shabby old chair. I wish I could say the chair reminds me that I too am kind, humble, and gentle, but I can’t, yet I can say it reminds me of who I want to be!
Yes, these reminders, these symbols, are so important to you when you grow old. Not that you want to brag about them, but that you need to remember what gifts and privileges God gave you in this life … in this sad old world.
Soon, we will have my wedding band and ordination ring enlarged to fit my slightly gnarled fingers. Not to wear for the sake of prestige (one came from Tiffany-New York, the other from James Avery), but to remind me of the sacred gifts of marriage and ordination.
-o-
Ray Spitzenberger is a retired Wharton County Junior College teacher, a retired Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod pastor, and author of three books, It Must Be the Noodles, Open Prairies, and Tanka Schoen.