“A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing,” I sang, looking down at the words in the hymnal I’d grabbed from the shelf in the choir robe room.
It was a sunny Saturday afternoon and our choir at St. John’s UMC, a church in Albuquerque where I was a member, was practicing for a special upcoming scripture and hymn service.
As I sang, my voice rising with the other altos, I thought back to all the times my mother and I had sung together. I wished we could sing together once again. But Mom was gone now. She’d passed away just a month earlier and I missed her so much.
She’d always loved music and had instilled that love in me as a little girl. “You were singing before you could talk,” she liked to say, and made sure I took piano lessons. In high school I even became the organist at our church, Kingswood UMC, in Clovis, New Mexico.
I left home after high school, but later moved back to New Mexico, to Albuquerque, where Mom was then living. Soon I joined St. John’s and began singing in the choir and as part of a women’s trio. Whatever concert or special program I was in, Mom was there, front and center.
I wish you were still here with me, Mom, I thought as the song ended. I closed the hymnal, looking down at the cover. Kingswood United Methodist, Clovis, NM, was printed on the front. Our church in Clovis. That’s odd, I thought. Now why would a hymnal from my old church be here at St. John’s?
Then I opened the cover. There was my mother’s distinctive handwriting. She’d written a dedication to my grandmother in this very hymnal…letting me know she was with me still.
