Motivation for Lay Ministry

Today I attended another lay ministers class. During class we were asked to give a short (2-3 minute) presentation on what motivates us, "Why We Answer the Call". I decided to dive deep and speak about my sister, Elizabeth Ashe. I always jump at the opportunity to do so. It bring me joy to remember her and share her with others.

However, in hindsight I wished I would have broached the subject from a different angle. After I was done, the leader of the lay minister's program made the offhand comment, jokingly, that "You know, some minister's have just one sermon, and they do it well." I laughed it off, but afterwards felt like I might jump on the "hey I have a dead sister" bandwagon too often.

I was also disappointed in my delivery. I practiced ahead of time to do it slow and not get choked up, but I went too fast and ended up with a shaky voice.

And I was turning inward and reanalyzing my performance, it dawned on me how selfish I was being. As others were sharing I kept reflecting and comparing to me. I immediately stopped and focused on my friends' words. It was refreshing to hear their backgrounds and their motivations. It was a good class.

Here is the little speech I gave tonight. Enjoy

Motivation

Length of days is not what makes age honorable, nor number of years the true measure of life. Understanding and an untarnished life, this is ripe old age. Coming to perfection in so short a while, she achieved long life

Wisdom 4:8-9,13

We have times in our lives that test us, that transforms us. One of those times for me was the three final years of my little sister’s life. Elizabeth Ashe battled with a rare malformation that took away her ability to walk at age 17 and her life at age 19. One of her creeds was, “We are not measured by our good time, but our bad.” If that is true, she lived 100 life times.

Elizabeth started early. In the second grade, at the same time as the 1988 elections, she first convinced her teacher to hold mock elections, and then went on to win those elections. By then she had decided that she was going to be the first woman president. But she understood well what was the true purpose of leadership, and that is to help improve the world. During her seventh grade year, she joined me in the local Red Cross Youth Council. Not only did she eventually take over the leadership of this council, but she won the Red Cross Youth Volunteer Award for two years in a row, one of those years being after the discovery of her illness, and a Red Cross Outstanding Group award. Red Cross wasn’t her only avenue of giving. She went one day with me to a community center called the Insider’s Teen Center, a place for teenagers in forest Park to hang out and be in safe and positive environment. She soon started talking one on one to the kids there. Not only making friends, but changing lives. She would reach out and touch the hearts of the most troubled children. Elizabeth adored the Teen Center and the help it provided to so many teenagers.

If you had the chance to ask the President of the United States one thing, what would it be? When the Starlight Foundation gave Elizabeth that chance in 1997, she told Mr. Clinton the value and importance of place like the Insider’s Teen Center. She handed him a large prepared report and gave him a 20-minute lobby.

See, the thing is, she was in a wheelchair, and depended on someone else for everything. But that didn’t stop her from pitching to the leader of the free world.

The last year of her life, she scheduled a peace rally for the city of Jonesboro. She was able to get hundreds to attend, attracting attention from former President Jimmy Carter. He called her, while in the hospital, and invited her to come and visit him. She didn’t live long enough to make that meeting.

While Elizabeth was changing the world from the top down, she was also reaching out to dozens of teens via the internet. She created a Teen Help web site where she helped other with teen pregnancy, runaways, drugs, alcohol, depression, suicide, abuse, eating disorders, and of course – serious illness. She would have me bring a laptop to her hospital room during her numerous long term visits.

You see, I’ve got a lot to live up to. I will never have touched as many lives that Elizabeth. She lives on inside me and hundreds other.

She has reached long life.

This is my motivation.

ps. Interesting footnote. The bible quote at the beginning is etched in Elizabeth's tombstone.