A Journey Ending

In the summer of 2001, we moved to Louisville so that Wes could attend The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. It's been many years of being challenged spiritually to grow and learn. At the same time, it felt like a never ending journey...one that seemed to go on year after year. And while we loved the seminary and Wes so enjoyed sitting under the teachings of such Godly men, we were feeling restless. Part of it was me ready to get back to school myself, and part of it was Wes ready to be done with school, period. Southern is known for academically challenging work, and the Masters of Divinity program, which Wes is in, is roughly 90 hours...compared to a roughly 30 hour program a typical school offers for a master's. It's not uncommon to hear laughter when a first year student comes in wearing rose colored glasses saying that he plans to finish school in 3 years. All in good fun, of course, but there's also a sense of "yeah, that's what we said too."

It had been a while since I had attended the seminary's chapel service. I had regularly attended when we still lived on campus, but since we've lived off campus, it's made it difficult to get over there. Wes works on Tuesdays and Thursdays (chapel days), and I wasn't going to walk during the winter and I needed to save my bus money for getting to work. But today was perfect. I had the day off, the weather was warm and beautiful, so I got up, got ready, and walked to chapel. I spotted some friends from church who are also seminary students and sat with them. There was such an awesome feeling of familiarity as we sang and worshiped our Lord. How I love going to the chapel service!! So while we were singing, I thought to myself, "I need to check my work schedule next week and try to come on over again." Then Dr. Mohler, the seminary president, announced it was the last service of the semester. I was stunned. I mean, I wasn't stunned that it was the last service of the semester...it's April 24th! But what stunned me was the date itself...it's April 24th!!

Wes graduates in 3 weeks. How the heck did time go by so quickly? After years of wondering whether we'd ever see a light at the end of the tunnel, we are now just about out of the tunnel and I'm sitting here thinking, "wait!" Don't get me wrong, I'm really excited about our upcoming move. But for the last 7 years, the seminary has been our home. How odd to think that we'll rarely see it any more after Wes graduates.

It blessed me to sit through chapel service and to be a part of it again. It saddened me to know it was the last one I'd be at and saddened me even more that Wes couldn't be there with me. After chapel, I walked to the cafeteria to grab some lunch. Wes and I used to eat there often when we still lived on campus...and some of my favorite moments were when I had class and would head over for an occasional early morning breakfast. After lunch, I walk to the seminary lawn and sat with my shoes off, enjoying the day and the sights. Soon after, I got up and walked back home.

I am not who I was 7 years ago when we began this journey...I barely recognize that person. And for that matter, Wes isn't the same person either. Being at the seminary has helped us grow as individuals, as a couple, and as followers of Christ. And while I spent a good amount of time telling Wes how nice and warm Florida is compared to Louisville throughout our 7 years, I really wouldn't have traded our time here. We love this seminary. Like a parent raises their child to one day say "go, it's now time to be an adult," so the seminary is now telling us "go, it's time to carry on your ministry." And funny how like I child I am, after so many years of saying "I can't wait to go," that I'm now clinging on and crying "but I'm not ready! We're just kids!!" But we're not kids, are we? Of course not. People always talk about the "real world" and how hard it is...sometimes it feels like that plus a hundred fold when it comes to the ministry's "real world." Fellow ministers and their families surely understand. So on one hand, I feel wide eyed and hopeful for the future. On the other hand, I'm like a scared kid asking "what now?" It's a weird feeling. But it's time. It's time to go in the confidence that God has laid out the path for us.

Seven years. I feel so blessed that God chose us to be a part of this incredible journey.

Alumni Chapel, SBTS

What time is it?

