36. Forty Thousand Testimonies
R
Great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:23S
PIKEwas tired—truly tired. He had driven with our son Andy in
his ten-year-old Toyota truck five hours to Atlanta to attend a
Promise Keepers conference. The traffic had been something we
small-town dwellers can fathom only in our worst nightmares.
The conference they were attending was rewarding but activity-
packed with speakers, small groups, and times of worship. But per-
haps the most draining part of the three-day gathering for my
introverted husband was being packed sardine-style into a mam-
moth stadium with nearly forty thousand men. When he climbed
the ramps with Andy to their seats high in the stadium, he admitted
to God and to himself his enormous sense of fatigue.
Then, as they took their seats, the worship leader began very qui-
etly to sing a familiar hymn a capella. His eyes were closed; his palms
were open as though he expected something precious to be placed
in them. He lifted his rich baritone voice toward heaven and the
words floated out across the heads of the men.