Sitting in my comfy chair and reading in the morning. The snow sneaked in last night and the small step ladder outside the kitchen window shows six inches on the three steps. A sturdy little thing of aluminum that helps the reach to the kitchen roof with the snow rake. Just clean around the two vents and try to control the ice dams.
Musing on writing something and finding solace in a brief Tennyson quote: “Death closes all, but but something near the end, some work of noble note, my yet be done” 1.
It occurs to most of us, that what have we yet to do now that the curtain is getting close to coming down on the play? As most of us, I have worked hard and made a few good choices to be where I am now. The great dream of a beautiful wife, younger than I! Two great sons of intellect and achievements that love us and our 30 acre homestead.
We have all worked hard and with sweat and satisfaction through most of it. The gardens of provision and beauty, our mechanical shop of provision and repair, still usable now for us and friends. Tools that only need an occasional handle because we use them. Heating with wood and always splitting and stacking and calculating supply. I have gotten so fussy in the winter that I have a tape measure out there to make certain certain lengths are put in the wheelbarrow. Long, short and gnarly for day and night fires in the stove. It’s in the middle of the house.
All of the accomplishments great and small some of which are still visible. Some are tenuous and need conversation to reveal them to one another. Pictures on the stairway wall of births of the kids, a summer kitchen and a field all limned by a photo of Julie, very pregnant with our first son, Bjorn. Myself, just our of basic training taken by a pro in town with my cover just so, leaning to my right in my dress blues. I look happy and am looking to my right and smiling.
Another accomplishment that I just heard today from my son Soren’s good friend Zeke. I asked
him before a Saturday breakfast what he would call our home. He only paused for a few seconds and said; “Casa Del Pas” house of peace. A good handful of men come to join us at times. Good strong young men that are bonded with Soren and us. All of them live in the area but many times Julie and I awaken to extra boots in the entry.
Making sure the coffee maker is filled with water and the fire is properly set and banked is my job as I rise earlier. Breakfast on Saturday mornings with pancakes and eggs/bacon and good coffee after an hour or two. One bathroom and the ballet for it and the preparation for breakfast is done as the snow keeps coming. Pastor Zeke blesses the food and our meal is shared. House of peace indeed. “The author appears on the last act, the best of all”2 1 and 2 Lord Tennyson
It was just a memento, really. A friend had given me the coin, in honor of my service in the six day war, back in the middle sixties. (The story is in my column, Soaring.) It is a recollection of the times at sea when my ship was threatened by a Russian guided missile Frigate at night.
That young woman could buy a coffee in Jerusalem at a Cofix store or some noodles with the coin, but it meant more than that. It was a confirmation from a total stranger that Jesus holds her tight, and will always love her. Right here right now. It’s pretty good. Jack Gator.
The rescue came from ‘above’ with a tomcat fighter on our side of the war. Battle group stuff.No body died at that time but it was very terrifying nonetheless. For both ships and crews.
So, many decades later, that five shekel coin wound up on my dresser. Covered with dust many times and mostly forgotten with the usual dresser top debris. Pens, pencils, notes on small post it pads and a jewelry box with alligator pins, bow ties and very ancient and worthless cuff links. There even was an old hand-held ham radio transceiver up there with a nice whip antenna. Battery was dead. I found the charger and the battery works. Two meter rig, handier than a cell phone with 5 watts instead of 1/2 or less.
One day, a Sunday, I was getting ready to go to my volunteer position on a prayer team. Early in the morning as the church was about an hour and a quarter drive away. I grabbed a handful of quarters to buy an espresso and at the last moment put them aside on my desk and grabbed the 5 shekel coin and pocketed it. No reason really, just felt right in my left jean pocket. It belonged there that day.
On the somewhat dark morning drive there was a whisper in my spirit that I was to give the coin to the first person I met when I walked in the door. This is an interesting time of day to get into the church as it doesn’t open the doors until 8. I had left a message with a pastor that oversees the facility that I would be in early. I was being dropped off by my son who works at another campus of the Eagle Brook church nearby (Blaine) He is a director of the media department and has to come in early to set up the equipment and test the simulcast stuff. I was early at 7 and walked up to the big doors from the parking lot and it was pretty quiet. Lots of parking at that time!
When I reached the locked doors, a woman inside the second set of ‘airlock’ doors smiled, and came right up and opened the outside door and greeted me by name. Very pleasant considering there are over 800 staff people in the organization. Ten times that many volunteers. I dug into my left hand pocket and handed her the Israeli coin. I told her briefly why I did so. She widened her eyes and told me I did not know how much this meant to her. She is a missionary to Israel, is involved with these things and later, at an early gathering on the second floor, she gave it to a young woman that was going to Israel soon. Her plane had been canceled due to the new war.
