For the Love of Cheerios

Our focus statement today is, “God loves us in so many ways. When we steep ourselves in that love, it comes out into our lives.” One of the Going Deeper questions reminds us that God’s love often comes to us through other people, and today I am remembering a time when someone showed me a special kind of love many, many years ago.

 

I was 10 years old, I think. My best guess is that this happened in the Christmas of 1960, perhaps 1961. I lived in Africa (Zambia and Zimbabwe) until I was 15, with only two visits to my parents’ families back in Pennsylvania. When I was nine years old, we spent six months in Pennsylvania, and for those six I lived with my Uncle and Aunt in Woodbury, PA. Also, during those six months, I discovered Cheerios! 

 

Then we went back to Africa. We didn’t have Cheerios in Zimbabwe! We had lots of good food, but no Cheerios. I loved Cheerios, and I made it known that I wished we had Cheerios in Bulawayo. Of course, we didn’t. 

 

My Dad was the Bishop of our church (the BICC in Zimbabwe) there, and we lived in the Bishop’s house. It was a big house in the shape of an L, and he had his office at one end of the house. His secretary (Lois Davidson) lived in the office wing of the house and ate her meals with our family. 

 

One day, Lois was in downtown Bulawayo doing some shopping and she found a box of Cheerios in a grocery store! I have no idea why it was there or who imported it, but it was there. She knew I liked Cheerios, so she bought it and brought it home. She kept it in her room until Christmas and then she wrapped it up and put it under the tree. I got a box of Cheerios for Christmas! (Here, that would be a crumby gift. Then and there, it was special!) 

 

Out Going Deeper questions lead me to wonder, how did getting a box of Cheerios make me feel? Ten-year-old boys sometimes don’t know how they feel, so I can’t tell you how I felt then, but 50 years later I met her again. In between that meeting and the gift of Cheerios, when I was in my 40s, I was pastor of a church in Indiana, where her sisters (Edith and Esther) were members. Then, 10 years ago, we were visiting Indiana, and I heard that the three sisters were living in a retirement centre in Goshen. 

 

I decided to drive over to Goshen and visit them. I found Edith and Esther, living together in an apartment. They were glad to see me, and we had a short visit. It was good to see old friends again. Then I went to Lois Davidson’s apartment. She welcomed me with open arms! She invited me in. We had tea together and talked and talked, and I realized that she loved me and my family. I remembered that box of Cheerios. It was more than just a box of cereal. It meant that she was thinking of me when she was in the grocery store that day, 60 years ago, because she loved that 11-year old boy. As a 60-year-old man visiting her that day, I felt loved and cared for by our old family friend. I knew it was God’s love! 

 

There you have it! You can ask your Mom and Dad if they have ever experienced God’s love, shown to them through other people? May you can even think of a time when someone else has shown you that they love you, and you can tell your parents about it.

Note: I told this story as the children's feature for our Sunday Service at Steinbach Mennonite Church on May 2, 2021

Peculiar People

What follows is the Children's Story for Sunday's Service (which we recorded today). I don't often do the children's story -- harder I think than preaching any day! But here it is, as best as I could do.

Lee’s sermon is called “A Peculiar People”. What do you think the word “peculiar” means? It means strange or unusual – and not always in a good way. If I look at you and say, “You’re peculiar!” you might not like me very much. But what do you think when Pastor Lee says he’s going to preach about peculiar people?

I think he means us, the church! I can tell you what I think about this, and Pastor Lee will tell us what he thinks in his sermon. You can ask your parents if Pastor Lee said the same thing as I did. If we say the same thing, that’s great! And if we run down different tracks, that’s okay too.

Anyway, my grandparents would have said that the church is “a peculiar people” (or a peculiar group of people), and they would have meant “unusual” – and in a good way. They were unusual because they wanted to follow Jesus more than anything else in the world. The way that they showed it was definitely unusual. They dressed differently than the people around them. I have a picture here. You can’t see it, but I’ll describe it to you.

