To Verna from Lou Wargo
In the 4 plus years we served together on the staff of Westminster United Church of Christ in Spokane, WA I came to know and appreciate Verna not just as a co-worker but as a friend and colleague in ministry.
Her capacity to organize was nothing short of remarkable. Perhaps that ability is no better illustrated than in her work on our Tree of Sharing project. Originally, the church took over the program from the Spokane Downtown Council who’d had a hard time coordinating the effort. Conceived as a way of gathering gifts for individuals and families for whom Christmas held little or no promise of joy or much else, the program had moved by fits and starts. It became such a burden, the Downtown Council seriously considered pulling the plug. I thought the program too important to do that and committed the church to doing it. The first year, somehow or another, we gathered some 700 gifts and thought we’d died and gone to heaven! Enter Verna! She contacted community agencies asking for the names of possible gift recipients, she gathered gift requests, printed labels and ornaments and saw to it everything was ready to go when the program began just after Thanksgiving. One year, right after Christmas, Verna took it upon herself to solicit all the local department stores for unused gift wrap we could use the following year. I know because I personally went downtown and picked up huge rolls of gift wrap Verna had “shaken loose” from the stores. The last year I helped organize the program, with Verna going full steam, we had three tree locations, more than 50 community agencies involved and gathered more than 4000 gifts! And all of this was accomplished under Verna’s careful stewardship and watchful eye! And she accomplished all that while still fulfilling her other job responsibilities in the church!
Her wonderful sense of humor and “can do” spirit infected all of us who worked with her on the church’s staff. And when any one of us began taking ourselves with too much seriousness, it was Verna who’d bring us back to earth (and reality!) in a way which never injured or demeaned but would make us smile!
Verna’s was a gentle spirit not unlike the breeze which takes a kite out of one’s hands and lifts it high into the air there to swop and soar on its own. Verna’s spirit lifted us all. And, like the wind, though no longer visible to us, it continues to lift us beyond ourselves.
Blessed are those who knew her and loved her!
