The Rod and Staff

Writings from a shepherd of Christ's flock

Tag: Death

When Chaos Floods Your World

September 14, 2023 / / 0 Comments

During the season’s first Monday Night Football, a matchup between the Bills and the Jets, the camera paused on a healthy, smiling young man on the Bills sideline. It was Damar Hamlin, the Bills safety who, just over eight months ago, collapsed on the field after making a routine tackle. Like millions who were watching that January game, I stared in shock at the television as an ambulance drove onto the field and 65,000 fans in the stadium were silenced by this inexplicable and entirely unanticipated event. A healthy, strong, 24-year-old professional athlete had just dropped like a rag doll onto the field. 

It was only natural to feel a range of emotions as I saw Hamlin alive and in good spirits, from joy that he is back on the team, ready to play, to a nervous remembrance that his near-death experience could happen to anyone. There is a chaos in our world. It is usually held at bay by the limited control we exercise over nature and our resources. But when chaos intrudes into our regularly scheduled programming, it leaves us wondering when it will happen again. [ . . . ]  [read more]

The Sting of Death

April 20, 2022 / / 2 Comments

When we talk about the early 2020s in decades to come, those younger than us may be surprised to learn that death never lost its sting, at least, not in the particulars. “A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” Allegedly Joseph Stalin said that, a man who created plenty of tragedies and statistics in his generation. As our generation’s horror—the COVID-19 pandemic—nears its statistic of a million deaths in the United States, this loss en masse has done nothing to inure us to the single serving stories of the end of life.

Yesterday we learned that Roger McGee, Minister of Music at Alexandria First Baptist Church, was released from the equipment keeping his body alive and into the glorious presence of Jesus. Or perhaps he was already there once his brain functioning ceased. I don’t know how it works exactly. We asked the same questions when Silvia Escamilla lay at INOVA Fairfax a month and a half ago on a breathing machine. Silvia, in her mid-30s, was there because of a brain aneurysm. Roger, in his mid-60s, was at a family cookout the Friday before Holy Week and had a choking episode. Now they—by which I mean their spirits, that intangible essence that defines them more than hair color, country of origin, or occupation—are with Jesus. [ . . . ]  [read more]

Riding the Coil: How a Midlife Crisis Changed the Way I Think about Life

December 4, 2020 / / 5 Comments

Staring into the waves, hearing their hypnotic crashes, I started thinking about my dad—about all the summer vacations we spent at the beach, about his sudden and unexpected death two years ago, about his impermanence against the permanence of the waves.

That’s when the thought crashed into my mind, uninvited: “Your dad is dead and the beach doesn’t care. And the beach will still be here long after you’re dead too.” And thus began my midlife crisis. [ . . . ]  [read more]

The World Series – A Taste of True Drama

October 30, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Game 6 of the World Series last night was one for the books. Not only did it display brilliant pitching and hitting from the Nationals, it set a World Series record for 6 away-game wins. With the news of Max Scherzer unable to pitch Game 5 but slated for tonight’s game, the drama could not be higher.

Drama is, of course, what draws us most to sports. Sports may be the last frontier of unspoilable drama. With the ubiquity of smartphone cameras and spoiler websites, most movies and TV shows have to go to extraordinary lengths to keep their plot twists under wraps. Not so with sports. Barring any illegal “throwing” of a game (which may have happened in the infamous 1919 World Series), no one knows who will win any game. Entire industries exist around gathering statistics, making predictions, and commenting on the action in real time. But the thrill is in the unknown. It is where we remember that we are human, bound by time, uncertain about the future. [ . . . ]  [read more]

Grief, One Year In

May 25, 2019 / / 4 Comments

On May 25, 2018, Rachael burst into the bedroom a little after 6:30 AM sobbing, “Chris…your dad…he died!”

I didn’t cry in that moment. I stared at the ceiling in a daze. Time stood still. The shock cauterized my emotions and fogged my mind. Here a load-bearing wall in the Davis house had unexpectedly, impossibly collapsed and all I could do was watch blankly. [ . . . ]  [read more]

With Vision Partly Blurred

March 26, 2019 / / 0 Comments

I didn’t know what to expect from a visit to my father’s grave, but I knew I had to make the trip. It had been nearly 10 months since I stood by that plot at the graveside service. Afterwards Samuel, then 3, packed down the mound of brown, moist dirt, engaging this shocking loss more freely and tactually than anyone else. Our conversation was profound:

“What did we just see happen, Sam?”
“Grandpa is dead.”
“And where is he now?”
“He’s into God.”
“And where is his body?”
“His body is down there.” [ . . . ]  [read more]

Remembering Chuck

January 4, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Originally posted on July 25, 2014.

When I sat down on the front porch to talk with Chuck Tannery, neither of us could have anticipated the transformation God intended for our hour together. It was the first time we had any extended conversation. Since I lived down the street, our most frequent interaction was an exhausted wave as I jogged by with our toddlers in the running stroller. This was supposed to be an equally brief wave, a quick stop on the way somewhere else, but God had a different itinerary for my day. [ . . . ]  [read more]

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