I'm currently reading Terri Irwin's book called "Steve and Me: Life with the Crocodile Hunter." It's such a bittersweet book, reading about all these happy and lovely memories, but knowing ultimately how it's going to end. One part caught my attention in specific...when Terri and the kids were in Tasmania and Bindi had purchased a new watch. Out of nowhere, Bindi looks down at her watch and says "it's twelve o'clock." They all stopped to consider that it was twelve o'clock and moved on. Soon after, Terri received the news that Steve was killed...and time of death had been twelve o'clock, the moment Bindi looked at her watch and called out the time. Earlier in the book, it was mentioned how Steve had fallen off a piece of machinery as though something knocked him off...it happened to be the very moment when his mother was killed in a car accident.

I thought back to the day my grandfather passed away. How we received the phone call from one of my aunts around 4:30am telling me his breathing had changed and we needed to get out there. We got up, got ready (and I grabbed extra clothes so I could stay with my family a few days), and headed out. Being that the drive was around 45 minutes to an hour, we had to stop at a gas station since we were low. I was feeling quite panicked, and found it difficult to even breathe. While Wes was pumping gas, I looked at the clock...5:15am. All of a sudden a wave of sadness came over me. The panic was gone, I could breathe normally again, but I was overwhelmed with sadness. We finally arrived at the house around 6am or so and my mom came outside to meet me. She told me he died at about 5:15am.

And even though I never knew this man personally, I can recall all the details going on when I learned of Steve Irwin's death. It was late and I was tired and was ready to go to bed. Wes was already asleep and all the lights were off and I was on the computer wrapping up. I was about ready to shut down the computer when I just felt an urge to stay online for another hour. Being that it was already around 12:30am, there wasn't exactly a lot happening in the online world so it made no sense for me to think that I needed to stay up that extra time. But the urge remained so I played around on Yahoo games for awhile, bored out of my mind and wanting so bad to go to sleep. Approximately an hour later, I got off the games, refreshed my home page and a picture of Steve Irwin appeared with a blaring headline that read "Crocodile Hunter feared dead." A few minutes later, another headline appeared confirming that it was, in fact, Steve Irwin who died. While he had passed away over a day prior to the headline appearing, we were just receiving word of it in the States. I remember covering my mouth so I wouldn't wake up Wes with my sobs. But it brought me right back to when I was sitting at a gas station, looking at a clock that read 5:15am.

It's a bit eerie, isn't it? To have a moments in which you don't know why you're noticing something or feeling something, but you just notice it or feel it. But sometimes I wonder if this is God preparing us for moments that we need to be ready for. Moments that can rock our world, moments that seem to suspend reality for us...is God cluing us in to what's ahead? And don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about some psychic ability. That would be absurd to peg me as that kind of believer. But I am not ruling out the possibility that God can and some times does do things that are clues to what we need to be ready for...particularly if it's something that will deeply affect us.

I had no appetite when my grandfather died. We all went out to eat that day as a big family and I couldn't finish even half of my meal. I remember a comment being made to me that I should eat since someone else was paying for me. But I just couldn't get the food down...otherwise it would come right back up. I could barely sleep for days and when I did sleep, I had dreams that haunted me. Though I never knew Steve Irwin, I cried for days on end after his death...being that what he did was something I felt so deeply about. I'm sure many of those tears were also from unresolved grief over my grandfather. However in the midst of both of those situations, and others, I was comforted by the knowledge that somehow, at particular times, I had been prepared. I was prepared for a storm I was about to face. I won't sit here and pretend that my sadness over Steve Irwin is matched with that of the rest of the Irwin family. Hardly. But I bring it up because of my own experiences of noticing the time of things...and seeing how others have experienced it as well when it was mentioned that Bindi took notice of the time.

Do I believe that God will always give me some divine revelation prior to an event or right at the moment of an event when I haven't yet learned of it? No. But I do believe there are times when God gives us a sign in order to prepare our hearts...as if He were saying "there's something you need to know...here's a small insight." And not that I believe there's something going to happen every moment that I want to know what time it is...but I've also learned to not ignore something God is very clearly putting in front of me.

Photo of tv preview by Mary King (me)