This post was written several years ago. Since that time I have moved to the Blaine Campus and am an assistant director in production. I still slip down and join the prayer team if they have need. Dual chitizenship!
“Hey, introduce me” Thinking of all the prefixes quickly to describe the person standing next to you. Uncle, Aunt, child, spouse or parent are the usual choices. We are all faced with that a lot and the easiest one I have found is to say; “We both have the same best friend! That’s how Social situations are the usual place that question is put forth. A gathering. Anywhere really.
If asked we can expound on the situation but it often suffices to settle the polite inquiry. Conversation then can go deeper between the three people. It’s fun to find connections between us. Often it seems serendipitous when mutual discoveries are found.
Some people refer to this as “providential” but to me that sounds like an insurance company.
Many times I have used ‘Miracle’ for so-called chance encounters that are incredible and so complex with place/timing and circumstance, that I like to use the word miracle. Things happen that we can’t explain. I have had plenty of them and have given up on randomness to explain them.
I can tell you about some of the real interesting ones, I have already written of them. They are at my web site publication, ask me and I will give you the location. One of my favorites is the way I met Julie, my precious wife. A miracle, no doubt about it. Undeniable and funny too.
How about you? Do impossibly neat things happen to you that can’t be explained by the Brownian movement of randomness? It happens every day most days for all of us. I look ahead to it. I am willing to venture that is a common occurrence for you too.
Do you have a best friend? Most of us do and of course, as we get older, a lot of them die. Pass away is the polite term for that. My new friend that I share a relationship with as having the same best friend have that in common too. Our best friend died some time ago but is still in our hearts when we talk about Him. He lives on. Eternity is like that. Time can’t stop love nor destroy it.
Talk about miracles! Our mutual best friend didn’t stay dead! He still talks to us. It is very subtle sometimes when we hear from Him. We have to be quiet, real quiet and open in our spirit to Him. No cell phone or text needed. Just listen.
By now, you have figured who our mutual best friend is! The nice part is, He be yours too. He gets around a lot and spends time with many people. Of course, you can ignore Him but the nice part is, He doesn’t get mad when you do. He never forgets anyone and you can talk and listen anytime day or night. No long distance charges. Let me know who your best friend is and chances are, if you have read this to this point, It’s probably the same one as ours. It’s pretty good. Jack Gator Scribe
It was always gentle, the touch, almost as though the touch was a memory. At the first time I was surprised, astonished, and did not know who was touching me. I turned and did not know what to say. There was no one there but I knew I was to be never the same. Years upon years passed.
The story of the spoken words, five words with the touch. A healing touch and my life changed. Another five words decades later. A confirming and a beginning of knowledge and my life was now further to destiny. The fire within fanned into flame to show where the small fire had begun to glow.
I was running at the start, always running away from the pain that would not leave. All my life that pain and absence of love was the matrix of my heart. No one would ever get in again, it was too obvious that no one really cared. It was taken for truth that I was beyond all love. Trust was only a word about banking somehow or contracts for an exchange of some kind. I was abused as a child, running away only to find gangs and international smuggling with the usual weapons and anger. Run, they will torture you or kill you. Run and hide once again. Be wary and keep close watch on your heart.
There was a betrayal of an effort of love, love lost and cast away as a raft on the ocean far from land. No compass nor sextant nor even a chart to show what was ahead. Just adrift and always in the middle of the ocean once my land went beyond the horizon. No hope and only death to look ahead to. It was what I put away in a lock box in my heart, thinking out of sight, out of mind. That box was transparent. Most saw in it through my eyes. I knew it was safe in there.
So, adrift in the ocean of pity, I did not know what path I was on but I knew something was happening to me. Getting fed something good and drinking clear good water. No idea where these things were coming from. After all, adrift on an ocean does not include drinkable water. Even tears are salty.
Finally a meeting was available to see the one true love that betrayed me. She was in a bad way, in a hospital of recovery from her own trauma. Drugs used to dull the pain, like a path I also chose before five words began the small fire in my heart and saved me from a bad end. “Life or death, Choose now” Words spoken audibly in an empty room as I was staring at a line of heroin. Obviously life was chosen. The addiction was gone and there was no withdrawal. A miracle that took decades to see who said those five words. Our Lord Jesus. There was something ahead for my life, indeed there is.
