From “My Best Christmas and Other Stories of the Season”
by David Koning
Available at Amazon.com
The Rock of Agnes
Truth be told, Harold De Wit, teacher at Hartsville Christian School and elder in his church, would rather be teaching his fifth graders the nuances of equivalent fractions than the assignment set before him at last night’s elders meeting. Between home and school he had a dozen loose ends to finish up before Christmas.
“…and now this!” he complained to his wife when she came home from work that following afternoon.
Maggie kicked the snow off her shoes and hung her coat on the hook in the entry way. “It’s cold out there!” Harold had hot tea ready on the table.
“One week before Christmas… and they expect me to bring the ‘word of the elders’ to her… and… what will I look like… the Grinch of the Hartsville Church!?.” Harold slid Maggie’s tea across the table, still moaning about tomorrow’s meeting with Betty the bulletin secretary.
Maggie handed Harold a ‘Celebrate the Joy of Christmas’ napkin. “What do you want for Christmas?” She tried to change the subject, since she had already heard more than enough of Harold’s complaints the night before.
“Ah, just get me some rocks and sticks…” He hung his head and pouted, then smirked a bit, cocked his head to one side and looked up from the steaming tea. “And a spell checker… for Betty!”
“Harold! Maggie said, “It’s not like you have to fire her.” Maggie defended. “She does the best she can.”
“I know, I know. It’s just that if it weren’t for all the typo’s I wouldn’t have to meet with her at all.” Harold sighed and then munched on his Christmas cookie, biting off Santa’s head. “You know, Maggie, it was the offering for those in ‘puberty’ that got the deacons riled up.” Harold chuckled.
Maggie put on her Sigmund Freud accent and warned, “Be careful with this one, young man, you are dealing with a person who has a ‘Type O’ personality — surely a desperate cry for help!”
“Stop it”, Harold said blandly, “You’re killing me.” He got up from the table, gathered up the mugs and put away the cookies.
Changing the subject, Maggie said, “Are you still going to see Mrs. Clifford, tonight?”
“Yep. Wanna come along?”
“Not tonight. Gotta do some Christmas shopping. You know where I can find some rocks?”
Harold didn’t know about rocks but he certainly had grown to enjoy the visits with Agnes Clifford. The fact that they were both teachers, Agnes retired and Harold just tired at this point in the school year, helped to break the ice.
* * * * * * *
Harold walked through the slushy parking lot past the tastefully illuminated spruce trees outside the Pine View Nursing Home. He walked in with a group of carolers. They made a left turn and went down the East wing singing, “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing.”
“Who me?” Harold mumbled, thinking of Betty’s misspelling of ‘herald’ in last Sunday’s bulletin. He turned right and walked down the West wing.
“Hi, Agnes,” greeted Harold, as he approached the frail white haired woman in a wheelchair by the nurses’ station.
“Oh, hi!” Agnes looked up. “It’s so nice of you to come,” she said politely and offered a limp bony hand to the visiting elder. “Is Maggie here, too?”
“She had to do some Christmas shop–.” Harold was interrupted by an anonymous voice on the P.A. system inviting everyone to the chapel where the umpteenth caroling group of the week was going to give a little program.
“Oh… did you want to go? I’ll push.” Harold offered.
“No… Let’s go to my room. I want to show you something.” Her eyes came to life in anticipation. Harold grabbed the handles of the wheelchair and deftly steered the old lady past the linen hampers that lined the garishly lit hallway. They turned through the doorway into Agnes’s tiny room. There was just enough space to maneuver the wheelchair between the hospital bed and a small dresser.
“What do you think of that?” She pointed at the dresser.
“I, uh, well… those are your Christmas decorations?”
“Yes,” she said with a crooked grin. “I’ve been working on them for weeks.”
“I like them,” said Harold, trying to be tactful. He saw an odd assortment of objects arranged on a red cloth. Harold’s eyes roved over the cluster of artifacts arranged with no plan obvious to him. He picked up a Christmas tree made out of popscicle sticks.
“A third grader made that for me…” and she proceeded to give name, year, and what that child, now an adult, is doing with her life.
He held up a piece of construction paper, “And his name shall be called… ” printed in the middle. Spiraled around that were dozens of names — Wonderful Counselor, Prince of Peace, Everlasting Father, Light of the World, Bread, Rock, Lamb, on and on it went until it reached the end of the page.
“Melissa, 1963.” She’s a teacher now. Her eyes brightened.
So it went for twenty minutes as Harold held up objects that represented the countless lives touched by God through the career of his servant Agnes.
Harold came to a plaster cast of small child’s hand with a wreath painted around the outside.
“Alex,” she said. She paused, her breathing labored. Her eyes glazed over as if she was trying to pierce the fog of decades of memories to see his face. Harold stopped fiddling with the Christmas odds and ends. He looked over at Agnes staring out of the window at the snow covered bird feeder. “Died in January 1951 … Just a child… polio.”
