Goodbyes are hard

Saying goodbye is rarely easy. It appears to occur more frequently as I age, or perhaps I just notice it more nowadays. This has been a week bookended by endings. On Monday we said goodbye to our beloved family pup of 9 years. As typically happens, Shiloh had become very much a part of the fabric of our family. We adopted him when he was 3 or 4 years old. No one was quite sure of his age at the time. Nick had been going through the normal middle school blues when we decided to give him a furry friend - a great parenting moment for us.

On the way home...

It was obvious that Shiloh had suffered abuse or mistreatment in the past. We discovered after a few weeks that the pooch and crates were a poor, even disastrous, combination. Until we learned our lesson, we had to repair or replace molding, carpeting, and wallboard, not to mention the two crates that were damaged beyond usefulness. Shiloh also broke a few teeth struggling for freedom.

Nick meets Shiloh

Never a very playful dog, Shiloh loved nothing more than to sit next to our legs and have us pat him atop of his head and rub his supersoft ears; well, that and eating. I've never seen a dog more excited about food! As he aged he learned some new tricks - such as getting into cabinets to get food from the garbage can or the pantry. We think the cat taught him how to use his claws to open the doors. We have no proof, but it's a fun conspiracy theory. Besides the loss of some foodstuffs and having to clean up the inevitable mess of trash strewn around the kitchen, the worse problem came later. Imagine the messes we discovered the mornings following Shiloh eating an entire box of cocoa powder (little liquid gifts left all over Nick's bedroom carpet), or after lapping up half of a bottle of olive oil (twice), or after devouring a huge mound of grease-soaked charcoal from the smoker!

Instant friends...

Monday morning I knew something was amiss when I woke up. Shiloh was not outside of my bedroom door to greet me, tail wagging, hungry for breakfast. He had been inexplicably losing weight over the past month although his appetite had not changed. Other clues told us that he was near the end of his life. Beagle's average lifespan is nine years. We knew Shiloh to be older than that.

Shiloh's grave

I finally found him in one of our upstairs bedrooms, appearing to be sleeping naturally. He must have passed away peacefully in his sleep. I went downstairs and phoned Nick, who was enjoying a rare morning off from work. Audibly upset Nick said he was on his way. I texted Natalie too. Just before Nick arrived Nat called. She told me she was on the way as well.

He loved to roam these woods

Nick wanted to dig the grave himself. He carefully chose the site just beneath the tree line in our backyard. We shared Shiloh memories while he worked, tears moistening our cheeks. We had a few laughs about the antics of the silly pooch.

As Nick finished digging, I went upstairs to wrap his furry friend in an old sheet. I gently carried Shiloh into the backyard. I found some discarded bricks stacked beneath the deck and brought them out too. Around 8 am the whole family converged in the backyard around the shallow grave Nick had dug. As the others walked towards the gravesite, weeping, and arm in arm, I carefully laid our friend into his final resting place. We all hugged and cried together. Each of us murmured a goodbye before Nick and I filled the grave with dirt and covered it with the bricks.

Nick, of course, cracked a few jokes to lighten the mood.

The rest of the week has also been hard. It's been hard not hearing Shiloh's baying when I arrive home each evening after work. It's been hard knowing my son is grieving the loss of his friend. Nick has been back to the house to visit the gravesite. We have often looked into the backyard from inside the house to the bucolic place Shiloh is buried to remember. Each time my eyes fill with tears.

But that's not all - this week is one of another goodbye. Today is my last at the UGA BCM. I have been employed by the Georgia Baptist Convention (now Georgia Baptist Mission Board) 1989 after graduating from seminary in 1989 - 29 years ago. I have spent my professional career working for and with Baptists in Georgia and around the world. I have been at this post in Athens since July 1, 2000. As a recently retired colleague told me, "You will find that your identity is very much wrapped up in where you have worked over the past three decades." I am discovering he is correct.

While it is exciting to think about possibilities for my next job, today I'm a bit nostalgic.

Over the past month, I have given away many of the books in my vast library. But there is much left to give away, donate, or pack. At the moment I am lacking the motivation to do it.

"Free books" brought students
running to my office

So many memories, so many faces of the phenomenal students who have come through these doors, who have sat in my office, who have allowed me a glimpse into their lives - their souls - to help them narrate their way into the next part of the journey of life/faith. My office is filled, stuffed almost, with memories. Each picture from a wedding, each momento brought to me from a mission trip, each trinket collected over these long years has a face and a story attached to it. There's the license plate sent to me by Amanda with a mission trip report written on the back in sharpie. There's a similar report written on a coconut and another on an aluminum cooking pot - all sent without packaging through the mail. There's the photo of the Road Rules mission team that trekked from Athens to Atlanta, Birmingham, and Johnson City. There are two of the Dinner Theatre (DT) banners that hung outside of the BCM building, rolled up and forgotten in the corner of my office. There are also random DT props cluttering the nooks and crannies of my office, including a giant book and a handmade wooden rifle behind my door. There's the piece of a tire on the corner of my desk collected from a rural highway on Ride for Christ, our annual bike ride from Athens to Jacksonville. There are the comics that clutter my office door, noticed and read by students through the years. There's the framed article that Jenna's dad wrote to celebrate her graduation describing her years in college and involvement in BCM. There's the plaque of appreciation from the Korean Baptist Convention; the stash of 14 coffee mugs (some with molded coffee still in the bottom); the little pot, one of 1000 I made for the statewide, "Molded by the Master" conference; the notebooks from each leadership team; and the books, the never-ending shelves of books.

