Sabbath day choices and blessings in my life (Part 1)

In the little community of Glenwood, Washington, where I was raised, religion was important to a fairly small part of the people, and they represented several different denominations--Baptists, Presbyterian, a couple of Catholics. We had one Seventh Day Adventist family, the Andrews, that we quite dutiful after one of their children died. Early Saturday morning we would see them driving past our place to go to White Salmon for their church’s services and were quite conscientious about not doing any of their farm work on their Sabbath. When I was small my mother took us to the Glenwood Community Church for Sunday School and eventually my dad joined us in attending.

Sunday was also a baseball day. Every little town had their own ball team in those days. My dad usually had a team to play for until WWII started and then he had long work weeks plus he was trying to work our little dairy farm. After the war he tried to play baseball again but retired after about three years because he couldn’t compete with the younger guys any longer. After that we generally we went to Sunday School in the morning and in the afternoon watched the ballgames of the Glenwood townteam when they were playing at home.

Glenwood was primarily a farming community. During harvest season, most of the farmers had their big work days on the weekends, because that was the time when they could get extra help. Of course, my dad worked at his regular job during the week plus milked the cows morning and evening. He did the haying mostly on weekends and also helped neighbors with their big jobs (i. e., threshing grain) on the weekends. He was a big, strong man and hard worker and was in much demand in the fall, especially.

My Dad must still have had a little of his maternal ancestors’ Primative Baptist sabbath teaching in his head, who opposed working on the Sabbath (Sunday). Eventually, he concluded that when he tried to do his own farm work on Sundays, there were so many equipment breakdowns that it wasn’t worth trying. So he evolved a Sunday policy for himself. He wouldn’t do his own farm work on Sundays, but he would still help a neighboring farmer, when needed.

When I was a youth, baseball was a big thing for me and my good friend Jim Johnson. As early as about the 6th or 7th grade, we would bring our baseball mitts to school as soon as the snow started to melt, to play catch along the edge of the school building to begin to get our arms in shape for the baseball season. I played with the high school team starting about the 8th grade and also played a couple of years with the White Salmon American Legion team. In May of my senior year of high school, I also started to work out with the Glenwood townteam when they practiced on evenings. I sensed I was getting stronger physically. I still remember how the ball would jump off my bat in batting practice at that time. The men guys seemed excited to have me start playing on their team.

The week after I graduated from Glenwood High School I was baptized into the Church. I had wanted and prayed for this opportunity for over nine years. I quickly discovered that a new spiritual influence and direction had been added to my life. I immediately experienced discomfort with the idea of Sunday baseball. (That was when all the games were played.) I knew that I had new standards that I needed to live up to. So I made up my mind that I wouldn’t play baseball with the townteam. I let it be known that I had decided not to play, explaining that it was a religious commitment. The men expressed some disappointment, but I never looked back. This turned out to be a pivotal, life-directing choice.