Today I received the most unexpected phone call—one that reached across nearly 48 years and touched my heart.
On August 23, 1978, the USS Whipple (FF-1062), commanded by my husband, Bill, came upon a sinking, severely overcrowded wooden boat in the storm-tossed South China Sea. Aboard were 410 Vietnamese refugees—men, women, and children who were starving and desperately in need of help.
Bill and the crew of the Whipple brought every one of them safely aboard.
The following day, August 24, they arrived in Junk Bay, Hong Kong, where the refugees were transferred to United Nations officials. Eventually, families and organizations in America sponsored many of them, helping them begin new lives far from the danger they had escaped.
And then my phone rang today.
The caller was Ann Doody of Birmingham, Alabama. Ann had sponsored a mother and her eight children from that rescue and has remained in touch with the family all these years.
She called because she wanted to thank Bill.
I wish he could have answered the phone.
Hearing Ann describe how one act of courage and compassion changed the course of an entire family’s life was overwhelming. Nearly five decades later, the ripple effects of that day are still being felt.
It reminded me that we seldom know how far the good we do will travel.
Most acts of kindness don’t come with follow-up reports. We simply do what is before us—help someone, offer encouragement, take a risk, show compassion—and trust that it matters.
Sometimes, though, God gives us a glimpse of the rest of the story.
Today, through a phone call from Birmingham, He gave me one.
What kindness can you offer today whose ripple may reach farther than you’ll ever know?