My grandma is wearing a long dress all the way to the ground. She always kept it buttoned up all the way. She is also wearing a bonnet that covers her whole head. My grandpa is wearing a plain coat and trousers of dark material and a white shirt, buttoned up all the way without a tie. They dressed what they called “plain”. They said that people outside the church dressed fancy, and that they wanted to show that they listened to Jesus and not to the people around them. So they dressed plain. If you saw them today, you might think they were Amish or Hutterite or something like that.

When they walked down the street, some people might have thought they were peculiar – and not in a good way – because of how they dressed, but what they really cared about was not this “peculiar way of dressing”. What they really cared about was what Jesus thought of what they were doing.

Now that’s the kind of peculiar I want to be. I don’t dress like my grandparents! I don’t wear a plain coat, and Lois doesn’t wear a bonnet. But I want to follow Jesus just like they did. I want Jesus to guide my life. I care more about what Jesus thinks of me than I do about what people outside of the church think.

I think that’s probably what Pastor Lee is talking about too. We don’t have to look peculiar to love Jesus. The way my grandparents dressed was one way that they tried to follow Jesus, but they did a lot of other things too. They loved the people around them, and they helped those who needed help, and they cared for their family, and they always asked what God wanted them to do. That’s a good kind of peculiar. We are a peculiar people – unusual because we want to follow Jesus wherever he leads us.

Appendix
The issues this memory of my grandparents get us into are complex indeed, far too complex even for the full sermon. They understood that dressing plain was only a symbol, and they held on to that inner meaning (following God faithfully whatever the world says) fiercely. I remember them with deep respect, even if I never put on the plain suit or ask Lois to wear a head covering. I wish we today had half their desire to follow Jesus; we would make our world a better place if we did.

Mothers Day Memories

My mother -- Dorcas Climenhaga (nee Slagenweit) -- grew up on a dairy farm in Western Pennsylvania. One of eight children -- five boys and three girls. She inherited her mother's get to work attitude, always on the move. (Many years later, I married Lois Heise, who shares the same get moving approach to life. Now she is Gogo -- Zulu for Grandma, and expressive of her constant motion.)

Mother also inherited her father's penchant for jokes and laughter. When I first met PapPap as a three-year old boy just "home" from Zambia (where we lived as a missionary family), he got down on all fours and approached me as a growling bear. I backed up until I reached the wall; he kept coming. Finally, against my parents' standing rule, I pointed my finger at him and went "Bang!" He rolled over and played dead. Mom and Dad decided I hadn't broken their prohibition on "shooting people", since I had really shot a bear.

Mother had the Slagenweit humour to the full. I remember when I was a moody teenager, she would come up to me and start bobbing around me, jabbing and saying, "Let's box!" How can a 14-year old boy stay moody when his 4'11" mother is trying to start a boxing match!

We lived in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe then. We had servants inside and outside the house. People needed work, and refusing to have servants meant making them go hungry, but it was hard for a Pennsylvania farm girl to have someone else cleaning her house. She would tell Rida that they needed to wax the concrete floor (a red concrete I know from Zambia and Zimbabwe) and he would get to work. Then she would get down on her hands and knees beside him and they waxed and polished together. She said that they solved the world's problems working on the floor together. Rida said, "When uMfundisi [meaning my Dad] is the president of the United States and I am the Prime Minister of Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), we will make everything right!"

Mother had the ability to work within the structures while subverting them with God's love and a sense of everyone's essential human-ness. What the Ndebele and Zulu people call "ubuntu". She was a Pennsylvania farm girl and a Bishop's wife and an African mother all together. She was and is my and my sisters' mother, our children's grandmother, and someone we love and miss more than we can say.

An African Memory: Waiting in the Dark

I remember Carol Concerts in Bulawayo’s Central Park. I remember the wonderful descant to “O Come all Ye Faithful” on “Glory to God, all glory in the highest” – sung in the small city hall at a combined choirs carol concert. I remember candles and music that shaped my heart as a child.

