All Doves:

What I am about to share here with fellow Doves is about an event that I have never shared publicly.  Only one time did I even consider writing the story details and submitting it to 'Guideposts' magazine that published another magazine about Angels.  I have shared it with few individuals, family members, but never to a larger audience. 

Hebrews 13:2, says, "Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."  

Even now, I'm not totally sure as to why I am sharing it here, perhaps it is because I believe that we might be Raptured home this week on Rosh HaShanah.  It has been something that I have held private as a personal experience, not something to talk about. 

It was a Friday evening a week before the Thanksgiving week, in 1992.  I stopped to pick my wife up at her work on my way home from Seminary.  Our youngest son was the high school photographer and we knew he would be home around eight on the school activities bus after the football game.  We usually went to Hometown Pizza on Friday evening.  My wife and I thought we would take a nap until Scott got home from photographing the game.  It was cold and a perfect time of the day to take a nap.  It was 4:30 pm when we wrapped ourselves up in nice in our comforters. 

When I woke up and noticed it was almost 6:20 pm and time to turn on the national NBC news.  On the rural ridge we did not get but two stations on our television even with "rabbit ears" antenna.  We were in north central Kentucky.  I was student-pastor of two small rural United Methodist churches at a place called Corinth, KY, (yes, same as the Biblical Corinth) each eight miles on either side of Interstate 75, about halfway between Cincinnati Ohio and Lexington, Kentucky. 

I got up and walked around the bed to the door to the hallway and then to the front door.  It was dark outside, and I could see by the light snow falling against the street light in front of the church and parsonage.  There was a street light in front of the Baptist church on the opposite side of the road about four hundred feet up the road.  I went to the door and peered out the window for a couple minutes.  We were located on a bend in the road so I could see clearly in both directions for more than an eighth of a mile each way.  The light snow was laying on the grass and along the road.  There was no activity on the rural county road. 

I walked about four steps around the sofa toward the TV.  Just as I reached down to turned on the TV, there was a knocking on my front door.  I'm 6'5" and I know it only took me three or four seconds from the door to the TV.  I was startled because, seconds before, I could see clearly there was no one out on the road in the light snow falling highlighted by two street lights and two church lights.  A side light on the church lit up the yard between the church and the parsonage.  I quickly went to the front door to see who was knocking.

I opened the front door to be greeted by a young man wearing 'hospital greens' and a light jacket.  He said he was looking for work, and the Baptist church pastor up the road sent him down to the Methodist parsonage.  I hadn't turned on the lights at that point, and we parked our little Ford Fiesta around behind the church, so there was no way this person could have known anyone was at home.  This little fellow in 'hospital greens' came out of nowhere.  I invited him in and we went into the kitchen and sat at the table.  I told him that maybe some of my members might be in need of day labor workers.  It was the end of the tobacco harvesting and most farmers were in the process of hanging their tobacco to air dry.  I began to call everyone that I had a phone number for and strangely, every number that I called, their lines were busy.  I couldn't get anyone. 

I was struck by the fact that the weather was in the low 30's and this fellow is walking around wearing nothing but 'hospital greens' and a light windbreaker-type jacket.  I asked him if he had eaten recently, and his reply was that he hadn't eaten since about 11 am earlier that day.  I told him we didn't have much but that I could make him a cheese sandwich.  The refrigerator was virtually empty.  We had a half loaf of Kroger sliced bread, a package of Kraft individually wrapped cheese slices, some mayonnaise, a jar of pickles, and a pitcher of iced tea my wife made the night before.  I never thought to offer him a cup of coffee since neither my wife or I drink coffee. 

About this time my wife woke up and came out to the kitchen to see who I was talking with.  I proceeded to tell her of our new guest's dilemma.  I can't recall ever seeing the young man shivering from the cold.  If he walked eight miles to the parsonage from the Interstate, he would have certainly gotten chilled at least.  Walking eight miles in the cold would have taken several hours for sure.  What made this all the more strange was that the rural county road we were located on branched off from the road leading to the Interstate intersection.  It also went onto, in the opposite direction to Owenton, KY about thirty miles to the northwest.  It was a two-lane state highway with all of the traditional road markings.  If you were hitch-hiking or heading for Owenton you would have no reason to wander or turn off onto a windy, narrow, hump-backed rural road, that led to nowhere particular. 

We waited a while and I began to start calling church members to see if anyone could use a 'day laborer'.  We had lots of Mexican migrants that moved around doing farm work for local farmers.  Still no answer and the phone lines were all still busy.  I was perplexed, irritated, and angry.  I was perplexed as to how I could help this young fellow, and I was irritated for the Baptist church pastor sending me someone for which they were better equipped to help.  They had 250 members, and had just built a new church education wing onto their church.  They were financially able to do things we were not able to accomplish.  More so, I was angry because the Baptist pastor knew the Methodist Church was barely able to keep its doors open when I was appointed as their student-pastor.  The Baptist church in town had several members that were executives in Cincinnati, Ohio, one worked for the Kroger's Supermarket chain, and one worked for Proctor & Gamble.  The man that worked for Kroger's in Cincinnati had bought the old stone elementary school building in town and was in the process of renovating it for his home, including building a large in-ground swimming pool in the school basement.  All of my folks were dirt farmers, making a go of it by raising tobacco, corn, soybeans, and a few cattle.  In those days an acre of good Burley tobacco would net a farmer upwards of $5,000 an acre.  No other crop could generate anywhere near that kind of income by farming.

