The Rod and Staff

Writings from a shepherd of Christ's flock

Tag: Loss

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]

Sorrow Undone: A story in progress

March 11, 2019 / / 0 Comments

I originally wrote this in September 2012.

Michael was one of my groomsmen, and his wife Emily one of Rachael’s bridesmaids. These were not honorary positions but acknowledgements of deep friendship. During our early college years, Michael and I prayed much together. He joined me on weekend trips home to Atlanta and fast became an honorary Davis. We did ministry together, and we ministered to each other. As Michael shared more of his painful family history–along with the contorted view of God those experiences handed him–our times of tears and anger and unanswered questions and scripture and just doing something were the early indicators that God was making me a pastor. [ . . . ]  [read more]

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