Dear Friends,
On Tuesday we celebrated the life of Norma Fenton who is now in heaven, finally healed and sitting at the feet of Jesus. As Pastor Nick so lovingly expressed it, “She was one of a kind”. Anyone who knew her could never forget her. She could stretch your patience to the limits, and those who knew her recognized she could be direct and demanding at times. However, there were few people you would ever meet who loved Jesus more and served Him more faithfully than Norma.
A number of people from New Monmouth eloquently shared touching personal tributes, in which they pointed out the beautiful qualities of Norma's life, and how those qualities impacted their lives.
I loved Norma because she loved Jesus and she loved New Monmouth. I can't count the times she would look into my eyes and repeat words I had heard expressed countless time before. She would say, "Pastor Tom, I love you and I love New Monmouth Baptist Church”. I would bend down and kiss her, and she would say, "Give me another kiss”. She always wanted things in two's, and so she not only wanted two kisses, but two bulletins, and two communion elements. Yes, she had her quirky side, like the times that her son, Greg, would visit her, and she would ask him to stop at Mc Donald's and bring a Big Mac, and then as quickly as she had stated her order, she would ask Greg, “Could you also stop at Burger King and bring me a Whopper?”.
She was independent as anyone could be, and in spite of her physical handicaps, she shunned any help with cleaning, and she would often be seen crossing busy streets in her wheel chair on the way to pick up some needed groceries.
As I reflect upon my relationship with Norma, I recognize she taught me many things. She taught me to look inwardly at my love for Jesus and in so doing I would recognize the deep need in my heart to love Jesus with the same childlike faith and unconditional love with which she loved and served Him. The Bible tells us that "love is patient and kind,"(1 Corinthians 13:4), and while I can say I always tried to respond in love to most of Norma's demands, I didn't always do so with an attitude reflective of one possessed by the love of Jesus .She forced me to look inwardly and examine my love for Jesus to see whether it was always "patient and kind. " And sadly, sometimes I had to answer no compelling me to go to Jesus and ask Him to give me a heart to love Jesus the way she did.
I learned encouragement from Norma, but not always in the conventional way. Sometimes during worship she would be led to affirm and encourage the one in the pulpit and she would yell out in the midst of the sermon, Pastor Tom, Jared or Nick, "I love you". That was Norma, unconventional in her methods of encouragement, but so sincere and genuine in her expression that you could never doubt her heart and her plain and simple honesty.
I learned boldness in sharing my faith from Norma. If you knew Norma she never left home without "witness wear" whether an FBI hat (For Believer in Jesus,") or a shirt emblazoned with some form of witness for the One she loved. Wherever she went, she would be quick to share her faith, regardless of where she was. She was not "ashamed of the Gospel, for she knew it was the power of God unto salvation" (Romans 1:16), and her desire was to see as many come to know Him as possible. A friend of mine once challenged me "to do something uncomfortable for God every day." and Norma was Jesus' poster child for doing the things that many would consider uncomfortable or even foolish in the eyes of the world.
I learned from Norma what it was to give your best to Jesus, regardless of what you had. In the eyes of the world she possessed little, but like the widow who put her one small copper coin into the treasury, she would give Jesus all she had. She enjoyed little of the conveniences which mark our lives today, but that never bothered her. Her great joy was to bring her tithe from what little she had and lay that gift in the Sunday offering plate. She was fond of saying to me when she would hand me something extra for the church: "This is for my Church". And so rather than filling one Samaritan's Christmas gift box she would fill three and then the next year it was six. When the church was raising money for a special collection, she raised a few eyebrows when she took off her prosthetic leg and made that her offering gift. I think even Jesus must have got a chuckle out of that.
I learned from Norma what it was to love your family. She would often ask this question to her loved ones every time she spoke to them asking "Who's boy or girl are you first"? The expected response was, "I am Jesus' boy/girl first. " And then she would ask a second question "whose are you second" and they would say "I am yours second." I know from talking with her that her greatest desire was for all her family to know Jesus, and she was happiest when one of her children or grandchildren would accompany her to church.
From Norma I learned the value of spending time with those who I might not normally never ever get to know. Every church I have served has a Norma of some kind. And I have always found that when you get to know them you appreciate the fact that they will help make the church what God has called it to be, a church of diversity, one filled with people who are not all alike. It is easy and natural to talk and hang with people whom we like (usually they are people like us) people who have the same things in common, who enjoy the same tastes and preferences, but that is not what the church is called to be. The church is to be a place where differences are overlooked in the name of love. It is a place where we have the opportunity to get outside our comfort zones and learn from others who may be different from us, who, like Norma, might challenge and stretch our faith.
The bottom line for me and the most valuable lesson I learned from her is that she made me see how far I yet have to go to love Jesus like she loved HIm. I learned from her that compassion and love are more important than comfort and convenience and that too often I choose comfort and convenience over service and unselfish love. Thank you Norma for setting the bar high for me and New Monmouth, and thanks for teaching us so many things about what it means to love Jesus unconditionally.
And thank you church for being a model of what it means to love others, even when to do so might be uncomfortable and inconvenient. Thanks for those of you who spent time loving and visiting Norma, and bringing her to church every Sunday, and taking her shopping, and out to dinner on Sundays. You have been such an encouragement to your pastors of what it means to love others the way that Jesus loved us. Your put shoes to your love, and because you did, New Monmouth has been blessed, and its people have learned more about loving Jesus by watching the life of one of His very special saints.
Yours in faith and friendship,
Pastor Tom
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