JOURNEY OF FAITH
PROLOGUE
For those of you who were here for my Statement of Faith, I like prologues. When I have mentally prepared my Journey of Faith, I often begin at an early college age as this was when I came back to church as you will hear about shortly. The more and more I thought about it, however, I realized that this wasn’t a fair assessment. While I quit going to church for 4-5 years, mainly during high school, part of what brought me back was that foundation that was built early on. I think where it really struck me was when we had all of those discussions on Whole Community Worship. I thought back to those early years when I learned The Lords Prayer, Apostles Creed, the Beatitudes, various Psalms. I remembered those times in Sunday School and in church and realized, this was the foundation that my faith was built on. While I left the church for a while, this was a major reason that I came back. And it’s probably helped me a lot throughout the years as my journey has not always been the smoothest. That being said,
MY JOURNEY OF FAITH
There are so many moments or periods of time in everyone’s life that shapes who they are. As I searched and thought about what has shaped my life and my journey of faith, I came across four “snapshots” from my life that were those forks in the road that Jim Clay so eloquently talked about last month. I believe that thanks to taking the right road when faced with each of these forks has made all of the difference in my life.
Alcohol, drugs and rock and roll. In many ways, that sums up my high school years. That’s probably the biggest reason that I am scared to death for my children to hit this stage of life. There are so many times that I should have been dead or seriously hurt, but for the most part, I escaped anything too serious. Do you know what it’s like to wake up in bed and have absolutely no idea how you got there? I can assure you, it’s pretty scary. I often think about the story Sandy has told in one or two of his sermons where at the end the gentleman attributed a huge moment in his life to luck. I don’t think so.
As unlikely as my journey could begin, it began under the influence of a substance that is unimportant at the moment out with some friends playing pickup basketball. One of the guys playing was Don Dougherty. Don was one of the extremely cool guys of the time. He had long hair, was confidently quiet, was big, and was well-liked by the girls. He also had always been a partier. But Don had a new girl friend, from a different school, who went to church. So Don had quit partying and was going to church. Of course, we figured that this change in Don was all attributable to a female. They can often be bad influences on males. After playing basketball for a while, we were sitting around talking. Somehow, various questions were directed Don’s way. What was going on with him? He had changed so much. Much to our surprise, it wasn’t just a girl thing, he talked very seriously about Jesus Christ and how accepting Jesus had changed his life. I’m not quite sure why or how this hit me so much. Maybe it was because I was so lost at the time. Maybe it was because it was coming from Don. In any event, when I went home that evening, I told my mother I was going to go to church with her the next week. This made my mother ecstatic as she was always the one responsible for getting all of us to church, and my older brothers had quit going long ago. I was pretty much the last hope, and until now, a lost cause.
The next Sunday, I went to church. It was Westminster Presbyterian Church in Butler, Pa. The head pastor was Stuart Perrin and the associate pastor was his son, Daniel Perrin. These gentlemen were rock solid in their faith, I would come to discover later, and they really had a profound effect on me. The sermon that morning was “The Amazing Grace of God” and was geared around the writing of the song. I had returned to church at that point, and have never looked back since. But not to mislead anyone, it wasn’t a solid upward line from that point headed in the direction of the kingdom of God. It was an extremely jagged line, with many ups, but also some downs along the way.
A difficult moment for me and all of our family came when my brother Bill committed suicide. There are probably not many days that go by where I don’t think about it. Last week, I was in Sandy’s office, and he mentioned Ann Hardwick. His comment was that there was absolutely no clue that she was going to commit suicide. In my brother’s case, we all knew. He had pretty much pre-ordained this for himself at an early age. He had a fascination with suicide, finding it to be a heroic means to an end. Do you know what it’s like to helplessly watch and know someone you love is going to do something like this, but have absolutely no idea of how to stop it, change the course of life? We all sat by, knowing it was inevitable, but having no idea how to stop it. While this has been one of the most painful, if not the most painful, episodes in my life, it has made me stronger in my faith and my desire to live and to cherish life. In many ways, I probably suffer in the same respects that my brother did, but as I sorted through his death and my own faith journey, I realized that this was not the answer. I had been given a life, a wonderful life, and I had to fight to always remember that.
Probably the biggest downward curve was when Laurel and I experienced some marital difficulties several years ago. I had come to the conclusion that our marriage was not fulfilling. We went through marriage counseling, but ultimately, I chose to leave. I piled all of my clothes and belongings in our van, and set out looking for a new life. I ended up staying at friends’ homes, moving from place to place, being a vagabond of sorts. I slept on pull-out sofas, on floors, in guest bedrooms. I remembering waking up at one friend’s home and trying to figure out where I was, I had moved around so much. I also remember looking in the mirror the one morning and really not recognizing who was looking back at me. I stared and stared and really couldn’t recognize who was looking back. It was the strangest feeling.