Advent is a different time than Christmas, even though it is the time was always had our Christmas concerts. Advent is for waiting, and my African memory is of a time I don’t remember, although I was there. An African memory of waiting in the dark for someone to be born.

[The pictures are from Google images -- of the Central Park, but not of the amphitheatre where we had carols by candlelight, and of the City Hall where we also had carol concerts.

My older sister tells me the story. Our mother was waiting for a child, expecting her third baby. The life of her second was short – eight months long, before Dorothy died of malaria and was buried at our home in Sikalongo. [The picture below was taken in 2003, as Lois and I and our sons visited Sikalongo and reconnected with the memory of my sister, Dorothy.]

Perhaps as a result, mother went to the nearest hospital well before the birth of her next child. Livingstone was the nearest city with a hospital, so she and my sister Donna and another missionary, Verna Ginder, went down to Livingstone in a 1948 Ford Pickup.

I have wondered what they talked about. Verna had lost her husband to a tropical fever a few years before. Mother had lost her daughter to malaria. They may have identified closely with each other. They stayed in some government rondavels (a nice hut with a thatched roof) beside the Zambezi River, just above Victoria Falls. After several days by the river, mother announced that her labour begun.

[Pictures taken from Google images: the rondavel was probably not quite this nice, and this hospital -- in Livingstone, Zambia -- may be newer. But you get the idea.]

They drove to the nearby hospital in the 1948 Ford and hurried inside. I don’t know anything about the labour (although I am told I was the cause), but I gather that during labour the mother delivering the baby does not think about anything else. So Donna remained in the Pickup, momentarily forgotten.

I don’t remember what time I was born, but finally the time came, with the night well spent. Donna spent that same night in the dark of the African night, wondering where her mother and Aunt Verna were as she sat in the 1948 Ford Pickup. After I was born, someone thought of Donna. Maybe mother asked, “Where is Donna?” And maybe Verna Ginder rushed out horrified to make sure Donna was safe. Maybe Donna had fallen asleep; maybe she was just glad to see someone she knew.

In any case, they hurried back into the hospital so that Donna could find out what had kept mother so occupied. As a five-year old child, she was maybe less than impressed with the discovery of her baby brother. “That was why you left me alone in the dark?”

She has been a good sister, for which I am grateful, and mother was a good mother, for which I am doubly grateful. Her experience of waiting in the dark is a paradigm or model of the way we all are waiting for the night to end, trusting that God brings us this Christmas the joy of new birth and new life. Maranatha!

The Meaning of Death

A little more than two years ago, we gathered here to say goodbye to my father. Now we are saying goodbye to Verna Mae Climenhaga, his wife of 24 years, our step-mother and grandmother. Those of us in the next generation are aware that we are now on the front lines. With that awareness, I want to reflect on the meaning of death. This is a different question than, “What is the funeral for?” The most important part of the funeral is the committal service: “Ashes to ashes and dust to dust.” The funeral recognizes and enshrines the great transition from this life to the next, the final transformation that Paul describes eloquently in 1 Cor 15:

For behold I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. … For this corruption must put on incorruption and this mortality put on immortality! Then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory!” Death, where is your sting? Grave, where is your victory? The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the Law. But thanks be unto God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!

I am asking instead about death. The great task of life is learning how to die. Death is one task that none can shirk. Whether we have been wealthy or in modest circumstances, whether we have had good health or lived with pain and disease, whether we exercise power in this world or have lived under the rule of others, we all die. What does it all mean? We are all engaged in the search to answer this question. I hope primarily to honour Verna Mae as we remember her and to stimulate your own thinking as you and I continue to prepare for the end of this life.

Verna Mae

Our beloved step-mother and grandma and sister and aunt and great-aunt was born in 1932. Her birthday was the day before my own, on May 29. She entered the BIC Church at Conboy BIC, close to the birthplace of the BIC Church as a whole. She spent some years at the Navajo Mission in New Mexico, where my wife was then a small girl. She once told us that she remembers Lois and Carol (Heise) and Nancy and MJ (Heisey), four girls at the mission, peering in at the window at this new arrival to their home. Years later, in the BIC Missions Office, our paths were again intertwined, as she sent out the cheques that supported Lois and me in our work with BIC missions. Then, in 1993, two years after our mother died, Dad and Verna Mae were married in the Conoy BIC Church. Now the intertwining of our lives on this earth comes to an end as we say goodbye.