Thomas and Abby "shopping" on
my bookshelves

My library has been a source of encouragement and inspiration to hundreds of students. I loan them freely. In fact, alumni have come back to visit with books in hand, discovered as they unpacked after a move. They say, "funny thing - we found some of your books. Sorry, it's been ten years!" Often I have purchased the books again, only to loan them out again.

So instead of packing, I sit here at my messy desk reminiscing - sometimes smiling, often with tears trickling down my cheeks. Several students in town for summer school have stopped by today. They know today is my last. Each one has come in for small talk. Most have mentioned something about today being the last day they will see me in this role. Oh, there will be an official send-off in a month or so. I will see most of them again then. But not here. Not in this sacred space. Yes, it's just an office - a very messy, cluttered office. But even space can be sacred. It can become liminal - a thin space where heaven and Earth seem to meet. Over the years this place has become that for me and for many of the students who ventured in to chat. In this space, students have come to know themselves and their God a bit better. In this space, I have counseled more than 50 couples to prepare them for marriage. In this space, students have learned to laugh and love and serve in the name of Jesus. In this space students have opened dark corners of their hearts and minds, revealing deep hurts and heavy burdens that they can no longer bear alone. In this space, many tears have been shed. In this space, much laughter has been shared. In this space...

Goodbyes are hard.

Goodbyes are hard not because of leaving a space as much as because of the people we have met along our journeys. I will have another office, but it will not be this one. I will probably one day have another dog, but it will not be Shiloh. However, as I say goodbye I take with me wonderful memories of him and of the many students and alumni that I will carry with me forever. Perhaps - I hope - I have helped some of the folks who have entered this space over the years. But part of what makes the goodbyes so hard is that I know I am not the same since coming here. I have changed, grown. All of the faces, all of the people who have passed through this office door have left an indelible mark on me. Each one has helped me become the man that I am today. I leave this place a different person than I was when I arrived in 2000. This office, this space, holds all of those stories, all of those experiences. Each trinket on the bookshelves and walls prompts remembrance of those people and those stories. Without this space will I be able to remember all who have been here, all who have touched my soul? I smile as I look around and remember each one. I savor the memories while I recall many of the conversations, the lightbulb moments, the boxes of tissues emptied, the many hugs.

Today I will leave this space tearful, yes, but full of joy and anticipation for the relationships I will make in my next stop.

So it's time. I'm going to put on some good music, a soundtrack perhaps, the strains of which will narrate my packing - and my remembering:

"I've heard it said, that people come into our lives for a reason, bringing something we must learn. And we are led to those who help us most to grow if we let them. And we help them in return. Well, I don't know if I believe that's true but I know I'm who I am today because I knew you."

"Because I knew you, I have been changed for good."*

So with a heart full of joy, with tears leaking down my face, I say goodbye to this place and to all of the incredible people I have met here. It's been quite a ride. Please keep in touch.

*From Wicked 

Walking in Memphis

This week I am in Memphis on a mission trip with five students from the University of Georgia (three seniors, one junior and one recent graduate). We arrived in the city late Saturday afternoon. After an evening of settling in and a Sunday of worship, orientation and prayer-driving areas we will work in, we are ready this Monday morning to start work. Late last night the students decided we needed to trek across the river to Waffle House. So at 11pm we piled into the van to drive to Arkansas - only 8 miles away. Someone qued a playlist and cranked the volume. Soon “Walking in Memphis” was blaring through the speakers with everyone singing along. 

Memphis means “enduring and beautiful” in ancient Greek. As we drove through the city yesterday - and again in the wee hours of this morning - I must admit I didn’t see much beauty except when we traveled the more wealthy parts of the city. As the leader of this journey I was thinking about issues of safety and, honesty, just wanted to pass quickly through the rougher parts of town. 

This week our devotionals and evening conversations emerge from Paul’s love-letter to the Philippians. Paul longed to return to this small community and the church he started there. He confessed that he thanked God for them every time he thought about that community. Paul traveled his world seeing it as he thought God did. He didn’t avoid the bad parts of town, but sought to tell everyone he encountered about the Love and grace of God found in Christ. He had learned to see with God’s eyes, learned to see every place and every person as a Memphis, enduring and beautiful. 

In my personal devotion this morning I was reminded that often my initial thoughts are not the best ones. While safety is important on such trips, as the leader of this endeavor perhaps I need to be focused more on those to whom we have come to minister - whether the homeless man shuffling by asking for a cup of coffee in the early dawn light or the refugee kids we will be working with at their apartment complex Thursday afternoon. My prayer for this week (and most days) is "Lord, give us your eyes, your hands, your feet":

“Lord, help us examine ourselves and see if we are willing to give all for you. Search our hearts and convict us where there is still fear, self-preoccupation, and lack of trust. Amen. 

May the peace of the Lord Christ go with you : wherever he may send you; may he guide you through the wilderness : protect you through the storm; may he bring you home rejoicing : at the wonders he has shown you; may he bring you home rejoicing : once again into our doors.” (From Common Prayer, by Claiborne, Wilson-Hargrove, and Okoro)