Bluffing my way into the hospital as a youth minister working with her father who was the senior pastor at Central Lutheran, I managed to see my lost beloved before me. She was in a haze of recuperative drugs as she sat up on the bed in her room, clothed in hospital scrubs. Dazed, confused and finally focusing on the one she betrayed and had discarded the love we had. She had moved away with a Guthrie actor and hid her engagement ring. Now Right in this moment, I knew this time was different. Only the tenderness for her was in my heart. I again chose life.
She awakened and recognized me and asked; “Why are you here?” Without hesitation, I spoke the words of healing for her too. “Because I love you!” I Said loudly surprising them both and then I left soon thereafter.
I had showed her the wood camper I now lived in and had driven two thousand miles to see her. It was disappointingly impossible for us to see through the recessed windows of the locked area. The small fire in my heart was being fanned into flame. There were my habits still to overcome but the seed of love was beginning to grow within me and the marriage that came decades later to a wonderful woman was right and true. I never knew what happened to the girl I had loved in the hospital. Rumors from old friends then said she was now living in New Orleans.
I found her phone number and asked her to send me the engagement ring I gave her at Theodore Worth park just after discharge from the Navy in 1967. I had met her at the YMCA when I was playing guitar as a paid entertainer.
Sometimes the fear and trauma would return but my wife helped me and with a counselor that said those memories and fears of the past were just that. Eventually I realized there was no danger with betrayal, violence and guns of the past. A word or even a tone of voice was the trigger to be recognized as just a vapor of evil, trying once again to destroy my life with fear. It can happen to you.!
The burning one with fire in His eyes gives us the knowledge that we are, indeed, loved and worthy to tell others of this discovery within our hearts. My heart lock-box was opened and I have never been the same since. The flame of eternal love is burning bright with the Fire in the eyes of Christ. It’s pretty good.
There is a common feeling and conversational platitude. When asked where did you grow up, we usually respond with the name of a city or region of the world. Appearing to be clever or witty some of us will say “in a house” but where when the slight smile goes with the second question, the answer is a nice neighborhood. A sheen of ‘normality’ and wit to deflect focus from ourselves.
Some of us grew up in homes that were destroyed physically or internally. Our childhood is not just a growing up like a house plant. We are awake and like the potters clay, are formed into someone unique and beautiful as our creator meant us to be.
Our world is filled with people that grow like trees, all of us have a heritage of leaves and branches and roots that grab a hold. We are meant to grow near streams of living water and our roots then go deep and we grow strong. That image has been written about and sung.
Images of buck thorn also come to mind and the pain of touching one of those is not forgotten. What happened to creation and why was it there? We want to cut it down. I don’t like them and it seems they don’t like me either. It is then that judgment on many grow. I think of the superintend”of a dormitory that Anne of Green Gables lived at when she was in college. Anne described her as ‘prickly as a cactus” Katherine Brook. She was portrayed as that.
A potter can throw clay on the wheel and when it is fired and glazed it becomes a work of the hands. “The colors are off” A painting of beauty seen before the first brush stroke comes forth framed and a thorny one remarks that there is a smudge on the corner. Written poetry is put on paper and given to another. “Oh, I really like that image of the withered branch!” But a critic notices a spelling mistake or a missing comma. Love within trapped by our own thorns.
A tree that has weathered storms can be gnarly or even destroyed. The work of the potters hand can be broken and written poetry can turn to ashes. Chainsaws, anger and indifference are the tools wielded by the thorny ones. I use a chainsaw by the way, a small one to cut down prickly ash and buckthorn. No one likes those except Goats who eat them.
The question for me and you is, am I a buck thorn among the grove? Do I find fault instead of the poetry of creation? Do I listen and see the light? There are many things that can change us into grapevines that tear down the trees. We have our excuses, some dredged up by a therapist we did not know was an operating system in our hypothalamus! I was told I had 6 tenths of a second to differentiate between a threat or an old memory. It took a while to deal with that but it is possible.
A hand gesture like a pointed finger, a tone of voice spoken what seems harsh. Triggers that instantly made me run away, to get away. To leave that danger by the small boy that still lives inside. PTSD from experiences recent or long past. All the same fear and loss.
As children we are much more aware of our world than we know. We draw conclusions about our world, nurtured or abandoned. Abused or cuddled. Fully alive, taking it all in and processing to make sense of where we are and who we are.
I think of John the Baptist and Jesus in their mothers wombs. Joyful at meeting one another before they were born. Why is that in the Bible? Tender words, gentle voices that guide us. We know who is our mother. It feels so good and perfect when a very new person responds to our smile and soft words. “Be like children” good idea, the best advice given by the One who made us. Again, Anne of Green Gables, a kindred spirit like two tuning forks ringing together.
