Because we had children forever, I was not liable for regular tour for many home assignments. But all good things come to an end - and I couldn't have more babies forever, so with Mark we stopped. Our family was complete. Even then, it was a long time before I had no more children at home. The last Home Assignment that we had you at home with us, Mark, was that year in Shell Point. Such a fun year of family with you and also John and Jennie living in our same area. So Dad went on tour and I stayed at home. Grandma Pierce and you boys were there with us and we enjoyed that. The rest of you also came down for a family reunion later in the year and that was a memorable time. But basically I had nothing to do there.
I had always been used to speaking in area churches, but there were not many area churches there so I only did a couple meetings when Dad was gone. I spent my time visiting little old ladies in their apartments at Shell Point Village or having an occasional open house at our place for people to come and enjoy food and conversation. We had a beatiful home right on the water, everything provided. But I was restless when Dad was gone. Mark was in College, John working long hours - I did have Jennie who often came to stay at our house while John was at work, and that was a good thing - to get to know her. Every Sunday morning I was given FOUR MINUTES to give something on missions! Dad fulfilled that requirement when he was home from regular tour.
From then on, when we came on home assignment, I had my tour assignment right along with Dad. It was rare that they sent us together, as they needed more countries represented on each team. So for the most part I toured with two men. I was always on interdistrict tour, so we flew from place to place. Once in a while the larger churches were closer - like Ohio - and then someone drove us to the next stop. Both Dad and I made new friends with the other missionaries on our tours, many of whom we still pray for and became good friends.
Being a woman on tour had its incidents as well, as there were pastors and/or churches who did not want a woman speaking in their pulpit. Usually it was easy to determine the attitude about women in ministry soon after meeting the pastor and his staff, and I just played along with their particular perspective. There were very few who did not want me to speak in regular services. But there is that thought out there that "Men preach" and "Women share"! And more often than not, at a preliminary meeting with staff and pastor in a church, the subject would come up. One pastor called me into his office alone soon after I arrived, and informed me that no woman had ever preached in his pulpit, and he was glad I was there to be the first woman to do this. I assured the pastor that it made no difference to me - I could speak from down in front if people preferred - but he was adamant that he wanted to make me an object lesson! One does learn to roll with the punches on tour!
I had one strange incident along this line. I was in another fairly large church, and the pulpit was high up above the congregation and I was told to preach from the pulpit which I did. The first night I spoke, I had the strangest feeling - it was almost as if a curtain was in front of me - between me and the people to whom I was speaking. I am usually at ease when I speak, and this kind of thing had never happened to me. It was almost as if I was speaking in a vacuum. But I made it to the end of my message finally. After the service I was being entertained in the assistant pastor's home, whom I knew well. And I mentioned to him what had happened to me - I wondered if I came across in a strange way. He said no, they did not notice anything. But that there was one man in the congregation and he objected strongly to a woman ever giving a message in that church and especially not from the sacred pulpit! That man was sitting in the front row while I was speaking. That was a strange incident!
Dad and I both have crisscrossed the United States (and Dad even in Canada) and also did speaking tours in Puerto Rico and the Bahamas. For the most part, people were kind and even extravagant in their entertaining of us as tour missionaries. Steve and Darrell will remember the time they were on regular tour in New England, that week in a very small church. The pastor had let them take his car to go and visit me a few miles away on another tour - he had to get money from his wife's tips in a restaurant where she worked in order to buy gas for the car! When they met me at a pre-arranged meeting place, here I was in an elegant Cadillac which was mine for that week, staying in a lovely home. It was always a kind of family joke - needless to say I took them out for the meal together. I was getting big love offerings. I guess it is just a fact of life that our way of doing tours is never equal to all participants. Some get big love offerings and others get almost zero. But every Alliance church needs to be served by someone.
The list of places where we ministered on tour is long - Ohio, PA, Georgia, Oregon, California, Virginia, New York, Vermont, Nebraska, New Jersey, Mass., CT., Illinois, Florida, Canada, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas....there are no doubt more! After we retired, we were no longer liable for going each year on tour, but Jean Burch (who arranged the tours) was always needing someone to fill in somewhere. And so once again they called Dad and me to go - usually in different directions. After a while, we put in a request to be sent together, and we both liked that better.
Dad and I were sent to southern California on a wonderful three weeks tour. We stayed at the Alliance home and ministered there. We had meetings every day and the old folks just loved it! Grant and Eunice Crooks took it upon themselves to be our tour guides and took us to the Crystal Cathedral and the fishing pier and the beach, so we saw the tourist spots. From there they sent us by passenger train down to the far south of California and again we had a wonderful time in the churches there. In one church I was interpreted into a Phillipina language, and in another Dad was with Spanish speakers. It was a fun tour and almost like a vacation, seeing new sights and meeting so many people of different cultures!
We went on one Choice tour, where the church calls and invites you to go and spend the whole week - that was down in Deltona. And again we had a wonderful week there, ministering to all ages of people. Jean had scheduled us for a six weeks tour in Floirida together, and we prepared for that. The week we were to leave on tour, our long awaited Bobo Bible manuscript arrived by special mail! So that was a real working tour. I organized all the material and Dad drove and I corrected the Bobo manuscript on every lap of that tour, as well as during any free time we had. So when we got back home, we were able to send the corrected manuscript off to the publishers. Again, there were many people from other nations in churches on that Florida tour. One Sunday I was invited to preach in French to the Haitian congregation and I loved that! Dad felt cheated because he had to stay with the Anglos and preach in English!
Speaking tours are a part of missionary life - as you know! - and we have had our part in that ministry for many years. We always hated the long separations from each other, but now the Alliance has chopped up tours so that families can have some time together during the mid-point of a long tour, so that is easier.. Dad and I each wrote to each other every day when we were on tour separately, so again keeping in touch through letters. And occasionally someone would even pay for a phone call for us! (That was back in the days when phoning was terribly expensive.)
Probably our most fun tour was in Puerto Rico, so I will write about that in the next blog.
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