NOW IS OUR TIME TO DANCE

"This was written the last week of October, 2012"

Joni and I have very multi-dimensional lives. We have a lot of passions and pursue many different paths of adventure. For the last 25+ years, one of those adventures is that we have had the privilege to serve the community as a Pastor. An additional responsibility is that we serve as the Administrator of a Christian School. As you might imagine this has provided us with many unique opportunities to be with people in some of the very best and the very worst of times…

Friday morning we got a call at about 4am. A 38 yr. old father of a family in the School (4 daughters, ages 5-16) died unexpectedly of a heart attack. Joni and I immediately responded. At about 6 in the morning, with the youngest daughter sitting on my lap and her next older sister on Joni’s… I told the girls that their Daddy had died. This is a part of the job that never gets easier. There is no easy way, and I’m not sure I will ever get it completely right… How do you tell a 5 and 6 yr. old that their Daddy is gone? 

What I have learned is that Joni and I are often times just there to hold people in our arms while they cry… It is not our words that matter, but rather just the power of holding each other… the power of human touch. This is the “frame” of the dance of unspeakable grief which has no music… no rhythm. It is just stillness and tears. It’s only sound is the deep, ethereal cry of broken hearts.

A few hours later, I had to make the announcement in our School. It was a full day spent comforting the students… lots of tears… lots of hugs. After lunch, a first grader handed Joni a “card” that she had made. She said, “Miss Joni, you look sad. This is for you. I love you.” We are supposed to be comforting them and they turn it all upside down and comfort us… Life is so powerful and good…

You may be trying to figure out why I’m telling you all this. My reason is to let you know how much Joni and I needed to dance Friday night. We needed to love each other. We needed to live. We needed to dance… It was very hard to keep my “head” in mechanics of what we were doing, but my heart desperately needed to dance. We needed to hold each other and just dance… Life needs the dance. There is so much sadness and grief in the world. For many years Joni and I have seen so much of it very up-close, and raw, and unfiltered. For those of us that experience life as Joni and I do… For people that are unafraid to embrace the worst that life can deliver… We need to have an opportunity to embrace the dance. Now is our time to dance.

Life needs the dance.