Torch, Fall 1993

A Full Nest: Three Generations by Martha Baldwin I n greying America, almost everyone, sometime or other, faces the challenge of how to care for aging parents. What is a young or middle– aged couple or single person to do when parents require different housing arrangements which are more in keeping with their needs? The biblical principle of honoring one's father and mother indicates a responsibility on the part of the children to see to the care of their parents. What about bringing parents into the children's home to live? The following account is about a family of three generations living together in a home. The experience was a positive one, and lessons learned continue to affect the youngest family member as she now has her own family. Occasionally a friend of Marlin Rayburn's would ask him how he managed with all those women in his house. Marlin would just smile and say something about being glad to be able to help them. "All those women" included his wife Ethel, daughter Marilyn, his wife's mother, and his wife's aunt. Three generations under one roof. Was the situation a sentence of despair or, as Ethel Rayburn describes it, a time of joy, cooperation, and happy memories in the making? Marlin and Ethel Rayburn were involved in missionary work, a number of pastorates, and then a teaching ministry with Christian colleges. They longed for children, and Ethel had suffered several miscarriages. They had received discouraging counsel from friends about adoption, but while Marlin was pastoring in Michigan, the director of a Baptist children's home felt the Torch 13