Just close your eyes and think what it will be like when Jesus opens His arms and smiles as He embraces us. In His presence, all fear is gone. Eternity, is calling me away, eternal song is calling me home. It’s still there in our spirit, the wish to be seen and wholly loved. It’s me, the prodigal son. I see my Father running towards me. My tears he holds in His heart and He cries them over me as we embrace. Eternities, eternal song, is calling me; calling me away, calling me home. It’s pretty good. Jack Gator Scribe
Sometime ago, in the last century, 1944, I was born in Minneapolis at Swedish Hospital. It was exactly two months after D Day in WWII. My parents were doing OK as they both worked and I was put in the care of my Grandparents. Out in a western suburb called Golden Valley. At that time, my father was working for the Minneapolis fire department, Station 16 in the near north side. My mother worked downtown for the Minneapolis school administration. Secure city jobs.
It worked for the family and besides, I had a sister that was four when I was born. She helped me grow up for five years. She always referred to me as her baby brother. It makes sense, it didn’t when I was in High school. Sis went to school for four years in a one room school, right on Golden Valley Road, a few miles away. No school buses then, they hadn’t been invented yet. There is no memory of how she got there. She cut across the Golden valley golf course. There were the usual stories of trudging through deep snow and cold to get to school and back. They were true.
Life out there in the valley was pretty bucolic, a big truck garden to joyfully weed by we kids. Dad and Grandpa smoked pipes and it wasn’t high quality Latakia tobacco either. Seemed an odd habit for firemen. Their nicknames at that time was smoke eaters. Scott air Pacs were not yet invented, Many times the phone would ring from the hospital telling us that Dad was in for smoke inhalation.
I had a neighbor friend, Freddy, and he lived right across the fence line at the southwest corner. I exploited Freddie’s friendship, I can remember him still with the super electric train set in his basement. it was an American Flyer with two rails instead of those Lionel trains with three. Hours we would spend down there. I also remember the electric smells of the small transformer that powered that train. Now and then there would be little sparks as the engine crossed a switch. I yearned for a model train for most of my childhood. As an old man, I wonder what or where he wound up. Freddie Hill. Do we all do this?
I never got Freddie to help weed the big garden but he did join us on the ‘rock boat’ But I never really knew him. Maybe that happens more often than we realize. It worked as he was just as bored as I was. No climbing trees, no forts, It wasn’t rural, it was very early suburban. Golden valley road and Winnetka Avenue. I think briefly of driving past that intersection. Nostalgia that is better left as is. Too many times all of us go back around to those places.
We did go fishing in Bassets creek though. It was right across the road from the big fancy Golden Valley golf course. The creek was fairly narrow but to us, it was a mysterious river. Adventure unknown. Bogart gets an early start in river life. Wind in the Willows with Rat and Toad. I had the impression for quite my life that I was Toad. Adventuresome, arrogant and oblivious to other people’s needs. I was always intrigued by motorcycles and vehicles that make noise. Just like Toad.
When I was barely a teenager, I had enough paper route money to buy a motorcycle! We put it in Grandpas garage he permitted me to ride it around his property. When they were on vacation, I crawled in that garage and took that Indian Chief out for a spin down highway 100. It was bright red and I sure wish I had it now! Toad gets a noisy machine!
I had to sell it of course, everyone in the neighborhood saw me riding it. I was allowed to buy a Cushman Eagle scooter soon after. A downgrade with two speeds and a large lawnmower engine. It would slip the clutch to make it sound like it had gears instead of V belts. I was so focused on self image and wanted to be just like those glossy ads in the magazines for Harley Davidson. The Harley flathead came later during my senior high school days.
In the creek down the hill, I got a hold of a fish that was so big, I couldn’t raise it from the water. No one else believed the story but I still remember it. Maybe it was a big Sturgeon! A nasty catfish or bullhead?
Looking back at it, I suddenly realize that it’s not the catching that is important. Its being a part of the fish and the water having business together. a. We just get to go along with for a brief time as they do business with us too. Lasting and poetic things they are. Catch the spirit and never release it for life.
That fish got away… Almost catch and release of a yet to come tradition. The Holy Spirit now resides in me decades later. I asked Him in and that’s pretty good. Once you are caught, there is no release. Just Joy and understanding are always with you.
The golf course was a good place to slip into (before the six foot chain link fencing) and golf balls abounded in the creek. Pretty good, easy money for myself and Sis. It was a water hazard and the golfers were very grateful for them. These days they would most be detained and arrested. Different times, in the last half of the twentieth century. Now a days children are forbidden to set foot there. Too much fear but then it results in isolation from fascinated children. A tall chain link fence goes all the way around, even in Basset’s creek! Golf ball concussions not available creek side.
