The Clay and the Potter

Many people say to not focus on the bad and just remember the good times. They say these things mostly during periods of mourning such as our times after September 2, 2008.  I believe that this statement is a good statement at the time for those in mourning to hear and it uplifts them maybe for a period of time, but as far as it applying to someone 2-3 years removed from September 2, 2008 or 2-3 years removed from any situation like that I do not think it does. 

Something the Lord has really been harboring on me over the past year or so is that we should never forget those dark nights, those nights where life just plain stinks.  When I learned to remember all those nights of staying up and crying out to the Lord asking why, why, why, it was then that I was able to truly see how far the Lord had brought me over the past 3 years.  I began to see that those hard times actually molded me into who I am.  It’s just as Jeremiah 18 talks about I was the clay and my God was the potter.  The clay must be put through the fire in order to remove any in purifications on it and then the potter may start to mold it.  Numbers 31:23 and Isaiah 48:10 talk about being refined and purified through the fire in order to become like gold.  Something Thom has always said is that these past 3 years have been the worst and best times of his life.  Many people have always kind of cringed when he said that, but to me it fits with exactly what the Lord accomplishes through times like these.  He humbles you to the core and then uplifts you by his love in order that you may look at Him and life differently. 

So to anyone going through anything tough or even just going through daily life please do not forget where you are now so that 3 years from now you are able to look back and say “ok, God now I see what you were doing.”  So I hope that if any of you are in those dark times right now that you begin to take mental pictures of yourself and where you are and put them away for the day when you need to be uplifted.  Then you can open up that box, take the pictures out and say “wow”, God really has been doing something amazing in me!”

A wise man once said “Our walk with the Lord seems like walking in the Sahara Desert.  There are so many times during our lives that it seems we are going no-where with God and that our relationship with him is not progressing at all.  Just as in the Sahara we look around and see nothing but sun and desert all around us and it seems that we haven’t moved in years, but we know for a fact that we have been walking for what seems like forever. If we were to look behind us on the ground we would see the hundreds of thousands of footsteps that are just one reminder that we have been moving and just as in the Sahara there is a plan for our lives today and that we have been progressing with the Lord each and every day through good and bad.”  Just look at the Vines family, me and all of Kelsey’s friends. God has been doing a work in us each and every day for the past 3 years.  We are testaments to His faithfulness and to His one perfect plan.

John Michael Vestal

Moving Forward

You never get over losing a child. That’s just the way it is. That kind of pain never fully evaporates. It is always hanging around, hovering over your every thought and action. For the rest of your life there is a hole where your child should have been,

And yet, you have to go on. Your family is depending upon you. People at work are depending upon you.

I suppose a lot of people figure if they just keep busy that somehow the pain will be eviscerated. And to some degree that is true. But then comes the idle times, particularly in the evening. And into creeps the demons stronger than ever. Making up for lost time. Devouring your mind and heart. I quickly concluded keeping busy was not enough.

So then what?

I do not make New Year’s resolutions. Instead, I make goals. As 2009 came to an end, now over a year since Kelsey had been killed, I asked myself: what do I want to do with the rest of my life?

There were some immediate answers: take care of my family, and complete my career in school administration. But beyond that, what? Over the span of about a week, two answers rose to greet me. One, wait until I got to see Kelsey again. But that was only about the passage of time. What did I want to do with the rest of my life? How did I want to spend my remaining time? And I could hear the answer being whispered to me: serve God.

Yes, that was it. But how? Doing what?

By that time I was writing the book. I could finish that and see it through. Then we could speak to church and grief groups. I nodded as the plan formed in my mind. Yes, that all made sense. But some thing was missing. I could feel it. And over the next few months the missing link emerged and became clear to me. Before I could go on I had to go back. I had to go back and forgive the people involved in the accident.

This was tough. I did not want to do it. There was some thing gratifying about righteous hate. And yet, I knew that if I did not forgive, that hate would eventually consume me.

