I was five months pregnant when we moved from Regina to the Estevan area. Actually, I moved. Lyndon had already been working in the Estevan coal plant for a few months. I had been so sick with the pregnancy that I hadn’t been working, and it looked like his job was going to be permanent, so we put our house up for sale and made the move. The first of many.

I’ve been thinking about our time in Estevan. Reflecting, I guess, on when the marriage was new and the children were small. We lived outside of Estevan, but we worshipped with the Estevan Church of Christ. Lyndon worked shifts, so he often couldn’t go to church with us. Many times I was there on a Sunday morning with one, and then two, babies.

I was almost thirty-two years old when Tyson was born. You’d think I would have had a clue. But really, I didn’t. I was often a lonely, tired, stressed-out, uncertain, insecure mom.

The Estevan church was not perfect. They had their struggles. Probably still do. But when I think of attending there, with my babies and my overflowing diaper bag and my not-so-peaceful heart … I remember, always, one woman. Janice Tucker.

I don’t think I remember a single sermon. I remember visits at potlucks, and trying to help organize ladies events, and teaching Sunday School. And I remember juggling. With a fussing baby in one arm and a hymn book in the other, and arriving late and placing a box of purchased cookies on the potluck table beside Elsie’s still-warm banana cake.

And when I’d take the wiggling babe to the back of the church, to bounce and hush and walk, Janice would be there. She’d take him out of my arms and whisper go sit and listen, and I’d apologize and she’d wave me off and walk away with the boy. And I’d sit and listen. And the tears are there still, today, when I remember that gift. Sunday after Sunday.

If Janice and I were to sit down and talk theology or doctrine or theory, I’m sure we’d find some areas on which we differ. I’m sure we could find places where we think differently. But I don’t care about the differences, because what we agree on is so much more. There were some Sunday mornings, with the babies and all, when Janice Tucker saved me. In a way no doctrine ever could. With warm hands and whispered words and a smile. A great gift, never forgotten.

It’s advent. The season before. The remembering. The preparing. And I’m thinking of babies and worship and gifts. And I’m thankful for women like Janice, who have seen me, and touched me, and cared.