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When I got old enough to go to the one room school with my sister, we had to move! It was because a neighbor took offense at them and turned my Dad in for being a city employee that did not live in the city.
Grandpa, a fire chief, had more seniority and was close to retirement, so he got to stay there. He was a cabinetmaker and also made stuff in his basement for the Shriner’s. I remember the huge scimitar with lights all around the perimeter that he made. They still use it for the Shrine Circus. They hang it from the top of the stage curtain. “That was made by my Grandfather!” It gave me bragging points when I would go to that circus in downtown Minneapolis.
Grandma was a tough old Norwegian that made the best deep fried doughnut holes on the planet. She loved her grandson and I loved her too. She was an orphan from the Superior orphan train, but I never did hear how she and Grandpa met. He was lonely and picked her up at the depot on the spot. A variation of Anne of Green Gables. A lot of family history is just gone. It was down in the Baldwin Wisconsin area that the two of them lived on the Punde farm.
So there in our new home, a stucco and brick house in North Minneapolis at 4208 Russell Avenue and it was time for me to go to kindergarten. It was only five blocks away so I walked. It was OK. Now I have bragging rights of walking through the snow to school.! We would always walk on top of the mounds of snow between the sidewalk and the curb. I enjoyed the time alone and got to eat my lunch at home alone with the TV on the linoleum counter. It was tuned to ‘Lunch with Casey’ A guy with a railroad engineer outfit and a sidekick named Roundhouse Rodney, our family was rich. We had two TV’s with rabbit ears too! A glass of milk, an Apple with a PBJ sandwich and a hostess twinkie for dessert looking up at the TV. A functioning Asperger child in his preferred element. I still like eating alone at times.
Often I would sneak into my sisters room and play Beethoven on the upright piano. She did not like me going in there alone. She really didn’t like me at all. After all, she had to raise me up and do all the baby stuff while mom was working when we lived in Golden Valley. (to be continued)
He was a farrier for many decades and was a very kind and thoughtful man. A recent day when the winter weather was changing to colder, he came by to visit. I had just stoked the wood stove and greeted him, took his weathered cowboy hat and he took off his boots.
We walked past the wood stove and sat as old friends do, and began to talk. We got right to the good stuff and began to learn more about each other than we had planned on. What a pleasure it was for both of us and he had to leave much too soon.
He was on a drive to visit friends across the border here in rural Wisconsin. Catching up and ministering to one and all. I asked him about his career as a blacksmith and I began to listen to his wisdom. He has shod horses all his life and he learned the right ways to do it.
He created the bond between himself and some horses that were known for bad behaviors. The rules were to be gentle, affirming and to help the horse in realizing that being a horse of strength and snorting power was not as good as being with him. Firmly he reassured the horse of his no nonsense ability and to teach the lesson of bonding with love and the feelings of being safe around him. I was reminded of Bob Smith, Secretariats trainer.
No nonsense and affirmative gentleness was the key. The horse of biting and snorting and kicking was soon seen as gently nuzzling him as the hoofs were trimmed and re-shooed. The firm and loving embrace is also the way we are gentled into our saviors embrace. Letting us know who our safe place is. He tied that horse up and pushed him over and after a while, came out to the pasture and sat on him. He loved on him quietly and then released the rope that tied his legs together. The horse was free again and knew who the safe place was.
As was I, so are you. Going our own way. Thundering and running away. Some where else.
The Lord can so many things with a heart that is open. He can do anything with a heart that is broken. Keep it open. 1.
How can we teach truth to a broken world? The essential part is listening. We all have an ache to be heard and be astounded by someone that is eager to hear us and our stories. We tie ourselves up in knots and ache for someone to love us and gently untie those bonds.
A pastor came to my kitchen table, only hours after he just missed his appointment with my mother who had died that morning. “I’ll come to you” I spoke about all the thousand religions and Buddha, Indian mystics and the like and he answered me: “We are not talking about them, we are talking about you. He pushed a book across the table to me. It was C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity. Not long afterward the Holy Spirit grabbed me and held me close and whispered to me: “It’s all true” I have never been the same. A firm, committed and loving embrace that told me I was loved and safe. Open up and receive, & have confidence in His love. It’s pretty good. Jack Gator scribe
It was a good friendship. An E4 and an O6. That’s a Petty Officer third class and a Captain. We were also neighbors. Myself and Pastor Russ. Neighbors that met riding bicycles on passable blacktop roads. Russ lived about a mile and a half away from me and once in a while, we would go for a ‘spin’. There was another huge difference between us as Russ was a category 2 racer and I just liked to ride. Cat 2 is pretty professional and impressive. He was a very good rider to be with. I learned a lot.
