‘A call-boy’s job is exactly what he does,’ the Train Driver explained. ‘His job is to provide a wake-up call and call the train crews to their duties, often during the early morning hours. Then to mop and clean the office and to run messages for the Roster Clerk.
Back in the early 1970’s, when mobile phones did not exist and when many people did not even have a telephone, the call-boy personally called crews to work.
With the call notes written out, I would sort them into order just like a postman does before he delivers the letters. I would then jump on my bike and ride all over town, delivering the call notes and advising the crews of their next turn of duty. They would ask me all sorts of questions, why they were rostered on this particular job, why they’d been laid back so far, who was doing what jobs, and so on and so on.
I would answer, “I’m only the call-boy. See the Roster Clerk.” And after a month or so I got to understand rostering practices and could soon answer all their questions.
As in any depot, some jobs were hated by the crews, such as an all night shunting job to barracks. They would shunt just about every siding and cross every train and a lot of the time they had to be relieved before they got their tasks finished for they worked long hours. The crews would try anything to try to avoid being rostered for an all night shunting job to barracks.
In my time as a call-boy I would cover more than two thousand miles in an area of about five square miles, just to tell the loco crews when to come to work.’
Two things were apparent as the Train Driver talked. Firstly, he knew the needs of train crews by association with their difficulties. Secondly, he was only the call-boy.
Just as surely, Jesus knew firstly, the needs of families and workers by association with their difficulties. Secondly, He was only the ‘Call-Boy.’ He delivered the messages His Father had given Him whether they were popular or not and He mopped out the world for His Father.
‘Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.’ John 1:29.
Have you had a wake-up call and have you heeded the Call-boy’s call to duty?
Elizabeth Price