Letter: To Love, and Laugh, and Live Again

As many of my readers know by now, I have announced that I have been led by God I believe to someone in my life who has come to mean so very much to me.

All my life – and there are so many, many instances of such – God has orchestrated from heaven the very intricate and intimate details of my journey.

Among them, the sale of our home where I was a pastor to a passer-by who drove by at the very same time as our realtor was digging a hole in the front yard and inserting the For Sale sign. She offered more than the asking price, far beyond what the realtor said was possible.

With that sale we were able to purchase a lake-front marina and island cabin that has meant so much to our family and community over many, many years.

It is the same marina that burned to the ground where we lost irreplaceable treasures.

There has been tragic, tragic death in our family of which I am reminded on this very day that I write this, the six year anniversary.

I lost my wife of 50 years, and the mother of our four children, to cancer almost 19 months ago.

I write this in part because God’s goodness and, for that matter, great grief, are no respecter of persons.

Simply because I am a seminary graduate and retired pastor and retired police chaplain and have conducted numerous memorial services and made death notifications, does not of course mean I am immune from the pain – any more than any of us – that accompanies great loss that had once been great love.

Tragedy became a whole different matter when death knocked on my door.

At such times, when my heart is overwhelmed, I have found a rock where I have retreated to regain perspective.

This past summer I wandered for one-hundred miles backpacking through the wilderness forests and coastline of Washington during which time I saw unparalleled beauty as I stood face to face with the majesty of mountains soaring far above me, and early morning dewdrops like diamonds in the sky, millions of them it seemed, on just a tiny leaf at my feet.

Twice on the trail I had specific plans to go right and yet, inexplicably at the time, I turned left with the consequence that the whole new direction led to destinations I would not otherwise have had, and people I would not otherwise have met.

I wrote about these adventures with the wonderful result that hundreds and hundreds of readers joined me on the trail, sharing their own loves, their own losses, their own rekindling of their love for life.

All to say, that as God has directed my steps throughout my life, and in such instances this past summer, sometimes in contrast to my well-laid plans, I am convinced that He has not abandoned me now as concerning His love and has in fact blessed me to love and laugh and live again.

I write to share my good news; I write to you who still have a hand to hold and how love then should be; and I write to you who have loved much and lost much that you too would see your steps so directed to fall in love with life again and discover the one who loves you.