NEVER LAUGH

We know we've seen the outline of God's hand countless times--and even more so as we've approached this crossroads that has stopped us in our tracks.

At first any abrupt change in our lives (like we're experiencing now) was so far off, the possibilities so many and varied, it would've been sheer guesswork or plain self-determination to say where God was leading us.  Years ago Larry chose not to create a picture for his future or even to draw an outline of where he was going.  Each day has been God's to use.  Each assignment has been the focus.  But looking back we see the pieces God has been putting together:

We were only a few years into ministry when Larry came home from a pastors' meeting stirred, restless.  He had heard a presentation by a young colleague that deep in his heart he knew was neither Adventist or Biblical.  But his fellow ministers were impressed.  Who could challenge something so articulate?  So engaging?  It was the first time Larry expressed a dream for further education.  I wasn't impressed.

I guess I was eavesdropping years later, because I'm sure I wasn't  really part of the conversation between Larry and Dr. Kis one summer afternoon soon after we arrived in Berrien Springs.  We were standing outside a wedding reception on the road outside the Habenicht's home.  I know.  I remember studying the asphalt at Larry's feet.   I didn't want anyone to see me laugh at Dr. Kis's suggestion that Larry should focus his doctoral work on philosophy.  Ethics. Whatever that was.  I could not imagine Larry philosophizing.  I knew he was no Socrates.

But he took his GRE, passed by one humiliating point and prayerfully enrolled for doctoral classes.  As Dr. Hasel--who probably blew off the top of the GRE graph himself--assured him, the most gifted often never finish their Ph.D. or go on to contribute.  One point is enough, he claimed.  And that's all that's needed for Larry's constant reminder that "I am what I am by the grace of God."

So every quarter Larry enrolled in a doctoral class.  For years of quarters studying was his hobby, his off-hours pastime, his recreation, even his vacation.  After sermons, Bible studies,  hospital visits, funerals, committees, and church work bees; after mowing the lawn, staining bookshelves,  putting the boys to bed, and unstopping the toilet of apple cores, he quietly read the volumes, wrote the research papers, did the languages, took the comprehensives, finished the dissertation.   I was so overwhelmed myself with keeping the family boat afloat, I could hardly even acknowledge such an ambitious project or such dogged determination, much less cheer him on.  Not until I sat in his doctoral defense in 1997 did it dawn on me what an unusual journey God had brought him through.

Oh, God, what have You done here?!   And what are You going to do now?   I felt a mix of wordless awe and mounting fear.  The parameters of our life were going to stretch.  I knew it.  That same week, Larry's articulate, engaging colleague from those early years in ministry announced he would be leaving the Adventist Church and beginning a ministry of his own.

The message to my heart was quick and sharp.  My response had to be honest:   OK, God, You've done so much with this ordinary, good man.  Forgive me for laughing.  Forgive me for being too weary to support.  I'll accept whatever You want to do with his life.  I'll accept whatever it means to my life.  

Dr. Kis, Larry's doctoral advisor and a Village member himself, stood up in front of the congregation one Sabbath soon after Larry's graduation and  invited the church family to expand their own vision as Larry took up duties as a "watchman on the walls of Zion," a parish beyond our town and a broader field to serve.  We all wondered what that might mean.

I challenged, but didn't laugh, when Larry was asked to become involved in the Adventist Theological Society.  He felt the need to contribute, but how much he didn't know.   I could see his energies spread, but how far I didn't know.   Let it go, Kathie; after what God has done for him, he has much to answer to God. 

What a relief!  We were on a journey I could leave safely with God.   I knew instinctively that what God was doing would stretch him, use him, and extend us all beyond our imagination.

The outline of God's hand was unmistakable.  I had no worthwhile complaints.