by Alena Pitts
“No, I am just really glad I know you guys. Maybe one day my dad will want to go to church. But at least right now I get to learn from you guys.”
“Well, we don’t know it all but we are glad to help you however we can!” Emma said.
I cleared my throat and tried to sound brave when I asked, “Can I ask you a question?”
“Yup,” Joey said while taking a bite out her of peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
“Do you believe in God and God’s son, Jesus?”
Joey put her sandwich down and looked at me. I wasn’t sure what she was going to say. I didn’t mean to make her upset, so I smiled and pretended to look at my lunch.
“I don’t know if I did before, but I do now. I think even watching your movie, Above the Waters, helped me a lot.” She thought for a moment. “And I’ve always loved Mallory Winston’s songs and they talk about God. But after learning more about her and getting to talk to her at your house, it all really made me want to know more.”
“Aw, that’s great!” Savannah cheered.
“Can we pray for you?” I asked.
Joey nodded her head yes. I closed my eyes and even though I wasn’t sure what to pray, I did it anyway. I remembered praying for my tour bus driver, Mr. Ernie, and decided I would do the same thing.
“Dear God, thank you for Joey. I am glad that you have made her our friend! I know that she believes in you and wants to learn more about you. Please, will you help her to know how much you love her? In Jesus’ name, amen.”
When we opened our eyes Joey had a tear rolling down her cheek. She quickly wiped it away and smiled.
“Soooo, how about that budget? How much are we charging for tickets and VIP tickets and T-shirts?” Emma said playfully. We all laughed as the atmosphere around us got a little less serious.
“Thanks for the reminder on that stuff! I’ll ask Mom and Dad to talk to Ms. Blount about that if they haven’t already. I think we’ve done all we can handle for today!”
Chapter 11
I did just what I said I was going to do. That evening I asked Mom and Dad to work with Ms. Blount on creating the price list while Emma, Savannah, Joey, and I continued to work on some of the other details.
Dad agreed and met with Ms. Blount the next day.
As we sat around the kitchen table together that evening, Mom and Dad told me everything that they decided with Ms. Blount. Together they decided that we should charge $35 for a regular ticket to the event. We would charge $55 for a VIP ticket, which meant that person got to actually meet Mallory for a few minutes after the show.
Dad took the last bite of his chicken and said, “Ms. Blount thought it was a good idea to have the ticket cost include a T-shirt. That way people will only have to spend money one time. Mom and I agreed. I think we will raise more that way. And we will figure out a way that the ticket holders can still choose their T-shirt color. And they can buy additional T-shirts, of course.”
“We think you can get about 1,500 people to come to the concert,” Mom said while still concentrating on her dinner.
“That’s a lot of people!” I exclaimed. I had to admit that that was a lot more people than I was expecting, although we hadn’t talked about it too much.
“Yes, it is. But to raise $150,000 you will need a lot more than that. That’s only about $52,000. We will have to really try to get a lot of things donated in order to take care of the costs of supplies and still raise money.” Dad wiped his napkin across his top lip. He didn’t sound very hopeful.
I knew that $150,000 sounded like a lot of money but I really believed we could do it. “I’ll just keep talking to God about it,” I said, trying to stay positive. “He’ll help us.”
Dad tilted his head a little to the right and smiled a little.
“Mallory has a lot of fans!” Mom added. “I think there could be a huge turnout, especially now that the movie has had so much success. And people love to see you two together. Maybe we will have even more than 1,500 show up!”
Ansley grunted. “All of those people can’t fit in your school, Lena!” Ansley added to the conversation.
“Oh, that reminds me. Mr. Fraser agreed to let us have it outside on the big field next to your building.” Dad pushed his chair back from the table and stood up. “Forgot to tell you that. When we realized just how big this event could get, we needed to think about alternatives and the field seemed the best option. It’s huge and level and can certainly accommodate that many.”
He walked over to the counter and picked up his Bible. We all knew that meant it was time for our family devotional.
“Daddy,” I interrupted him right before he started reading the Scripture he had opened his Bible to. “Joey was sad today,” I said. “Her dad doesn’t read the Bible, and they don’t go to church either.”
“Aww, that’s so sad.” Amber sat up on her knees.
“Does she know God?” Ansley asked while sliding her hand under the table to give Austin a little taste of dinner. He licked her fingers while I explained everything that had happened with Joey.
Dad told me that I did the right thing by telling her how much God loves her and inviting her to church with us. He also said we should make praying for her a part of our family’s prayer time.
“I’m glad you talked to her, Lena, and I am glad you are talking about it with us.” He took a sip of water, and Mom added, “Girls, it’s very important that we go to church and learn about God as a family. The reason we do that is not just so we can make our lives better or more fun, but so we can tell others! Never make your friends feel bad about not knowing God. Instead, be willing to be the one to tell them more.”
“So, Mommy,” Ashton perked up. “What if we have friends that don’t want to know God?”
“Well, you can’t make a person want to know God. All you can do is tell them, and show them what knowing God looks like.”