This all happened during the midst of the end of the Lowry era here. At that point, I had no one to turn to at the church. I was out there on my own. And I was lost. Probably the only thing that saved me, or us, was the time I had to think and to try to figure out what was important in our lives. I remember sitting in the basement of one of my friend’s homes listening over and over again to “Hymns to the Silence” by Van Morrison. I remember driving from Cincinnati everyday for a while from one friend’s home, thinking and thinking about what was happening. I remember sitting in my apartment, with no furniture, except for a bed, trying to figure out where my life was headed. Ultimately, I went back. I learned a lot during this time. I learned that my wife was a lot stronger than I was. I learned that while Laurel could forgive me, I really couldn’t forgive myself. I learned that I really needed my church family, but unfortunately my church family was going through a troubling time also, and really couldn’t help me.
Eventually, that changed too. As our family and I changed and grew, Westminster grew along with it. A few years ago, we had the choice to leave Dayton and go to Georgia or stay here. Ultimately we decided to leave. I remember right after making that decision, Tom Preisser approaching me in the Narthex and saying what a wonderful church this was to raise your children in and how important that was these days. He didn’t know we were leaving, and I didn’t have the heart to tell him. We left and joined a large and active church in Marietta, Ga. I still remember when we asked the kids if they wanted to join First Church, Kelly saying, “I want to go to Westminster”. I said that I did too, but that wasn’t an option. I still remember sitting in church and feeling guilty, like I shouldn’t be there. It never felt like home.
Once when I was traveling to Dayton from Georgia, I came to a service here, which I believe was Kay’s ordination service. It was a special day in the life of the church, and the pastoral staff was at full strength after many years of interims. While I was happy for all of you, I was saddened by the fact that we would not be a part of a very exciting future. When the opportunity arose to come back to Dayton, we said yes. Probably one of the biggest reasons was this church. The one factor that we had failed to put enough weight on in our move was how important our church family had become to us. When people would ask us why we preferred Dayton, do you have family there? We’d answer no, but then, really we did. We had grown as a couple in this church, our children were born and baptized here, had grown up here. We had been through the difficult times, and we had experienced the good times. This was our home. We couldn’t wait to get back here. And for each special service we were able to experience again, Maundy Thursday, Easter Sunday, Heritage Sunday, Youth Sunday or those special moments like the kick-off of a new Christian Education year, we rejoice.
Four snapshots, four roads, four forks, four choices. God, life, family, church. With a great deal of help from God, I think I have made the right decisions, and that has made all the difference in the world.
PROLOGUE
For those of you who were here for my Statement of Faith, I like prologues. When I have mentally prepared my Journey of Faith, I often begin at an early college age as this was when I came back to church as you will hear about shortly. The more and more I thought about it, however, I realized that this wasn’t a fair assessment. While I quit going to church for 4-5 years, mainly during high school, part of what brought me back was that foundation that was built early on. I think where it really struck me was when we had all of those discussions on Whole Community Worship. I thought back to those early years when I learned The Lords Prayer, Apostles Creed, the Beatitudes, various Psalms. I remembered those times in Sunday School and in church and realized, this was the foundation that my faith was built on. While I left the church for a while, this was a major reason that I came back. And it’s probably helped me a lot throughout the years as my journey has not always been the smoothest. That being said,
MY JOURNEY OF FAITH
There are so many moments or periods of time in everyone’s life that shapes who they are. As I searched and thought about what has shaped my life and my journey of faith, I came across four “snapshots” from my life that were those forks in the road that Jim Clay so eloquently talked about last month. I believe that thanks to taking the right road when faced with each of these forks has made all of the difference in my life.
Alcohol, drugs and rock and roll. In many ways, that sums up my high school years. That’s probably the biggest reason that I am scared to death for my children to hit this stage of life. There are so many times that I should have been dead or seriously hurt, but for the most part, I escaped anything too serious. Do you know what it’s like to wake up in bed and have absolutely no idea how you got there? I can assure you, it’s pretty scary. I often think about the story Sandy has told in one or two of his sermons where at the end the gentleman attributed a huge moment in his life to luck. I don’t think so.
As unlikely as my journey could begin, it began under the influence of a substance that is unimportant at the moment out with some friends playing pickup basketball. One of the guys playing was Don Dougherty. Don was one of the extremely cool guys of the time. He had long hair, was confidently quiet, was big, and was well-liked by the girls. He also had always been a partier. But Don had a new girl friend, from a different school, who went to church. So Don had quit partying and was going to church. Of course, we figured that this change in Don was all attributable to a female. They can often be bad influences on males. After playing basketball for a while, we were sitting around talking. Somehow, various questions were directed Don’s way. What was going on with him? He had changed so much. Much to our surprise, it wasn’t just a girl thing, he talked very seriously about Jesus Christ and how accepting Jesus had changed his life. I’m not quite sure why or how this hit me so much. Maybe it was because I was so lost at the time. Maybe it was because it was coming from Don. In any event, when I went home that evening, I told my mother I was going to go to church with her the next week. This made my mother ecstatic as she was always the one responsible for getting all of us to church, and my older brothers had quit going long ago. I was pretty much the last hope, and until now, a lost cause.
