One Tambourine | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: One Tambourine | Previous Challenge Entry
By Gilbert Dixon
07/13/08
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My grandmother Armida is a relatively quiet woman, one of the godliest women I will ever meet. She is not quite 5 feet tall, not by a long shot, yet she is and will always be a giant in my life. She introduced all of us grandchildren to the Lord at a very young age. When you visited her house, you could count on good tortillas and beans, as well as hearing her sing to the Lord. She taught us those songs. She taught us about Jesus. She would take us to church even though it was in Spanish and we couldn’t understand any of it. When we were too lazy to go on Sundays, she went alone, just a veil, her purse and a tambourine. One tambourine played for the whole family. One little lady prayed before God and held faith that He would save all of us.

As I grew older I began to explore other ideas about the world, other philosophies. That Jesus guy became old fashioned; my grandmother’s ways and her religion were no longer suitable for my intellectual mind to believe in. Christianity became stupid to me, the beliefs and language of fools. From all the things I had seen in my life, I rationalized that if there was a God, he sure wasn’t doing a very good job of things. But I’ll be honest with you. When I took sociology of religion, a course in college, I remember writing that God was a social construction of human thought, religion therefore was false. When I wrote that sentence I could see my grandmother’s face and I remembered her tambourine and the older ladies singing and crying in church as a kid. Something tugged at my heart and angrily I hit print, turned in the paper and got an A.

Sometimes she would call me in Texas and just to say hello or leave a message. After every time we’d talk, I’d cry almost like a baby afterward. Priscilla would think it was because I was homesick, but the truth is that its because God was calling me. God was dealing with me. He was pulling at my heart and I didn’t want to submit. I didn’t want to admit all those years I was wrong, that my beliefs were wrong, because it meant I would have to change my life and what would people think? But with the sound of her voice, I knew there was a God and I denied Him. Over and over and over the Lord showed Himself faithful and full of grace for me. Well one day I did end up calling on His name and my life is forever changed…all because God is a good God and a faithful lady played the tambourine.

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