Loving a Neighbor

Christ’s call to love your neighbor as you love yourself is as simple as it is difficult.  

Understanding Jesus’ love for me, and seeing the way that he completely expended himself in order to communicate that love  compels me to obey his command.  His Holy Spirit inspires me to strive after his glorious ideals, and helps me to follow after him.  But it is a struggle for sure. 

At a practical level, one thing that we have done here in Santa Fe, is plug in to a church that embraces Jesus’ mission.  And, although there are other churches here that exalt Jesus, we love BlazeChristian Fellowship because it’s a place we can bring our neighbors and invite our friends and family to.  It’s a cool church that loves this city and it’s a place where outsiders are welcome. 

I have also prayed for opportunities to actively love my neighbors and asked God to help me engage them with the truths of his Gospel.  Over the past few months, I’ve had some amazing interactions.

 

But, one conversation leaves me haunted.  One of them leaves me asking myself: Did I love my neighbor well enough?

I met my parents neighbor a few years ago when my brother and I went over to introduce ourselves and chat.  He was a cool guy about 4 years younger than I am.   He and his buddies were really into working on, modifying and building rat rods, 4 Wheel drive trucks, rock crawler jeeps and stuff like that.  Their large corner lot looked like a practical junk yard full of car parts, axles, wheels, trailers and tools.  In the summer time there would almost always be 4 or 5 guys in their garage hanging out, welding, turning wrenches, drinking beers and chain smoking all day and into the night. 

Shortly after meeting him, I began praying for him.  (not as often as I should have….not too consistently)   He was  artistic and creative guy who was as friendly and helpful as he was profane.  But the more I got to know him the more excited I would get thinking about how cool it would be if he gave his life to Jesus.

Six weeks ago I went down the street to borrow a tool and hang out for a bit.  He looked tired and as we hung out he started coughing and I remarked that it might be a good time to quit smoking!  He told me that he actually had a tumor in a his lung.  It wasn’t cancerous, but it was growing.   He indicated that he was getting some tests done and was trying to figure out the finances of it all.

A couple weeks later, I went over again.  In just a few weeks, he had lost weight and he wasn’t getting out too much.  He wasn’t working and I could tell things were pretty serious.  It was the middle of the day and we sat down at his table.  His kitchen counter top was full of medical paper work I told him how I’d been praying for him.  We talked about illness and how it’s a result of Sin and the fall.  I told him about my dad and about J.C.Ryles words regarding God’s purposes in sickness.  I asked him about his spiritual beliefs. 

He told me he had a Bible, but reading it was somewhat “depressing” to him.  He’d grown up in the Catholic church, but he looked at me and said “basically, I believe in myself.”  He talked about staying positive, relying on what’s inside, depending on yourself and fighting hard.   I told him, that I believed that sickness does a good job of  revealing our frailty and weakness and self confidence –especially during illness is not able to truly bring hope.  God is our strength and we talked about my dad’s faith in Jesus and the true peace that he experienced because he trusted in God.  Not himself. 

It was good.  We talked about surgical options, doctor’s opinions and other aspects of life.  But, I felt truly burdened for him.  I hoped as I left that by God’s power, the mention of God’s might, would provoke him to open his Bible and understand truth.  He didn’t seem open to Jesus, and was full of misconceptions.  Above all, he was trusting in the wrong thing.  I left praying that God would use his sickness to change him and draw him to himself. 

I wanted to go over again.  I wanted to continue our conversation.  I prayed that God would work thru his suffering. 

Last Tuesday, our neighbor died.  I could not believe it.  He had plummeted so fast and I thought he had more time. 

Though we’d talked of God in our last conversation, I really don’t have much to be encouraged about.  I had hoped we’d have at least one more talk before I left town.  I wondered if I should have pressed him harder, and wished I had tried more intensely to convey to him how worthless it is to rely on self instead of Jesus.  I’d mentioned sin, but should I have said more about  his personal sin?  I really didn’t feel like we got to hammer on our utter need for a savior.   In addition.  I cared about him, and I wondered and hoped that he felt cared for during his last days.  He had many friends, and I was basically still an acquaintance.  But, did I show Christ’s concern for his life thru my actions?  I really wish I would have visited him more in those last two weeks! 

Life was busy.  But in the end, I thought he had more time.  Everyone did I think. 

I arrived at his house about 10 minutes after he passed and it was thoroughly sad.  I was concerned for his soul, and so our grief for him has been lacking hope.   As  when he was alive, upon his death, his house was a hub of masculine energy.  The street was lined with trucks and guys were everywhere!    It would have been so glorious if it was all transformed by the Gospel.  If he had come to Christ, he could have been a witness to many, many men…..men who would typically be reluctant to set foot in a church.

Stephanie and I felt like satan was victorious in his death.  And we mourn the fact that we didn’t have more time to talk with him about Jesus and that he wasn’t able to shine as a witness for Jesus.   He will be missed by us, and by many, many more.   And we will pray for guidance and strength to love our neighbors well.  

This Season of Suffering

In this post I want to give you an update about our current life situation.  (updated 1/30)

This summer we got to spend time in Santa Fe.  In these previous posts, (post 1, post 2) I updated you about my dad’s declining health status; he has recently died from ALS.