We say goodbye to someone who taught our family much. One mothers’ day, my father recalled the women in his life – his mother, my mother (Dorcas), and Verna Mae. His comment about Verna Mae was significant: “She taught me to accept people without judging them.” John Climenhaga and his descendants always enjoyed a good argument. It took Verna Mae’s quiet presence in Dad’s life for him to see the strength of simple acceptance. [Of course there were others in the family who knew how to accept people well, but this simple acceptance was a special gift in Verna Mae.]

Verna Mae also helped others to implement their dreams. When the old Missions Handbook came to an end (in 1978), Wilmer Heisey had the idea of listing the names of all those who had served with BIC and other mission agencies from the beginning in the 1890s to that point in time in 1978. Verna Mae coordinated the massive task of working through the relevant documents and compiling the list – a wonderful resource to researchers, as I can attest.

These memories bring me to the question, “What is the meaning of death?” which in turn brings us to the passage we read from 1 Corinthians 15.

1 Corinthians 15

In this chapter, Paul spends a lot of time and space on one central subject: the resurrection. He begins by naming this as the core of the gospel. That core consists of several affirmations:

·         Jesus Christ (Jesus the Messiah) was crucified for our sins

·         Jesus was dead and buried

·         Jesus was raised on the third day

·         Jesus appeared to the disciples and even to Paul.

In these affirmations, we find the gospel; we find God’s desired shape for our lives. God created us to be in relationship – with each other and with God. We have rebelled against God, breaking relationship with each other and with God and with all of creation. God desires reconciliation and does everything possible to restore these broken relationships. That is why Jesus died for our sins – to restore the relationship. That is why Jesus rose from the dead – to give reconciliation “power”. That is why Jesus appeared to so many and comes to you and to me still today – to make reconciliation in our lives a reality.

There’s a lot to unpack there, and Paul takes the rest of a long chapter to unpack it. Just one small piece for us here: Jesus died, rose, appeared, and ascended to God the Father to restore relationships. What is the meaning of life? Reconciled relationships. What is the meaning of life’s end, death? Reconciled relationships.

What will we wish we had done more when we die? Will we wish we had made more money? I doubt. Will we wish we had spent more time with family and with friends? Probably. We are wired for relationship, and time spent with others is worth more than money earned. Relationships made right – with God and with each other – are the core of Christian faith. When someone dies, we remember that life and death are about relationships more than anything else.

Death is an impenetrable curtain, and none of us can report what we see beyond. Recently, a good friend died of cancer. We were talking together and he said something like this, “Jesus cared so much for relationships that I am confident I will meet my loved ones in Heaven. I don’t know what that will look like. I can imagine joining my loved ones who have preceded me in Heaven, and starting to exclaim about what is around me, and then someone (probably Dad) saying, “Hush! Look there! You see Jesus coming?” But my friend is right. Relationships are the centre of our faith – right relationship with God and right relationships with each other. Verna Mae is with those whom she loved on earth, and most of all, she is with Jesus.

So What?

As I said, this reality – the reality of the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus – is the central reality of our lives. Verna Mae lived and died on that basis, the source of all love and acceptance in human relationships.

C.S. Lewis wrote a little book (The Great Divorce)in which he imagined what the borders of Heaven might be like. He imagines various of the bright people from Heaven. Near the end of the story, Lewis sees one of the “great people of Heaven”. Here is how he describes it:

… All down one long aisle of the forest the under-sides of the leafy branches had begun to tremble with dancing light; … Some kind of procession was approaching us, and the light came from the persons who composed it.

First came bright Spirits, not the Spirits of men, who danced and scattered flowers-soundlessly falling, lightly drifting flowers, … Then, on the left and right, at each side of the forest avenue, came youthful shapes, boys upon one hand, and girls upon the other. If I could remember their singing and write down the notes, noone who read that score would ever grow sick or old. Between them went musicians: and after these a lady in whose honour all this was being done.

