I met “Mary,” last fall at an RUF Large Group meeting. At the time when we met she was waitressing at a local restaurant and had overheard a guy at one of her tables sharing the Gospel with an international student. Mary felt compelled to chime in and tell the two men that she too was a Christian, a move that she had thought about making many times before when she had overheard similar conversations amongst her customers but never had. This time was different, and she just felt moved to talk to them. The guy sharing the Gospel happened to be one of my RUF students. Because this student has a heart for evangelism he immediately engaged her in conversation and invited her to RUF. I met her a few days later when she came to our Tuesday night meeting with him.
Mary had just moved from out of state with her family and didn’t know anyone in Clemson. She had no knowledge of any local church and had never heard of RUF. She is not even a student so she would have never run across RUF had my student not met and invited her. I got Mary’s number that night, and a few days later she came over to my apartment to join me and a few other girls for dinner.
Thus began my friendship with Mary. Mary works a lot and because she lives a ways out of Clemson and doesn’t have a car finding a chance for us to meet together regularly or even semi-regularly has been very difficult. Nevertheless, since the fall Mary and I have hung out 4 or 5 times and texted about various issues.
Mary has hard a hard life. She has faced abuse and poverty. Her family kicked her out of their trailer not once but twice since I met her. One of the times, they moved trailers and didn’t tell Mary. Mary thought they had moved back to the state they came from without telling her. Members of her family don’t speak to Mary. She has had to change jobs at least three times since arriving in the fall. It is hard for me to even tell you Mary’s story because so much has happened to her even since I met her that I can’t even keep it all straight myself.
A few days ago Mary texted me, asking me if I was back in Clemson and wanted to hang out. I said yes, glad that our availabilities had finally aligned. I picked her up at a street corner close to where she lives, and we headed out towards Lake Hartwell. The lake is beautiful and because summers are hot here and Clemson’s campus literally sits on the lake, Hartwell is the perfect place to chill out for an afternoon. As we drove I asked Mary how she had been since we had last seen each other (about 3 months). Like I guessed, much had happened. Mary began to tell me of breakups, family drama, job changes, and friend issues. At one point she casually mentioned that she “had nothing.” I asked her to clarify, and she went on tell me that she had $3 to call her own “because she had just finished paying the bills,” and that she had no food in her house, that she didn’t have furniture, and that there was some kind of bug in her duplex that was eating her alive. Sure enough, Mary as covered in small red spots and didn’t stop itching once in the 2 hours that we were together. I asked her what she ate, if she was hungry. She said that she wasn’t hungry, that she was used to eating one meal a day- the free meal that she got at work each day. I then noticed that Mary was much thinner then the last time I had seen her. It all stared to make sense. I asked her how she got to work each day and she said she walked. Mary lives about 1.5 miles from work. Now the weight loss was really starting to make sense.
I wasn’t really sure what to say. I wasn’t really sure what to do. I decided to ask her if we could go to the store and I’d buy her just a few basics. She said no, not in an offended way, but in a shy yet grateful way. I told her I would really love to and that grocery shopping really was one of my favorite past times. I told her that people gave me money to be in Clemson to do no greater thing than to buy her food if that’s what she needed. At that moment I don’t think I have ever been more proud and grateful for the monitary support I have received. Finally Mary agreed, and off to Ingles we went.
I could tell she was uncomfortable. She didn’t know what to buy or what she wanted. At one point she told me I was just going to have to take over because she wasn’t used to being in a super market and didn’t really know what to get. We ended up buying bread and meat for sandwiches, fruit, beans, rice, several cans of vegetables, a pot (she said she didn’t have any kind of cooking supplies, making her oven/stove quite useless) and some cookies because they were her favorite. The total came to $59.55, and I do believe it was the most profitable $60 I have spent since I got here.
I drove Mary home, and for the first time she didn’t have to haul groceries back 2 miles back to her duplex. When we got there we walked in and sure enough, the living room was bare except for a couch that belonged to her roommates. The kitchen had a refrigerator, which was for the most part, empty. It was terribly hot inside. We went into Mary’s room and the first thing I saw was a blanket on the floor with a large stuffed animal on it, not pillow. She had a dresser with more stuffed animals piled onto it. She had a name for each one. That was all Mary had to call her own, except for the posters of Justin Beiber and One Direction on her wall. The named stuffed animals and the images of people hanging on her wall made perfect sense when I though about it: they were Mary’s people, the faces that kept her company, during the hours she spent alone in her duplex.
I left Mary that day, not only feeling incredibly grateful for all that I have but also feeling guilty, guilty for wanting to leave, wanting to forget about Mary and her problems, and wanting to get away before the bugs started biting me. Despite my weak faith and fears, the Gospel gives Mary hope. Mary is a Christian, and in Christ she has everything that Christ has. Mary needs many physical things. Meeting these needs is the first step to helping Mary. But more importantly, and Mary would agree, she has the irreplaceable and increasingly satisfying love of God. She has not lost hope because she has Christ. I will not forget about Mary.
I don’t tell you this story to preach or to brag about what good deed I did for some helpless girl. I do boast though, and I boast, not in my ability, but in the fact that I could offer Mary help yesterday because of what God has provided though you to me financially. It was honestly my joy to help her. It was honestly God’s provision that you gave to me so that I could. It was honestly your generosity that paid for Mary’s food. It was your $60 that filled her pantry. Thank God for using us.
April Goes to Clemson 