Small Group

To me, there are three things we all should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. Number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special. - excerpt from Jim Valvano's final speech at the Espy Awards.

Since the mid to late 90's, I've been a member of a "small group" at my former church in Dayton, Ohio. There have been 10 of us who have gotten together on Saturdays, evenings, mornings for breakfast, for retreats, for baseball games, for over 10 years. I've been the "spottiest" member, since I moved to Georgia in the late 90's and now again in 2006. Dave Carr recently moved away also, to North Carolina, so now the local group is down to eight. We are a mixed bag, a cross section of people, some politically liberal, some conservative, some middle of the road. Our religious views are probably similar, some liberal, some conservative, some middle of the road. Some are married, some divorced, some currently in relationships, some not. We are somewhat similar in age, I think I'm the youngest at 49, not even sure who the oldest is, it really doesn't matter. What brings us together is our love of God, our search for answers in life, our need and desire for fellowship and community, and our love and support of each other. With our diversity and differing views, we have some great discussions and debates, we often trail off into so many tangents we have no idea where we started, but in the end, we enjoy the time and fellowship together. We have done book reviews and discussions, but we typically can't stay on task. We did "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" to start, and we quit about halfway through. We did "Tuesday's with Morrie", and all of us liked it (except Jim Clay of course). We tried various others, but in the end, we would digress into whatever philosophical discussion surfaced that day.

Last weekend, Dave Carr planned a retreat to Lake Lure in North Carolina. We were able to get eight of us committed to go, which is amazing considering everyone's busy schedules. The last couple days before the trip, three had to back out due to illness, and some serious illness with loved ones (Sadly, Tom Wilson's mother died shortly thereafter). So, it was down to five of us. We all got there late afternoon or so on Friday, and had the opportunity to share. We shared so much. There may be some things we don't tell each other, but it really can't be much. We open up, we share our dreams, our hopes, our fears. We talked about our loves, our wives, our children, we talked about dying, we talked about our walk with God. We talked about politics, we talked about health care reform, we talked about jobs, church, church politics. We laughed, we cried, we thought a lot. We took a nice long walk in the mountain area, it was incredible there. We locked ourselves out of the cabin and tried everyway possible to find a way in. John Ey miraculously got a locked door open after three of us had tried the door, he will forever be immortalized for that. Nike Nihiser cooked us some great meals, and we ate at a local restaurant on Lake Lure.

When it came time to leave on Sunday, we hugged and had to move on and get back to our real lives. Even though we leave each other, we still correspond, we still talk, we still share. I'm still on a high from that weekend. That is probably one of the biggest things I miss in my life right now. I think it's hard for men to make friends to have someone to share with and talk to about their lives, their hopes, their fears. In a sense, I still have that since I can talk to my Small Group or e-mail with them, but you miss something having that regular discussion.

Like with anything else, you can mourn the loss of not having something you used to have, or cherish what you did have and what you can still make of it. The high I have from that weekend to me represents a celebration of what we had and still have. So few people, especially so few men, have a relationship like this. We laughed, we cried, we thought a lot. We will continue to do that, even if distance, time, commitments make it harder. That's what a Small Group is all about.