The Tablecloth, Chain Mail

A church was very run down and needed much work. The pastor set a goal to have everything done in time to have their service on Christmas Eve.

On December 19 a heavy rainstorm hit the area and lasted for two days. His heart sank when he saw that the roof had leaked, causing a large area of plaster about 20 feet by 8 feet to fall off the front wall, about head high.

The pastor cleaned up the mess not knowing what else to do but postpone the Christmas Eve service, and headed home.

On the way he noticed a flea market for charity so he stopped to take a look. He saw a beautiful, handmade, ivory colored, crocheted tablecloth with exquisite work, fine colors and a cross embroidered right in the center. It was just the right size to cover up the hole in the front wall. He bought it and headed back to the church.

Near the church he saw an older woman running from the opposite direction, trying to catch the bus. She missed it. The pastor invited her to wait in the warm church for the next bus 45 minutes later.

She sat on the bench and paid no attention to the pastor while he got a ladder to hang up the tablecloth to cover the broken wall.

The woman walked down the aisle her face was pale as a sheet and asked, "Pastor, where did you get that tablecloth?"
The pastor explained. The woman asked him to check the lower right corner to see if the initials, EBG were embroidered there. They were. These were the initials of the woman, and she had made this tablecloth 35 years before, in Austria.

The woman explained that before the war she and her husband were well-to-do people in Austria.
When the Nazis came, she was forced to leave. Her husband was captured, sent to prison never to be seen again.

The pastor wanted to give her the tablecloth but she made the pastor keep it for the church. The pastor insisted on driving her home as she lived on the other side of Brooklyn.

On Christmas Eve, the church was almost full. The music and the spirit were great. At the end of the service, the pastor and his wife greeted everyone at the door and many said that they had a good time.

But an older man, whom the pastor recognized from the neighborhood continued to sit and stare, and the pastor wondered why he wasn't leaving. The man asked him where he got the tablecloth on the front wall because it was identical to one that his wife had made years ago when they lived in Austria before the war and how could there be two tablecloths so much alike.

The pastor asked him if he would allow him to take him for a little ride. They drove to the same house where the pastor had taken the woman three days earlier. He helped the man climb the three flights of stairs to the woman's apartment, and knocked on the door.

What the pastor saw was the greatest Christmas reunion he could ever imagine.

A touching story which has been around for a long time and the details have changed over time. It is now made into a chain letter. The story originated in the December 1954 issue of Reader's Digest.

And more recently, the tale was published as "The Gold and Ivory Tablecloth" in Christmas in My Heart: A timeless Treasury of Heartwarming Stories, the first in a best-selling series of inspirational books by Dr. Joe Wheeler.