One remarkable day, Russ was riding alone and met a very pretty and friendly bicycle rider. She was riding nearby and as Russ was married to Debra and a pastor, he was safe to ride with.
Not long afterwards, Russ mentioned to me about this woman. “She runs a lakeside camp nearby, it’s called Whispering Pines. Pretty good cyclist too!” Myself as a lonely bachelor, was intrigued. I knew where the camp was and began thinking about Russ’s new friend. Just by coincidence a real woman cyclist that lived nearby and with a job! Obviously fit and friendly. Russ said she was pretty too. I considered calling the camp. Why not?
Meanwhile, that cyclist, Julie, was out in Washington state at a conference. She was at a local bar near the Canadian border and the bartender, Margaret, was gregarious and asked Julie where she was from. She told her where the she was from and the bartender, casually wiping down the bar said, “where in Trade Lake do you live?” “What! No one knows that dinky little township!” Margaret replied, “My grandparents lived in Trade Lake” They had a few things to talk about then.
Margaret, incredibly enough, was an old friend of mine and gave Julie my phone number. Julie put it in her wallet and when she returned to Wisconsin and the camp, tossed that piece of paper into a drawer in her office. A Junk drawer holding device to eventually have some of it’s contents put into a round holding device standing on the floor nearby.
On a particularly perfect day for cycling, I decided to call the camp and asked for the director. I gave her my name and mentioned my friend Russ. I also told her that Russ and I rode a lot together and asked if Julie would like to ride sometime. “It’s that Guy! The friend of that bartender way out west!” Julie consulted the head cook, Cora who was her trusted friend if it would be OK to go ride with me. “why not? Sounds safe, a pastors friend” she replied
So Julie told me OK, and being mostly clueless but aware that neutral territory was not at her place nor mine, I suggested we ride our bicycles towards one another on county road M and we meet that way. I saw Julie coming towards me, uphill and riding strong. I waited for her, watching her technique. Pretty good climber.
We did a short 50 mile ride and I asked her out to eat afterwards. Little Mexico, a great local restaurant with homemade guacamole and chips, they had good Mexican beer too. Cora said: “why not?” And so we went. This time I drove my car, a Volvo wagon with a bike rack on the roof of course.
That wise cook had some chocolate cake for our dessert when we returned. After many enjoyable rides later, some of them with pastor Russ, it began to be clear that this whole thing was a coincidence of extraordinary circumstances.
Sometime later when my old friend, Margaret, the bartender, got in touch, I told her the delightful bicycle romance story and then she added one more fact. The exact place on County road M where Julie and I met, was right at the driveway where Margaret’s Grandparent’s had lived. As this story has been told many times, I always say; “It was a miracle, God’s handiwork”.
Julie continued managing the camp until another director was chosen for the job. She moved in to my farm and we played house for a time. We also began working at 7 pines lodge nearby in Lewis. Fresh caught brook trout and fried carrots was the main menu. It was also the only thing on the menu.
The manager was a good fly fisherman and had us, the waiters, put on mystery dinners. All the guests became suspects in the mystery murder and myself and Julie played the hosts of the hotel where the murder was. The manager did not take part in the play as he was busy in the kitchen.
Out of the blue at home, Julie and I proposed and it seemed to make a lot of sense to us. ‘Shacking up’ later on when I became baptized, we realized living in sin was also a description. It seemed good and right. I did get the wedding ring made from my Grandmothers ring. Proposing was an equal opportunity proposition. It worked for us. Still does. More perfect timing. We were married at 7 pines lodge and the wedding was a fabulous affair. The square dance band that I played in (Duck for the Oyster} came to help with the music as well as Bill Hinkley and Judy Larson and Mary Dushane from the Powder milk Biscuit Band. Myself and three fiddlers stood in a circle around my beautiful bride and we played a Swedish waltz, Helsa Hem Dar Hemma.
A Real log lodge with a stream house that straddled the trout stream, that was where we spent our wedding night. The running water made bathroom breaks occur often. It was glorious and one of those memories that is permanently set within us. The dance was at the West Denmark church hall and we still have a photograph of Julie’s dad strutting down the middle of the Virginia Reel dance. More food and leftover wedding cake.
My mom drove up in her Buick convertible to attend our wedding. She almost left in the beginning of the ceremony saying that her dog needed her at home. She stayed with some gentle urging from a good friend of ours. It was obvious that something was going on with mom. Dementia. Her dad had the same issue and died not long afterwards of the onset. Mom was still living in her third home in Bryn Mawr Minneapolis.