… I have forgotten [what she wore]. And only partly do I remember the unbearable beauty of her face. “Is it? … is it?” I whispered to my guide. “Not at all,” said he. “It’s someone you will never have heard of. Her name on earth was Sarah Smith and she lived at Golders Green.” “She seems to be … well, a person of particular importance?” “Aye. She is one of the great ones. Ye have heard that fame in this country and fame on Earth are two quite different things.”

“And who are these gigantic people … look! They’re like emeralds … who are dancing and throwing flowers before her?” “Haven't ye read your Milton? A thousand liveried angels lackey her.”

“And who are all these young men and women on each side?” “They are her sons and daughters. … Every young man or boy that met her became her son – even if it was only the boy that brought the meat to her back door. Every girl that met her was her daughter.”

Can you see Verna Mae there? I can! She lived quietly and lovingly, embracing the people she met without question. I believe that Jesus has greeted her already, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” Not everyone sees life the way that I have just described, and we can discuss such questions at other times and in other places. Here, this morning, this day of remembering Verna Mae and of committing her to God, we affirm that the central meaning of life is found in loving God and loving each other and loving all of creation. Not in power or in money or in any of the other places that we look, but in building and restoring relationships wherever we can.

When Dad said that Verna Mae taught him to accept people as they are, he expressed a central piece of her identity – as one who simply lived at peace with God, with others, and with herself. She died at peace with God, and now she lives in the glory of Peace Incarnate.

7 September 2019

Messiah Village

Text

1 Corinthians 15:1-11

The Resurrection of Christ

15 Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. ² By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

³ For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴ that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵ and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. ⁶ After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷ Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, ⁸ and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

⁹ For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. ¹⁰ But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. ¹¹ Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.

Vacation Stories: Churches

Today is a Sunday, so here are some stories of the churches we went to.

Our first Sunday, we attended St. Patrick’s Cathedral, “mother church of the Archdiocese of Melbourne”. We had noticed the cathedral in our walks, often with tourists taking pictures. Beautiful grounds with some lovely magnolia flowers; a striking steeple, which became a landmark for us to find our way back to Nevin and Ali’s apartment; uncomfortable pews (designated by our hosts as the most uncomfortable they had experienced).

The morning mass was led by a Palestinian priest. Notable in our worship experience was the closing prayer – the Ave Maria chanted in Arabic, sounding similar to the Arabic I have heard used in the mosque in Winnipeg.

Our second Sunday, we attended St. Francis’ Church, billed as the oldest Catholic church in the Province of Victoria. The cantor was a woman, which our daughter-in-law told us is unusual. The priest reminded the parishioners to carry their belongings with them when they took communion – a reminder that this is a downtown church and one’s stuff is not safe left in the pew. We went to the church hall for tea and coffee when the service was done. One has the impression of a vibrant community in the heart of the city of Melbourne.

Our last Sunday was at St. Peter’s Anglican Church, more fully, “St. Peter’s Eastern Hill”. We realised immediately that we were not in a low church Anglican setting, as the trio of clergy wended their way to the front, scattering incense as they went. This is not a church for those with scent sensitivity!

St. Peter’s is definitely “Anglo-Catholic”, with some elements that would be unusual even in other high Anglican churches. The New Testament Scripture and Gospel were chanted rather than simply read – giving me a sense of connection to the way that Jews read the Torah using a set chanted melody. The responses included an excellent choir. Someone else might have found the music “too highbrow”, but I found it deeply stimulating. It was a wonderful time of worship.

St. Peter’s was also the scene of another serendipity. The sermon was given by a visiting preacher, Dean of Trinity College at the University of Melbourne. He turned out to have been Associate Dean of Tyndale UC and Seminary in Toronto, one of Providence’s sister schools in Canada, about 15 to 20 years ago. So the preacher knew Providence, and in this high Anglican scented setting with the chants of the psalms and scriptures in our ears, I found a colleague from the Canadian seminary scene.

