An Amazing Lady

Shirley lives and pastors on St. Paul Island, by herself. Though few venture into her church, she is an amazingly active witness to the island, an island that is 386 miles from land. She is a native American lady, who is a retired nurse, living a subsistence life style while ministering to a predominately orthodox community. This would be a difficult task for any Evangelical, let alone a pentecostal one. Isolated far out in the Pacific, Shirley often calls to see if I'm doing alright. Those calls never last less than an hour, and I always feel better about life when we hang up.

Shirley recently entered an 8.2 mile foot race on St. Paul. At the conclusion of every mile, men of the community would bring her a chair to rest on. Then at the completion of every two miles they would bring her the community bus that contains a bathroom facility, just in case she needed it. When all the race participants had finished the course, except for Shirley, they sent the bus to pick her up. Though she didn't actually finish the entire 8.2 miles, they couldn't hold up the end-of-race barbecue any longer. However, when she made her appearance, the barbecue crowd cheered and whistled for her. Most people would not consider Shirley to be young anymore, but she did finish first in her age bracket - - she was the only one in her age bracket! Next year the race officials said that she could start early, get a head start, so they don't have to hold up the barbecue .

We should all be more like Shirley.