God’s command was utterly clear: forgive. Even if they do not deserve it. After all, we did not deserve God’s forgiveness. It was bought by Christ on the cross. Grace.

It took several months before I felt that I had truly forgiven in my heart the owner of the dump truck and the driver. And yet, it still did not seem complete. I knew what I had to do. I had to directly express my forgiveness to them. And so one day in October, 2010, I made the overture to the company owner, as well as to the driver. I expressed our forgiveness. Relief poured from them. When it was over I felt good.

Self-pity can be a bottomless pit. If after losing Kelsey, we would have allowed ourselves to indulge in self-pity, to crawl into its pit, and wallow in its mire, I do not know if we would have ever gotten out. Instead, we had to force ourselves back to our feet, as hard as it was, as necessary as it was. Physical survival was stake. More importantly, the survival of our souls was at stake.           

So we go on, one day at a time, growing stronger in the Lord. I do not know what God has in store for us, but I do know He loves us, and what ever it is, we will be able to trust and rely on Him.

Re-baptized

I say “re-baptized” because like many people I was baptized when I was a young person-- at age fourteen, to be exact. I was sincere enough when I was baptized by full immersion at First Baptist Church in Pella, Iowa in 1968, just a few days after Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed. It was not a game, or a rite of passage just to go through. I did not do it because my other friends were doing it. I knew what it was about, and I took it reasonably serious, which is to say, not serious enough.

In the decades after, however, I drifted from the Lord, falling into a loose deism filled with many doubts. I believed there was a God, but he was a distant God, and Jesus was just a good man made into a legend by his over-zealous disciples. I did not return to Christ until 2006, at age 52, two years before Kelsey was killed. However, even then I was more of an intellectual Christian. I believed Jesus was, indeed, the Christ, but I still did not fully understand that He wanted a personal relationship, not a part-time associate.

Then Kelsey was killed, and I had to decide whether I still trusted God. He had let Kelsey be crushed by a dump truck. To be honest, at first I did not know whether I trusted the Lord. How did the taking of Kelsey, who was such a wonderful witness for Christ, fit into His plan? What could be the purpose of that?

I spoke at length with Steve McMeans, the pastor of Indiana Avenue Baptist Church, where Kelsey had attended. While he answered many questions, I still did not know whether I could trust God again.

One of Kelsey’s favorite verses was Proverbs 3:5. About a month before she was killed, she stenciled on her bedroom wall in beautiful letters the opening phrase of that verse: Trust in the Lord with all your heart…” However, in the weeks after her death, it was the rest of that verse that came to capture to me: “…and do not lean on your own understanding.”

That phrase rolled over in mind time and time again. And as I reflected upon it, I decided that while I still had not resolved all my doubts about whether I could trust God again, I did decide that I would seek the answer, and part of that process would be to re-affirm my commitment: I would be re-baptized.

I spoke with Reverend McMeans about this, as well as expressing my many doubts, and he suggested that in light of my doubts, “maybe we should not call it re-baptism, but just baptism.” I chuckled, but saw his point.

So for me, my baptism in November, 2008, represented that I would not give up. That I would seek out God’s wisdom and love; that I would open my mind and my heart to His invasion.

And invade He did.

Community

Losing a child is as bad as it gets. There’s nothing worse. And yet we count our blessings.

Two things got us through. One was our faith. Tested for sure, but it grew under the strain, then flowered under His love.

The other thing that rescued us was the support of community. From the beginning the Lubbock-Cooper community, as well as friends from Meadow, Garden City and other places picked us up. Day after day. All through that horrible first year and still yet today. It’s amazing. It’s heart-warming. It’s inspiring.

There were so many people there for us: Pat and Jo Henderson, the Edwards, the Vestal’s, the Howells, Kelsey’s classmates. So many people.