We enjoyed our church contacts in Melbourne, but it was good to worship at home this morning. Steinbach Mennonite Church is home, and we are glad to be home.

Vacation Stories: Walking

I could title this “transit stories”, but so much of our “transit” was on foot. Melbourne is a large and densely populated city. Not so densely as some, since Australia has lots of room, but there are people all over the place. Nevin and Ali walk everywhere, so we did to.

Time to go to work: A 10-minute stroll down to their office on Victoria Parade. Let’s go grocery shopping: A 15-minute walk either to Aunt Maggie’s (organic groceries) or Woolworths (a larger grocery store). To the Royal Botanic Gardens: 30 minutes through the Melbourne Cricket Ground, the tennis courts where the Australian Open is played, across the Yarra River, and into the gardens. A cup of coffee on Lygon Street (lovely Italian cafes): 45 minutes down Victoria Parade and through the Carlton Gardens, into the long street of cafes and restaurants and shops. Just lovely. Another 15 minutes on to Trinity College, University of Melbourne? Sure! Why not? Only an hour’s walk back to Powlett Avenue, where we stayed.

Is it too far to walk? The trams and busses run regularly and take you to your destination quickly. We learned to use the Myki card, which gave us access to the trams and busses (and also to the trains, which we did not use). Is transit going to take too long? Or are there four of you, so that transit costs more? We learned about Uber. I was surprised at how convenient and quick Uber is, at least in a city like Melbourne. I doubt it would work as well in Steinbach.

Uber in Melbourne had the advantage that it introduced us to a wide variety of drivers – a Greek Australian who had moved to Greece as a young man and was now back home; a young Somali man who lit up when I asked if he was from Somalia; a Pashto from that part of Pakistan closest to Afghanistan. I learned from him that most of the Afghani are Pakistanis like him with family ties in Afghanistan. They came close, so close, to beating both India and Pakistan in the Cricket World Cup this year. It would have been their greatest coup!

I also enjoyed using the few words I have in other languages: “Assalamu alaykum” to the Muslims; “Efcharisto” to the Greek Australian; “Asante sana” to the Somali (OK – Swahili belongs next door in Kenya, but hey!). I am no linguist, but I enjoyed the multiplicity of cultures and languages around us in the city.

Melbourne and Australia as a whole are in the Asian orbit, so our walks took us into and through many little pieces of Asia, from Indonesia to Korea and from China to the Middle East. I was struck with the relative absence of Black people. Africa is more in the orbit of North America than it is of Australia.

The overall impression of life in Melbourne, then, included walking – to church, to eat out, to worship, to shop, to play chess; whatever it was, we walked to it. Now we’re back in Steinbach, and the garage door rolls up and down and the car carries us where we want to go. Almost makes me miss the civilized patterns built on walking almost everywhere.

Vacation Stories: OM Australia

In this and the next few blogs, I will tell some stories from our recent trip to Australia. We flew to Melbourne to visit Nevin and Ali, our son and his wife, who have recently taken positions there at the Australian Catholic University.

We spent three weeks in Melbourne, arriving on Tuesday morning, 16 July, and leaving on Tuesday morning, 6 August. On the first Friday there, Lois and I were fairly well acclimated. On our second Friday there, we [I] decided to go on an excursion. For the past 20 years (or just under), I have been on the board of OM Canada. Operation Mobilization (OM) is a worldwide organization that focusses on five primary goals: evangelism, church planting, relief and development, justice, and mentoring and discipleship. I have seen how OM Canada works in these areas and have relied often on OM to keep me in touch with the subjects I teach.

With this appreciation in mind, I wanted to see the head office of OM Australia, which is in a suburb of Melbourne. A quick Internet search showed that we could take the 906 bus 30 minutes east of Nevin and Ali’s apartment, and then walk for 10 minutes to the office. The weather promised rain, but we decided to head off to Blackburn, Victoria and find the office.