“Huh?” Ansley finally raised her hand from Austin’s mouth and wiped them on her napkin.
“Gross!” I shouted.
“Girls,” Dad said with a stern voice to get our attention. “This is important. Listen to Mom.”
Mom smiled and reached for Dad’s Bible. She opened up to Galatians 5:22–23 and read, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”
She closed the Bible and scanned the table until she was sure she had our attention. “You can show others what knowing God is like by showing His fruit.”
“Ooohhhh! I get it.” Amber said the words like a song.
“What kind of fruit grows on an apple tree?” Mom asked.
“Apples!” Ashton was the first one to respond.
“What kind of fruit grows on a cherry tree?”
“Cherries!” Amber’s word raced out.
“So, if you’re like a Jesus tree, what kind of fruit should you grow?”
No one rushed to answer.
Dad started us off. “We are love, joy, peace . . .”
All of us said each of the fruits Mom had read until we named all nine of them.
“Exactly!” Mom said, full of enthusiasm. “I love seeing the fruit you girls grow!”
This wasn’t the first time we had heard about the fruit of the Spirit, but it seemed to make more sense this time.
“One more thing.” Dad leaned back in his seat. “Does anyone like to eat rotten fruit?”
“Nope.” Ashton frowned.
“So don’t be rotten to each other or to your friends.”
The dinner table quickly filled with laughter. “You don’t be rotten!” Ashton pointed a playful finger at me. “No! You better not be rotten . . . yuck!” I laughed and started teasing each of my sisters.
Mom and Dad stood and started clearing the table and we joined them.
“Okay, girls, time to get ready for bed! School tomorrow,” Dad said.
We all hurried down the hall to our rooms joking a
nd teasing each other along the way. After we took our showers Mom and Dad tucked each of us in and turned off the lights.
“Lena?” Ansley whispered. “Even if you don’t make enough money to help Caroline, at least you helped Joey.”
I smiled. Ansley was right. I closed my eyes and thanked God for helping me to grow and be fruit for others.
Chapter 12
Once Mr. Fraser agreed to let us have the event outside, we had a brand-new list of tasks we needed to accomplish. I told Savannah, Emma, and Joey the news. Now there was more to panic about.
“What about the weather?” asked Savannah, as always the practical one. “It’s spring and that’s storm season in Dallas. We cannot control that!”
I told them not worry. “We just need to add that to the list of things we are already praying for,” I said. But that made me a little nervous too.
Dad helped me create a list of items we needed. He said we now needed to rent a stage, tables, and chairs. Since The Big Give was set for May, we didn’t worry too much about it being too cold in Dallas. However, Ms. Blount did suggest that we rent large tents in case it rained. She told us we could have the stage under some type of covering as well as the T-shirts and food under another. We all agreed that was a good idea and added the cost to the growing list of expenses.
Then Mom had a great idea. “Maybe I’ll call Mallory and Sammy. They must have some type of stage and covering they use on the road for outdoor concerts. They may be willing to let us use their structure for the fundraiser. It could save us lots of money!”
Dad asked us to write a letter that he could use when asking for donations. Ms. Blount agreed to help us girls. She helped us explain our needs and suggested we also include pieces of Caroline and the other families’ stories as well as Mallory’s biography as part of the perfect letter to ask for help.
Dad took the letter to where he worked, and they agreed to donate enough to pay for the tent rentals! They wanted to be called our sponsor and asked that we hang their company banner on the stage. Of course, no one had a problem with that, and we celebrated the response.
After realizing how easy it was to use the letter to ask for help, we came up with a list of other places to go and ask for donations. Mom took it with her to our local grocery stores and they agreed to donate hotdogs, buns, chips, and bottles of water. Another store donated paper plates, napkins, and cookies to sell.
Every time we received a new donation I remembered the morning I sat on Dad’s lap and he told me not to be anxious but to ask for help. The more we stopped trying to do everything ourselves, the more help God seemed to send!
Ms. Blount asked our art teacher, Mr. Shipply, if he would be willing to help us put the final touches on the flyer and the T-shirt designs. With only four weeks before the event he agreed to stay after school on Friday evenings to help us with any design work that we needed. Emma, Joey, and Savannah had track practice so Mom came with Amber, Ashton, and Ansley.
The first thing we needed to do was finish the flyers. Now that we had all the information, we could fill in the cost, the date, the time, the location, and exactly how to get in touch with the school office (who had generously volunteered to handle the sale of the tickets), and who would be at the concert. It was easy to fill in the blank spaces. Mr. Shipply made them look super fun with a picture of Mallory standing with one hand on her hip and the other waving in the air. When she saw it, Emma said it looked like she was jumping off the flyer and telling people, “Hello!”
Once they were complete and the team approved, including Mallory, Mom took a copy to our church and asked if they would print 3,000 copies of the flyer. When she showed them our letter and explained what we were doing, they offered to print them for free.
