Papa John

On Saturday, my aunt texted the family to see if we would like to join them for Sunday worship at their home (The Farm) where they have been taking care of my grandfather as his health has deteriorated. Immediately, Josh texted me saying yes, we could go. I didn't know I was about to witness one of the most beautiful mornings of my life. We arrived at 10am and settled in with other family members, the kids running in between the circle of chairs that had been placed inside the downstairs livingroom. My aunt mentioned as she was leaving to work in the kitchen that my grandmother had requested that some of us should go into Papa John's room during the singing so that he could hear, so Shaina and I filtered in as the hymns began. We sang How Great is Our God and The Old Rugged Cross and I'll Fly Away. His eyes were closed during the singing, but he really responded to the hymns and after the message and the last song, my grandmother came into the room with us and she told him that my father's cousin Dale had delivered the message and Michael (my brother-in-law) had also spoken. "Your work is done John," she said. He really woke up then and seemed to understand what was going on around him. "No more vessels." "Let it go, Martha" "Let's be done." On Tuesday we visited again, and on Wednesday. I kept thinking "today is the last day." He had believed that he was experiencing his final days a week prior and he was very dissapointed to wake up and find that he was still on earth. His body surprised even the most medically learned among us, and his vitals stayed very strong even up to the evening before his birth into heaven. Papa John and the farm have been one of the most constant things on this earth for numerous and diverse people. Not just family. Old friends, new friends, all well loved and prayed for. A revolving door, open to anyone and everyone. No need to call beforehand. In light of all this, it was very strange and paradoxical to see his body change so drastically in the space of one year, while his pleasant, constant spirit remained the same and even matured into a childlike receptiveness. On Thursday morning, I got the text. It was such a beautiful morning. I woke thinking that surely the Lord had mercifully brought him home by now, and this was confirmed within the hour. He passed at 6:07am, a time which he had faithfully spent with the Lord for years upon years. My grandmother's comment after she was graciously led to join him for his last breath was, "Isn't that just like John to go in the morning." Indeed, everything about the day of his passing was so intimately perfected; the purples and yellows, the calm procession to his graveside, the cattle pleasantly grazing nearby on the ground that he has stewarded so diligently. The crisp, bright sunshine, reminiscent of so many chilling mornings checking and feeding cattle on the farm. Our little offerings of music and scripture, a dozen or two shovels of earth poured meaningfully on his wooden casket, helped to express our feelings of love and gratitude so intensly felt. It was my grandmother's idea to quiz Papa John on his favorite passages, write them down on little cards, and pass them around on Thursday morning for the grandchildren to recite. It made the burial very sweet and it was incredibly healing to see each person participate in the service this way. Pastor Clarence and Grandma thanked each person as they walked away from the graveside and it strikes me as such an appropriate way to serve his memory because he was always so good at making faith a participatory part of family life and involving the youngest of us to participate and to feel like our participation was very valued and very special. Our Master's admonition to, "Let the little children come unto me, and hinder them not," (Matthew 19:14) was one that he took to heart and lived out with great excellence. We honored him in a way that would have pleased him, I think. With Songs, Hymns, and Spiritual songs, with the hope of the power of God to raise up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and therefore to raise up all who follow after Him in his suffering and death. In one way, if he hadn't been such a giant of a man, it wouldn't be so hard to loose him, but in another way, his influence is precisely what makes it so natural for us to rejoice in his newfound life. What can you say about a man so quiet and faithful?

This poem by my sister Shaina says it best:

Verse in Honor of a Humble Giant

A Giant of a man

6'5 he stands-

Or stood; the years have

Shrunk his stature some.

A Giant of a man

To a little girls eyes.

His laughter echoing-

His over alls never-ending.

Uр, up, up, they went.

He wore them for comfort and convenience.

When I sat on his lap, I felt every tool & every

Bone poking out of his lean frame

His body sharply contrasted

With a continual "soft answer"

A Giant of a mind

He had. Scientific and orderly.

A quiet, yet adamantine faith

His laughter, never quiet.

He marveled over youth

The perfection of my tiny hands

Nestled in his gnarled, knobby fingers.

Rugged hands which removed

Calves from their mother's womb

Cherished my soft white palms.

His unlooked for authority

Quietly reigned over us all

While he served the One

In authority over All

As we grow, people

Shrink to size- the lenses

Of childhood fall away

And we see them as they are.

But Papa John has always

Been a giant in my eyes.

-Shaina Duryea