About 40 minutes later, we reached the office, just as the rain began to come down. My watch read 1 pm, which in Australia means lunch time. We ducked under the roof and tried the door. Locked. I thought we might go for lunch in a nearby café, but first we rang the doorbell. After a short delay, someone came to the door. She opened the door and looked at us doubtfully. “I’m sorry, we’re not actually open today. The Australian OM Board is meeting today and they’re at lunch.”

That piqued my interest for several reasons. One, my connection to OM is through the Canadian Board. Two, OM is divided into several administrative layers – from the International Director to Area Directors (in charge of administrative areas) to Country Directors, and so on. Australia and Canada happen to be in the same administrative area, so I asked, “Is the area director here?” She replied that he was, so I asked if I could greet him. She took us in to the room where the board had just sat down to eat, with the administrative staff of OM Australia.

When Harvey saw us, he was (I think) surprised. “Daryl and Lois! What are you doing here?” “Visiting our son and his wife,” I replied. “Well, join us for lunch!” Which we did, gratefully. We enjoyed the Nando’s peri-peri chicken with fries, and we enjoyed the chance meeting even more. Then Harvey said, “I fly back to Canada tomorrow, but I’m free this evening. Would you like to join me for supper?” So it was that Nevin and Alison and Lois and I joined Harvey that evening at an Indian restaurant named Ish in East Melbourne.

When the board returned to their meeting, Lois and I spent another hour talking with some of the staff over a cup of coffee, a delicious cappuccino. It was good to see a bit of what God is doing in and through OM Australia. The staff wondered how we knew that Harvey would be there. I told them that we had no such idea; we had come by the office because we were visiting our son and his wife. Coming to the office was a bonus, with no idea of who might be there. God’s arrangement, not ours!

That evening, Harv hosted us at Ish. My farewell dinner to the OM Board. I have finished my team with the board because I’m ready to release various responsibilities, especially those that conflict with acting as the associate pastor at Steinbach Mennonite, our home church. Travel to Ontario for Saturday board meetings come into that category.

I leave the board with real regret, since OM Canada has been so valuable to my own spiritual and intellectual development, so I appreciated Harv’s gesture. Our May board meeting was my last. Sometimes (not always) we go out for supper after a board meeting, especially to say goodbye to someone. Thanks to God’s timing, Harv was able to give me (and Lois and Nevin and Ali) a farewell dinner for my time on the OM board. A special twist to a trip taken to visit family.

Anniversary on the Great Ocean Road

On our anniversary, number 42 -- 30 July 2019 -- we drove the Great Ocean Road. More accurately, we were driven. With 43 other passengers and our driver, James, we bumped and swayed an expressed our amazement and delight at the sights and stories (from James) of the Australian coastline.

From Melbourne to Port Campbell, then inland to the A1, and back to Melbourne (some 550 km or so in about 12 hours). A good overview and introduction to life in Victoria.

Some impressions.


The Ocean. Waves rolling in from the south, so that surfers are often seen there. We saw none.

Koalas. Almost immobile, so that when one person found a koala sitting in the crook of a gum tree, reaching out and taking some eucalyptus leaves, then munching them before going back to sleep, the rest of us could find it too. Not bears, we were told -- they lack the koala-fications.



The coast. Rugged. Cliffs broken by occasional bays and beaches, with the road cut out by hand through the difficult countryside.

The relentless surf has shaped soft rocks into a razorback, into the 12 apostles (or eight apostles and two sisters), into wonderful shapes pleasing to the eye and dangerous for ships. James kept up a stream of stories, one shipwreck after another, especially from the days of sailing vessels before the advent of steam.










Tourists -- like us. I would like to find one of the places we stopped at to sit and watch patiently when the crowds are gone. The surf and foam are patient. They keep their rhythm, an endless sound and sight of water and wind and rock. We are impatient, on a mission to see the next sight. I would like to mimic the patience of the ocean and sit in Port Campbell watching and listening. Life beyond the stream of tourists breathes in the surf and wind left behind when the last bus is gone.