The conversation stopped. The only sound was the squishy shoes of a nurse’s aide walking on the newly waxed hallway floor. Harold never had to deal with the death of a student. He glanced at the shrunken saint… and wondered how Agnes had coped then… and now, for that matter.
Harold spied a nativity scene amid the clutter. Trying to lighten the mood, Harold exclaimed, “Agnes, there’s a rock in your manger!” He pointed at a grapefruit size rock. “What’s the deal with that?”
“That, young man, is what Christmas is all about.” She smiled. Harold scratched his head. “You see, I got that rock for Christmas in ’47 from a cute kid, Nathan, who lived way out in the middle of nowhere – poor as dirt. He carried it to school in his coat pocket and gave it to me just before Christmas vacation. He was proud as could be. And I’ll tell you, it was my favorite gift, because I knew it was all he had.” Harold looked over at the lumpy brown rock in the manger. He didn’t see anything particularly appealing about it.
“After the kids went home, I stuck it in my bag and forgot about it. After my chores were done I loaded up my things, put on my coat and got ready to walk home.”
Harold interrupted. “This isn’t one of those -I walked to and from school in bare feet during a blizzard, up hill both ways – stories, is it?” Harold teased.
“It was cold, but no snow and I only had a couple of miles to walk.” She looked over the top of her glasses to see Harold roll his eyes. “Like I said, I put on my coat and grabbed my bag of books, presents and … oh, yes… Nathan’s rock, and headed for home.” Harold nodded but wasn’t a bit closer to understanding why the rock was in the manger.
Agnes continued. “I walked the same road I always walked except this time I turned a corner and there was this man, a young man like you.” She paused for effect, but mainly to take a breath. “He came up all friendly like and started asking questions, like where I was going and did I live around here and what did I have in my bag. Well, I just kept right on walking.” Harold nodded.
“I just kept going, but the stranger kept asking what was in my bag, which was none of his business, which I reminded him of over and over. I kept walking until –” Agnes was interrupted by the nurse bringing in her pills.
“Oh, the rock story? It’s a good one.” The nurse smiled, made sure Agnes took her pills and left.
“Like I was saying… I kept walking until he grabbed my arm, like this!” Agnes reached over and grabbed Harold’s wrist. “I was losing my patience, getting afraid and getting mad!! Anyway, there was no one around to help. ‘Lord?’ I thought. ‘Help me out of this mess.’ I yelled ‘STOP IT!!,’ I don’t know what got into me, but I grabbed my bag by the handles with both hands.” She paused again to catch her breath. “I spun around and the bag … with Nathan’s rock,” she grinned, “all hit the guy in the head.”
“And that’s the rock. Pick it up – out of the manger,” Agnes commanded.
Obediently, Harold grabbed the rock. “It’s in two pieces!” Keeping it together, Harold carefully lifted Agnes’s plain brown rock out of the manger. Agnes, the teacher, let her pupil, Harold continue his discovery. He separated the two halves. His face reflected his astonishment when he saw the secret revealed in the middle of the rock. “Wow! This is something,” he exclaimed. He was amazed at the beauty that greeted him as he gazed at the variety of large and small sparkling crystals of purple and rose that had grown in the inner cavity of the rock.
“The Rock of my salvation. That’s what it means to me and that’s why it’s in the manger instead of a helpless baby,” she stated matter-of-factly. “That baby, Jesus, that everyone gets all excited about at Christmas is the everyday-of-the-year Rock that helps get me through things… back then… when Alex died … or now just trying to catch my next breath.”
Harold sat and listened as Agnes proceeded to recite Psalm 28. Not exactly what Harold remembered as one of the traditional Christmas passages, but Agnes the teacher, now doing Harold’s elder job, continued ministering to him.
“To you I call, O Lord my Rock… the Lord is the strength of his people…”
When he got home, Harold reviewed the visit with Maggie, including the rock story. “Sounds just like her,” Maggie replied. “Slipping some healthwise, but what faith…” She interrupted herself, “Oh! I stopped by church and picked up a bulletin for your meeting with Betty tomorrow.” Harold muttered to himself. “Thought maybe you could point out some positives about her work.” Harold skimmed Betty’s work.
“Looks pretty goo–” He stopped reading, groaned and then laughed out loud.
“Now what?” Maggie rolled her eyes. “Let me see.” Harold slid the bulletin across the table so Maggie could read the order of worship. She read it, looked up and smiled. “Well,… it’s the truth you know.”
“Yep, on Sunday we’ll be singing…” He paused, put on his preacher’s voice, “Hymnal number 247, ‘Rock of Agnes.'” Harold pictured her, hair and soul as white as the wintertime snow, and, of course, the Rock – of her salvation – in the manger in her room. “Yessir! It’s the truth … indeed.”
Walk as Children of Light 