After a few years went by and our two children were growing and our farmhouse was rebuilt to double it’s original size. (right before Bjorn, their first born arrived) My Mom agreed to help finance the huge mound system that was needed for the ‘upgrade’ to our home. Bedrooms for the kids after all.
My mother was fading and I drove down at least every week to help her out. Managing the bills and looking after things. Not too long afterwards, about a year, we moved Mom up to our area into a nursing home. Julie had an old pastor friend, Barry, agree to come up to talk to my Mom. however, she died that night and he came up anyway and spent hours with me at the kitchen table. “Mere Christianity” was referred to a lot and I brought up other religions, Buddhism, Islam and my early family attendance at a Christian Science church in Minneapolis. “What about you? What do you think about all this, we are talking about you” It was a very important Question. This was serious and I had a lot think about. Barry slid the C.S. Lewis book across the table and it made sense the more I read it. Still do.
Barry’s church, a Congregational one, agreed to do mom’s funeral with a meal and even light a candle every Sunday for a week or two. No charge. Character in a great man of faith. We began attending as we both were becoming closer to being Christians. Julie already was one, I was still wary.
Soon thereafter, I had a life changing experience at Russ’ church (Russ was in the Navy as a chaplain then and there was a new pastor) . A Christmas cantata was offered and I reluctantly said I would go. Of course, Bjorn and Soren, our sons, were in Jammies, and went up on the choirs risers just before the concert! Great embarrassment for us as we were not well known even though the church was only a mile and a half away from our home. Zion Lutheran.
The Holy spirit overcame me as the choir was singing ‘Mary did you know’. A man in the choir began reciting the words of the song. All I saw was his face and those words changed my Life. Forever. “It’s all true! He is creator of all things! Somebody had to do it! Random evolution never made sense to me.
Pastor Barry said Christ loves me! I still believe the Holy Spirit was running the spotlight up in the balcony so the man reciting had the light directly on him and the angle of the light reflected right to me. It was the major point in my life. The church is still there and once in a while we go to a smorgasbord there. That experience was so overwhelming that attending would not work. The memory is too strong. I stopped once and told the new pastor about these things and he showed me the sanctuary where it happened. It seemed to encourage him. He has the same last name as ours, Peterson. Small world indeed.
Our marriage continues to grow as Julie was already a believer in Jesus. It was good news to her as well. Many times that story still brings tears to me. You know the feeling. Words began to fall short and it’s hard to speak them. That song, obviously, is my favorite and I weep and worship when it is sung.
Our whole family began attending Pastor Barry’s church near Amery, but with the two boys, it was hard to go 80 miles round trip every Sunday. There was a ministry too even further away at Lake Elmo, it was an automotive repair ministry (God’s grease monkeys) and I continued to be a volunteer there. Our Volvo was filled with food while I was working. I was a foreign car shop owner at that time and I was pretty useful. It was another blessing that continues on in various ways. Every church gathering we attend has miracles when we look. He is pouring His spirit out on us. You too.
Later, at a sweet corn feed at a local church, we met Pastor Roger Inoway and the relation with Grace Baptist, a church association for us began. It was only ten miles away in Grantsburg, Wisconsin.
Our family began attending that church and eventually we started a successful food ministry there. The monthly event was named Feed My Sheep. It was coupled with an automotive repair ministry, Grace Garage. The food ministry was a bright spot for us as we got to minister and pray for the people waiting in an adjacent room. They were waiting to be called to get in line for the food distribution. People still comment to Julie and I about those prayers and some healing that occurred. The church made me a deacon in the process too.
News came that the camp, Whispering Pines, was in need of a temporary manager while it was up for sale. Julie and I stepped into that position and soon after, two pastors showed up on motorcycles at the camp. They expressed interest in buying it! Perfect. Keep the camp Christian owned and run. A good vision for us for certain. We got baptized at Whispering pines soon afterwards. Pastor Barry had never performed a baptism and so dunked us three times. “Father, Son and Holy Spirit” and I saw him above me in the clear lake water. I asked him what he saw as he looked at me. “A dead man” he perfectly replied.
There was a quick transition to those new motorcycling pastors church with the blessing of the Grantsburg leadership. Back south of Highway 8 again! Our family fit in well and eventually became the worship team there. We were licensed as Pastors but weren’t installed. When the two Pastors they were hoping would buy the camp didn’t buy it we left. The camp was sold to a real estate developer and after a neighborhood fight about loosing the beautiful Methodist camp to a developer, it was developed into high end lake homes (½ mile of lake shore went with the camp) It was time to find a church closer to home and after dreaming together about their next move, both of us got the same named local pastor.