Flowers and cards. Letters, essays, poems and posters. Renderings of photographs. Quilts. The car window decal. Tattoos. Alexandra Nanny’s rock. Amanda Kitten’s essay. Kandice Bowie’s poem. Drawings from a mystery artist. Letters from a person in jail. The first small cross at the accident site. The bigger one later. The football flag. The football jersey. Kelsey’s retired jersey—worn by Kayla one more time. The flag from Governor Perry. Special songs at band concerts. The memorial garden-- a labor of love by dozens and dozens of people.

On and on. Every day. For a year Tracy Henson sent us a card every week.

The outpouring was so great and so wonderful that at times it almost swamped us.

As tough as it was, if we had not been people of faith, and if we had not been in the community we were, we know that it would have been that much tougher.

So yes, we count our blessings.

Denial

Kelsey was gone.

Gone.

I had seen the crumpled car. The 40,000 pound dump truck silently looming over it. We had touched her lifeless body in the funeral home. That’s as real as it gets. As bad as it gets.

Yet, a part of me would not accept it. Could not believe it. Was this some kind of bad dream? Some nightmare that just kept rolling on? How was this possible? When she had so much to live for. When she could be such a wonderful witness for Christ.

Waves of agony. Waves of denial. Battering us like ocean waves. First from one direction. Then the other. Relentless. Threatening to swamp us.

Then family started arriving. First my sister. Then two brothers. Each arrival bringing a new siege of grief, a new round of shock. Hanging on to them. Pouring out our anguish. Soaking up theirs.

The house was filled with people. All meant well. All tried to support, but it was so surreal. So unreal that it was numbing.

Dire days. Days of shock. And yet, days of piercing agony.

The worst days of our lives. No parent should ever have to go through this.

National Campaign

WHY WE WROTE THE BOOK

How does one make sense of losing a child? A child with a deep and abiding love of our Lord.

For us, there really was only one answer. We turned to God. Then many months later, as part of that process, we turned to others, hoping to help those who had also lost a child. Hoping to spread God's loving balm on their pain. So our initial focus was on helping other parents who had also lost a child. This is why we started writing the book.

However, our time, we realized that there were other kinds of tragedies that caused one to doubt God. So our focus expanded to include those people.

Then finally, I realized that our story might help others who are searching for God. In chapter three, I described how I spent decades in doubt. I did not become a Christian until 2006, two years before Kelsey was killed. I was 52. I hope that my story of searching can help others who are doing the same.

So, I guess, you could say that our book is an attempt to help make sense out of some thing that makes no sense at all. Kelsey's favorite verse was proverbs 3:5, which ends with "do not lean on your own understanding." We turned to the love of the Lord, and leaned on Him.

Tragedy and Trust

"Tragedy and Trust: Can You Still Trust God After Losing  a Child?" is a Christian book by Thom Vines and John Michael Vestal. Published through Author House. It is currently available at Amazon and also Barnes and Noble sites, both as an e-book or hard copies.

On September 2, 2008, a 40,000 dump truck veered into the lane of a Grand Am. Kelsey, my daughter, was driving. She was killed instantly.

The book is not only about the grief process, but it is primarily to address the searing question any Christian has after facing tragedy: can I still trust God? I, as the father, and John John Michael, as the boyfriend, are the primary authors. That said, each family member, as well as classmates and community members contributed to the manuscript in some way.

The primary purpose of the book is five-fold:
1. first and foremost, give praise to God for his redeeming love;
2. profits will go to help fund the Kelsey Vines Memorial Scholarship, which we award to two Lubbock-Cooper grads each May;
3. help parents and others who have lost a child, sibling or loved one;
4. help others suffering tragedy that have spiritual questions (losing a child is the the only kind of tragedy); and,
5. say thank you to the wonderful community of Lubbock-Cooper, as well as others.

While the book is currently available online, we plan the major kick-off for the book for April 7, the twins's 21st birthday. John Michael and I will be on Sharon Maines's morning show on April 5.

God bless.

Thom Vines