Be still, my soul: when dearest friends
depart,
And all is darkened in the vale of
tears,
Then shalt thou better know His love,
His heart,
Who comes to soothe thy sorrow and thy
fears.
Be still, my soul: thy Jesus can repay
From His own fullness all He takes away.
(Be Still My Soul verse 3 by Kathrina von Schlegel)
I am a very blessed woman
to have been born to Arlena Mahaffy, my dear Mother who went Home to her Savior
on April 30, 2015 after ninety-seven years on this earth. When she departed I lost, not only my Mother,
but a woman who had become one of my best friends. The last few weeks as I have contemplated how
much she has meant to me, I realized that the best way for me to honor her is
to learn from her and follow as I can in her footsteps, as her footsteps
definitely followed the Lord's. Like no
one else I have known on this earth, her life was about serving her Lord.
Chiefly she served Him by
being selfless; giving of herself for others.
As a new wife many years ago, she gave up the life she had known, her
family and friends to go with her husband to the depths of Africa where she
served the people she came to love. What
was needed she cheerfully gave: phonics
charts for her husband to use as he put a language into writing, medical care
which she learned as natives showed up with a variety of serious ailments,
meals to any who dropped by and in endless other ways. She gave up much to teach her seven children
and several others. When needed, she set up teaching curriculum
for other missionaries. Back in the
states, she taught school to subsidize her husband's income never stopping
fulfilling the responsibilities of a pastor's wife and a mother at the same
time. When a neighbor needed food, she
was the one to bring a meal. When
visitors came to church they were always invited home for dinner.
She also served Him by
keeping busy. Mother believed with all her heart that for
six days she was to work and then rest the seventh. In all of my life I can never remember a time
when she didn't fill her days with activities directed towards what she thought
the Lord wanted her to do. Sometimes that meant spending extra time at school
providing materials for a parent. In her later years, despite often being very
tired, it often meant getting material
together so that she could give her best when tutoring. Sometimes that meant calling (or in her
eighties and nineties e-mailing) lonely friends, friends she had been praying
for or friends she had promised advice to.
It often meant staying up until 1 or 2 in the morning to complete the
day's activities that she felt she needed to get done. What she did, she believed in doing well.
Mother was uncomplaining despite often having what
most of us would consider ample reason to complain. On the mission field she did not complain
about her encounters with deadly snakes and scorpions, bandits shooting over
the house, backwards conditions for delivering her babies or having more on her
plate than she could do. As she aged
her vision deteriorated along with her heart and her mobility. Though legally blind late in her life I never
once heard her complain about that or her other health ailments.
She was quite the prayer warrior. There was no need for Mother to keep a list
of those she had promised to pray for.
She had the list in her head and in her heart and would not go to bed
before she had completed praying for those in need every day. Frequently when I happened to get up at 1 or 2
in the morning I would see her light on and find her still in her chair praying
for those whom she had promised to pray before allowing herself to sleep.
Those are just a few of
the godly characteristics I saw in Mother.
She was a loving, gracious, merciful and determined woman
who delighted to do for others as she did for the Lord. Many have risen up and called her
blessed. Many are the lives she has
touched around the world and is still touching. As I ponder how to be more like her I have
asked myself how she became who she was and I think it is primarily because she
saturated herself in the Word. Even when her eyesight was failing her she
painstakingly read the Bible with her magnifiers. She had rare time for TV or radio, but she
always had time to listen to her Talking Bible.
Most nights she went to bed with it being read to her. During the day as she worked she often had a
sermon being played explaining parts of the Bible. When she woke up in the night she would make
herself work on Bible memory bemoaning the fact that in her nineties she
couldn't retain as much as she did in her younger years.
I miss my dear Mother and
have determined to work harder in my life to emulate some of her wonderful
godly qualities. Oh, that God would use
me as He used her on this earth! What a
wonderful thing that would be!