That church seemed appropriate and it was only a few miles away. You have noticed that a lot of what is called ‘Church Hopping’ occurred for us. It wasn’t that at all. It was Church involvement and being led by the Spirit. About five years at each house of worship was average. All of it extraordinary and good.
It’s a hard life at times and our whole family has had many challenges from both of our pasts. We are still together and praising the Lord and his way of loving them. Our Lord does not have a plan. He is plan. Now we listen to Him and we follow His leading. The Lord speaks quietly and we are getting better at listening.
We continued singing and playing songs to Him and about Him, writing a few of those songs as well. It’s better than my bar band, and I am not even obligated to wear a cowboy hat. We did move to another church again to a refurbished bar that I played with the country western band! It was a new life about 30 miles away. I occasionally played Viola and the Mandolin there. South of highway 8 again. As I write this we have again been called to another gathering, Eagle Brook in Minnesota. I am working with Bjorn who is the media director and he asked me to become his AD (assistant director) It’s a long drive but he drives most of the way after I drive to his place about 28 miles south. I am also being trained as a camera operator.
We do wear our faith on our sleeves. Just like in my Navy days in a way. This story catches attention to unbelievers. It still catches our attention around May 23rd as well. our anniversary day.
Who can foretell the leading of the Lord? Jesus guides as he provides and that is challenging and exciting.
I was at an ongoing book sale that a local library has in one of their meeting rooms. The books are arrayed with spines up and a double row so you can see all the titles. Only a dollar apiece and they are in excellent condition.
I looked and muttered authors and titles to myself as I fingered my way down the front row. Most, if not all were novels. The impression I instantly got was they had all been read by a handful of devotees to the genre and were not getting checked out anymore.
I was startled when one of the back row books had a title of Spiritual Literacy. Quite a change from Danielle Steele’s work. Nice bindery and excellent glossy cover that book had. It seemed it was not checked out much as it wound up in the ‘cut out bin’ too. I quickly grabbed it up and flipped a page or two and what I read was enough to make the dollar price insignificant. Yard sale gem or a find at the second hand stores.
The Quote I randomly turned to was indeed on spiritual awareness and in a most direct and refreshing statement of truth. The statement tendered the astonishing way contact with the spirit of all life occurs and how we expect it to. A full range of eastern sages to modern thought was summed up. We think of a spiritual department of our life. Activity at the penthouse of our minds. Top floor.
If you are feeling a need for such things, get going and punch that 43rd floor button and get ready to pray, meditate, chant, focus on something to get in touch with the real deal of life.
Hence the steeple chase for western minds that a steepled building is the place where these things are talked about and experienced. I do look for the pointed buildings as I drive and wonder what they mean, why are they pervasive and how do you build and keep one?
Those steepled buildings are an excellent place to taste the sacred and also a good place to trigger the hunger for more. It’s the whole idea to grow and mature in our faith.
That one reference I randomly turned to goes on to state we can experience the sacred in everyday life. One simple statement startled me: “I come alive when I hear or play music” or “I come to life when I am in the garden, working with my hands” A.
Those are the areas when we are spiritual. To be vital, awake and aware. I did this today when I was swimming my laps. I started looking through the water as I swam and began to pray for the other swimmers I saw and often knew. Strokes and styles and finishing pushes. I have a really good instructor that almost won gold in a relay race. The only reason she didn’t was that a teammate jumped into the water at the triumphant finish and the whole team was disqualified.
She is my wife and I firmly believe the win. She taught me things and I teach them to fellow swimmers when they are receptive to small changes.
I like to do that and it makes me feel alive. It is connection with spiritual activity. I did not realize that until I saw the wisdom in that incredible book.
Another example: A small group of people get together regularly in a home or in a church and discuss and answer one question. They go deep and share their lives stories.
Spirit led and gifts of spirit. Volunteer work is as rewarding to the people served as the servers are. I was not aware of why I felt fulfilled working on weekends in a large church gathering, helping in media production. Visual and sound. I found people approachable and eager to share their lives with me. If I was asking questions of them instead of banging on about myself it usually ended in mutual prayer. There was connection and an uplifting spirit.
It’s easier if you allow the spirit to move within and give you guidance for the hungry and open hearts. It’s very enjoyable and often leads to continuing growth and friendships. Growth in us and them.
Recently I have been mourning the deaths of so many close friends and immediate family. Why me? Now things have changed and I am seeing the Spirit moving around me, with me and in me. Church is great and we have heard that we are the Church.
As Thomas Aquinus reminds us: “ Diversity is the perfection of the Universe” 13th Century Jack Gator Scribe
A. Brother David Steindl the music of silence
With many thanks to the Grantsburg Library andThomas Moore, and Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat
Jack gators grace notes 