When Mom brought them home we all screamed! They were so pretty! We all spent the rest of the week passing them out to everyone in our school and taping copies of them on bathroom doors everywhere we went! People even offered to help us distribute them all around Dallas, and we needed even more copies, which the church was happy to help with.
By the end of the week we were amazed at how much had been accomplished and by how many things were donated to our fundraising efforts. We used our Saturday work time to pass out more flyers in our neighborhoods, and we took stacks of them to a few churches and restaurants.
“With this many flyers I don’t think you will have a problem getting at least 1,500 people to show up!” Mom’s confidence was contagious. We all believed her and were excited by the thought.
The next week was dedicated to helping Mr. Shipply finalize the design for the T-shirts. We finally decided it was best if each shirt looked exactly the same except for the shirt color and the family name that was being supported. Caroline’s shirt was turquoise because that was my favorite color. The others were purple, fuchsia, lime green, and tie-dye. Each name would be printed across the middle in large white bubble-type letters. Ms. Blount had given us the great news that a local screen printing company had offered to donate the T-shirts for our fundraiser! This was an amazing gift. The whole team decided that besides getting a T-shirt with each ticket sold we would have extras printed to sell for $10 each. We ordered 500 extra—100 of each color. Mr. Shipply said that having the shirts in different colors was a good idea because we could make it a fun competition on the night of the show, seeing which color was the most popular. We all loved that idea and thanked him for helping us.
Since the school was helping out so much, Mr. Fraser asked if the school could sponsor the T-shirts, and we, of course, agreed. He only asked that we put our school banner outside of the tent where the shirts and food would be sold. We loved that idea because that was also near where Mallory would set up a booth to sign autographs and meet people.
When I asked Mr. Shipply how he would get our designs off the paper and onto a shirt he suggested we take the artwork to the printer and see the process for ourselves.
That week mom agreed to drive us to the printer during our Saturday meeting.
Joey showed up in her workout leggings as always and Emma and Savannah wore their gym shorts. I thought about putting on a pair of nice jeans in order to look professional but quickly decided against the idea when I saw my friends. We piled into the van and followed the directions Mr. Shipply had given us.
When we pulled up to the building we thought we were at the wrong address. The building was brown with a red metal door and an old black fence that only wrapped around a part of the building. There was only one car in the parking lot and the place looked empty. Mom glanced down at her phone at the directions again, then looked closely at the building.
“Are you sure Mr. Shipply gave you the right address, Mom?” I asked.
“I’m not sure I want to get out, Mrs. Daniels,” Savannah said cautiously.
“I think this is it, girls,” she said back, just as cautiously. “Stay with me.” She gathered her things and got out of the van.
Emma looked at us and shrugged. Then she slid the back door open and jumped out.
We stayed two steps behind Mom and walked up to the door. When she rang the bell a girl opened the door with a huge smile on her face.
She didn’t look very old and was wearing a pair of gym shorts and a T-shirt, just like us.
“Hi, guys! You must be the Daniels family and friends, right?”
She swung the door open wide and welcomed us in.
Mom introduced herself first and then turned to each of us.
The young, bouncy girl shook our hands and said, “I’m Trina! This is my mom and dad’s T-shirt printing company and I work for them.”
Emma secretly tugged my hand a little and I knew it meant that she was excited. I smiled in agreement. The building looked completely different on the inside than it did on the outside. The walls were each painted a different color with brightly colored artwork hanging all around. There was a long white couch facing the door and a tiny white metal desk sitting in the corner. It smelled like a bag of le
mons and the soft music playing reminded me of being in an elevator.
“Come this way, everyone,” Trina said.
Trina took us into the back of the print shop where there were machines lined against the walls. She explained what each of them did and walked us to the supply closet. “This is where we keep all of the different shirts. I think we have a note of which colors you want but let me know if it looks like I pulled the wrong ones.”
She went behind a door and rolled out a huge basket of shirts. Immediately, I could see all the colors we chose and told her that it all looked right.
She and Mom went over all the details—sizes, spelling of the names, and quantities of each. Once everything was agreed upon, she asked if Mom could put her initial by the order to show that we approved.
Mom handed me the pen and I slowly wrote “L.D.”
Next we watched Trina hook up the computer and turn on the machines. She played with a few buttons, made a few adjustments, and hit a big green button.
Slowly we started hearing the machines rumble. “Alright, it’s all set! It will take them a few hours to run, so you can pick them up tomorrow.”
Mom nodded. “Thank you so much, Trina. And please, thank your parents for their donation of the shirts and printing.” She walked us back out toward the front of the building.
Trina stopped at the desk, picked up a white envelope, and handed it to Joey. Joey handed it to Mom.
“We want you to know that my family loved Above the Waters. It was such a good movie,” Trina said, looking directly at me.
I was shocked and a little embarrassed by her words. I felt everyone look in my direction, so I smiled as wide as I could and said thank you.
“So anyway, when my parents heard all about what you guys are doing for these children and their families they really wanted to help. We won’t be able to make the concert in two weeks, but please add this gift from us to your donations as well.” She pointed at the white envelope Mom was holding.