As I sat with the phone in my lap, I began to ask the young man a list of questions running through my mind.  It just did not seem to add up in my mind.  As we talked, he said that if he could get to a 'Waffle House' he thought he could get a ride to Cincinnati.  He said his destination was a shelter in Cincinnati.  Again, I thought, if he is trying to get to Cincinnati, how could he have gotten so far off the path that would take him there.  When he said 'Waffle House' I thought we had the solution we needed.  Twelve miles north on I-75 there was a 'Waffle House' at the exit just off I-75.  I said that I can get you to the 'Waffle House" in Williamstown, KY.  From my parsonage, it was nineteen miles exactly.  Just about that moment, I heard the school activities bus stopping outside, and the reflection of its flashing safety lights shown against the front door window. 

When Scott came in the door and put down his camera equipment bag and took off his jacket, my wife suggested that I take Scott along for protection.  I didn't think I needed any protection, I'm 6'5" and weigh 250, but I relented and thought to myself, I would let him drive back since he has his driver's permit, I thought it would be good practice experience for him to drive at night on the Interstate and the hump-backed rural road we lived on.  We suited up and went out back to get into my sub-compact 1989 Ford Fiesta.  Scott sat in the back of the front passenger seat.  As we started out for the 'Waffle House' my curiosity was running wild.  My car was covered with about a quarter-inch of fluffy snow sparkling against the light reflections.  As I backed out the wind picked up the snow and blew it off into the dark of night.  I hadn't got past the Baptist church up the road before I began my questioning and interrogation.  Where did you come from?  Where did you stay?  How did you decide to take an unfamiliar road instead of the well-marked state road?  Where did you stay last night?  Where did you eat?

As we pulled off at the Williamstown exit of I-75, I downshifted my five-speed to avoid sliding on the black ice that had begun to form.  I noticed the 'Waffle House' parking lot only was empty but for two cars beside the 'Waffle House', apparently the cook's and the waitress on duty.  She was standing at the register doing nothing.  I pulled into the second entrance and looped back around to the first entrance, parking directly below an overhead light standard at the entrance.  The two cars were right next to the 'Waffle House'.  I cut off my engine and got out of the car walking around to the passenger door, in four steps.  I asked him if he had any money and he nodded indicating that his reply was no.  I reached into my right pocket and took out what I had and gave it to him, shook his hand and wished him well.  All I had on me was $2.34, two singles and thirty-four cents in change: a quarter, a nickle, and four pennies.  It was my change from a $5 dollar bill I used to buy a yellow marker pen at the seminary bookstore that morning.  I told him it wasn't much but it would get him some hot coffee for the last leg of his 60-mile trek to downtown Cincinnati. 

As we were talking, I released the front seat lever to move the seat forward to allow Scott to get out and go around to the driver's side door.  As Scott went around to the driver's side, I said some parting comments about keeping warm.  Just as I was about to get into the passenger seat, I stopped, turned my head back toward the 'Waffle House' and the little young man in 'hospital greens' and light wind breaker was gone!  From where I stood, it was at least 150-feet to the front entrance of 'Waffle House'.  He couldn't have gone ten feet in those three or four brief seconds, let alone disappear in a well-lit empty parking lot.  My son Scott asked me where did he go?  He had obviously noticed his disappearance as well. 

As we sat their in the car, confused and puzzled by what we had just experienced, we were both speechless, like hypnotized deer in the headlights of an oncoming car.  We sat there for about ten minutes, scanning the windows of the empty 'Waffle House', and the area nearby.  The young man in 'hospital greens' came out of nowhere and disappeared into nowhere.  As we drove back southbound on I-75 we talked about what this stranger had to say about where he stayed.  He told us he started out in Charlotte, NC and was headed to Cincinnati, Ohio looking for work.  He said he slept in a cardboard box one night in Tennessee, and in an empty roadside construction port-a-potty the next night.  The details of this strange event have never made sense.  I was trained as a civil engineer, I could mentally make measurements within inches of accuracy. 

Interestingly, a few weeks later my District Superintendent called me and wanted to know if I would consider taking another assignment.  He had a larger church he thought I would be perfect for.  He asked me to discuss it with my wife and son, before making a decision.  By February he got back to me and began a series of meetings with both churches to work out all the details.  Then over the spring break we moved to Bardstown, KY, the bourbon capital of America.  Over the many years since I have never been able to get out of my mind that perhaps I had been visited by an angel.  One other odd detail I learned the next day was the fact that the Baptist pastor that sent this young man to my parsonage door wasn't home that Friday or evening.  

God bless,

Pastor Bob