The next Sunday, I went to church. It was Westminster Presbyterian Church in Butler, Pa. The head pastor was Stuart Perrin and the associate pastor was his son, Daniel Perrin. These gentlemen were rock solid in their faith, I would come to discover later, and they really had a profound effect on me. The sermon that morning was “The Amazing Grace of God” and was geared around the writing of the song. I had returned to church at that point, and have never looked back since. But not to mislead anyone, it wasn’t a solid upward line from that point headed in the direction of the kingdom of God. It was an extremely jagged line, with many ups, but also some downs along the way.
A difficult moment for me and all of our family came when my brother Bill committed suicide. There are probably not many days that go by where I don’t think about it. Last week, I was in Sandy’s office, and he mentioned Ann Hardwick. His comment was that there was absolutely no clue that she was going to commit suicide. In my brother’s case, we all knew. He had pretty much pre-ordained this for himself at an early age. He had a fascination with suicide, finding it to be a heroic means to an end. Do you know what it’s like to helplessly watch and know someone you love is going to do something like this, but have absolutely no idea of how to stop it, change the course of life? We all sat by, knowing it was inevitable, but having no idea how to stop it. While this has been one of the most painful, if not the most painful, episodes in my life, it has made me stronger in my faith and my desire to live and to cherish life. In many ways, I probably suffer in the same respects that my brother did, but as I sorted through his death and my own faith journey, I realized that this was not the answer. I had been given a life, a wonderful life, and I had to fight to always remember that.
Probably the biggest downward curve was when Laurel and I experienced some marital difficulties several years ago. I had come to the conclusion that our marriage was not fulfilling. We went through marriage counseling, but ultimately, I chose to leave. I piled all of my clothes and belongings in our van, and set out looking for a new life. I ended up staying at friends’ homes, moving from place to place, being a vagabond of sorts. I slept on pull-out sofas, on floors, in guest bedrooms. I remembering waking up at one friend’s home and trying to figure out where I was, I had moved around so much. I also remember looking in the mirror the one morning and really not recognizing who was looking back at me. I stared and stared and really couldn’t recognize who was looking back. It was the strangest feeling.
This all happened during the midst of the end of the Lowry era here. At that point, I had no one to turn to at the church. I was out there on my own. And I was lost. Probably the only thing that saved me, or us, was the time I had to think and to try to figure out what was important in our lives. I remember sitting in the basement of one of my friend’s homes listening over and over again to “Hymns to the Silence” by Van Morrison. I remember driving from Cincinnati everyday for a while from one friend’s home, thinking and thinking about what was happening. I remember sitting in my apartment, with no furniture, except for a bed, trying to figure out where my life was headed. Ultimately, I went back. I learned a lot during this time. I learned that my wife was a lot stronger than I was. I learned that while Laurel could forgive me, I really couldn’t forgive myself. I learned that I really needed my church family, but unfortunately my church family was going through a troubling time also, and really couldn’t help me.
Eventually, that changed too. As our family and I changed and grew, Westminster grew along with it. A few years ago, we had the choice to leave Dayton and go to Georgia or stay here. Ultimately we decided to leave. I remember right after making that decision, Tom Preisser approaching me in the Narthex and saying what a wonderful church this was to raise your children in and how important that was these days. He didn’t know we were leaving, and I didn’t have the heart to tell him. We left and joined a large and active church in Marietta, Ga. I still remember when we asked the kids if they wanted to join First Church, Kelly saying, “I want to go to Westminster”. I said that I did too, but that wasn’t an option. I still remember sitting in church and feeling guilty, like I shouldn’t be there. It never felt like home.
Once when I was traveling to Dayton from Georgia, I came to a service here, which I believe was Kay’s ordination service. It was a special day in the life of the church, and the pastoral staff was at full strength after many years of interims. While I was happy for all of you, I was saddened by the fact that we would not be a part of a very exciting future. When the opportunity arose to come back to Dayton, we said yes. Probably one of the biggest reasons was this church. The one factor that we had failed to put enough weight on in our move was how important our church family had become to us. When people would ask us why we preferred Dayton, do you have family there? We’d answer no, but then, really we did. We had grown as a couple in this church, our children were born and baptized here, had grown up here. We had been through the difficult times, and we had experienced the good times. This was our home. We couldn’t wait to get back here. And for each special service we were able to experience again, Maundy Thursday, Easter Sunday, Heritage Sunday, Youth Sunday or those special moments like the kick-off of a new Christian Education year, we rejoice.
Four snapshots, four roads, four forks, four choices. God, life, family, church. With a great deal of help from God, I think I have made the right decisions, and that has made all the difference in the world.
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