Here we are together at my parents home in Santa Fe, NM

Though my dad had been struggling since the fall of 2010, it was difficult to imagine or comprehend exactly how the disease was destroying him until we visited and saw him in person.  Although his speech had been degrading throughout the year, we’d been corresponding on the telephone and without seeing him, we could not fully understand all the ways his body was being affected.   Seeing him at home when we visited this summer was thoroughly shocking.  We were consumed with grief for days, even as we tried to hang out and interact with him and enjoy our time together as a family.

My dad required full-time around the clock caretaking.  As the weeks wore on his body became more and more paralyzed.   In December, he lost his ability to  support any weight at all on his own two legs.   He got an amazing wheelchair, but his decline was so rapid he barely got to use it at all.   It was motorized and  using his head, he could adjust the foot rest and the reclining features of the chair.  He only went outside one time in that chair; just to the porch.   ALS took away his ability to speak; which was by far the most terrible affect.  He also was unable to eat and had to receive nutrients thru a tube.    His arms ceased to work and his body atrophied and collapsed around him.  Physically he was completely debilitated.   We had to help him do everything and he was totally bed-ridden for almost two months.

With ALS, one’s mind is generally un-affected though current reasearch is showing that approximately 50 percent of the time, ALS is accompanied by some degree of frontotemporal lobar degeneration.    Mentally my dad is still basically there, although we've observed what we believe are some cognitive affects which are altering the way he currently interacts, communicates and relates with us.    

My mom, dad, sister (Leslie) and me in Pecos, NM this summer

My mom was functioning as his primary caregiver, but we could see this summer that she needed a lot of help.   Relatives and friends have graciously pitched in to help her and my sister Rachel put her classes at UNM on hold to be at home.  But during our visit this in the summer of 2011 it became clear to Stephanie and I, that somehow we also needed to be there.  We need to be in Santa Fe with my dad, serving him and helping my mom during this season of suffering. 

We borrowed a wheelchair and went downtown this summer.

We returned to Cornell in August to get ready for our fall kick-off.  We did not know exactly what the future held, but we did want to proceed on campus with our students and get the school year rolling.   Together with our staff team and regional supervisors, we decided that we would get things going on campus and then leave after our Fall Retreat.  We were  granted a medical leave of absence in order to help my father in Santa Fe. 

The first 6 weeks on campus were some of the absolute best!   While living here we have maintained close contact with our staff team and have been coaching from a distance.   Right now the rest of our staff team and our CRU student leaders are trusting Jesus and doing an amazing job of shouldering the leadership burden.

We are currently living in New Mexico.  My father passed away just over a week ago.  (1/19/12) 

Along with the physical caretaking, it was critical during our time together to come around my dad and remind him of the hope of the Gospel.  Spiritually he is o.k.  He loves Jesus, and knows the comfort of God in the midst of this affliction, and yet, it is so easy to be overtaken with fear, attacked by anxiety.  As total paralysis and death draw nearer and nearer it is easy to get discouraged and depressed.     While with him this summer, we spent time reading from the Bible, reading Christian books and praying together.  We continued to do that together when we returned this fall.  Reading God's word and praying together were some of the best times that we had.  

You can read more about ALS disease here:   http://www.alsa.org/about-als/

Lou Gehrig's Disease

Today I got a text message from my sister Leslie telling me that my dad was going to the doctor to check out his nose. It might be broken because he fell yesterday and knocked his face really hard. He got a cut and maybe his nose is bumped pretty bad. .

My dad has actually been going to the doctor a lot over the past few months, and has recently been diagnosed with ALS or "Lou Gehrig's Disease."

I love this picture here. We took it this summer the last time I was hanging out with my dad in Alamogordo, NM before my brother and his family shipped out to England. It was a wonderful time, we were all together. I'm not sure what my dad was laughing at here, but I love the joyful look on his face.

This was in July, and though my dad wasn't feeling 100% we had no idea that anything serious was going on inside. For the last several years, he's felt increasingly run down and low on energy. But, besides that, he was still operating fairly normally. Last year he drove around working for the census; cruising northern New Mexico in his truck, knocking on doors and taking surveys.

When my brother left in November, he had told me that our dad seemed to be talking more slowly. But, despite a slightly slower drawl, I was still having perfectly normal conversations with him on the phone. Even at Christmas time, my conversations with him were normal, though he was beginning to sense something going on with his throat and vocal chords and stuff.

We took this picture at White Sands this past July.

And we went out towards Cloudcroft and had a hilariously chaotic campfire. There were so many of our little ones around it was madness!

Today, my dad is experiencing lots of muscular deterioration and he is barely able to speak. I don't know exactly why the ALS messes with the throat and vocal chords, but it seems to be a pretty common symptom. We talk on the phone a little bit, but unfortunately it is hard to understand him; which is very sad for all of us.

Leslie and her husband Brad are living in Santa Fe, which is really cool. They are able to hang out with my mom and dad which is wonderful.

We are praying that the symptoms would be alleviated -I pray especially for my dad's ability to talk. Please join us in praying for his condition, and for my mom as she takes care of him during this time.