Villages dotted along the coast, shaped by place and by tourism. Anglesea and Lorne shaped irrevocably, Port Campbell touched more lightly -- living dual lives: their own and ours. Port Campbell is the smallest and quietest at the end of the line for our bus.

Back to Melbourne on the A1, a slice of Victoria that deserves its own exploration, passed through too quickly in the darkness as we watch the story of "Oddball", a dog in Warrnambul who saved the little penguins there from extinction by fox. (A true story.) Written down here in an attempt to remember and keep alive in the pathways of my heart and mind.

P.S.: This was indeed our 42nd anniversary, a unique and good celebration. I wish I could give Lois such a day whenever she wanted it. Too small a gift in return for all that she has given me.

Dad

Today is my father's 100th birthday. He died two short of this celebration, two years ago. I was with him for his birthday, holding a piece of cake in his hospital room in Harrisburg. The single candle was unlit in recognition of the oxygen tank that was helping him breathe. He said, "I don't like chocolate cake", which would have surprised mother. She baked him many chocolate cakes for birthdays of many years ago. So I ate the piece of cake as we talked together for his last birthday in his aging body.

Today, 100 years! Born 14 June 1919. David Elbert Climenhaga. My sister has told his story here, or at least the outline of it. Today, I remember him. I remember the INFJ (Myers-Briggs letters to give a snapshot of one's personality) who "overworks work re-working it". I remember someone who remembered more than I possibly could.

He wrote his memoirs (at one point called "Keep Lying to a Minimum"), in which I marvel at the precision of memory for events many years ago. I have his datebooks near me as I type, which help explain how he could state so clearly events from many years ago. He wrote things down! And he remembered things.

I remember his love and care -- for God, for the church, and for his family. These came together as we were driving to Phumula Mission in 1964. Dad was taking Bishop Elam Stauffer of the Mennonite Mission in Uganda to visit this outpost mission hospital 120 miles over sand roads into the bush. I was half-asleep in the back seat when I heard Dad say, "I wouldn't say this if Daryl were awake." Instantly I was awake, and completely still. "I know that the church has many problems, but I love the church deeply." I was unclear why I shouldn't overhear that and went back to sleep. But I remember it 55 years later. Dad loved the church deeply.

And Dad loved us deeply. In my desk, I have a letter he wrote when I missed the bus to Annville-Cleona High School. I was a 16-year old senior, and I overslept. Mother had to take me to school, throwing her day's schedule off. Dad sat down and wrote a letter to encourage me to be better and do better. Several pages. Some wisdom. Some just Dad. A visible memento of how deeply he cared for his children. [We, his children, could write letters about things that bugged us about Dad. No need to. He was also human, as we are.]

He loved mother even more. And in later years after mother died, Verna Mae. I remember his love and his care -- and his endless stories and puns and jokes, which we would try to derail, but never could. Today I remember, David Climenhaga was born 14 June 1919. One hundred years ago. I remember, and I love him.

A Story of Passports, continued

A few months ago, I traced our family's early life through passports. (Here is the link for that blog.)  Since then I have found two more passports in my desk -- newer than those, but from a time still long ago in our life as a couple.

The first one is the passport I carried to Zimbabwe in 1972. It was issued in Nov 1971, good for five years. I remember flying to Kenya and waiting a week in Nairobi for my work permit to enter Rhodesia. Returning to the States in Dec 1974, I spent a week in the UK, visiting Howard Hall (a friend in Manchester), going to a carols by candlelight in Westminster Cathedral (which, as it happens) is not Westminster Abbey, and forgetting to tell my parents when I would arrive. I landed in Chicago and called their home in Nappanee, Indiana. Collect, of course. Dad, mom, and Denise promptly got in the car and drove to O'Hare Airport to pick me up. we had supper in a diner beside the turnpike on the way home.
Two years after mine, Lois got her passport (also good for five years) to travel to Europe in 1973. She spent a year in Zaandam, Holland as a Menno Trainee, and visited Germany, Switzerland, France, Spain, and other countries in Europe during that year. She also used it three years later to do her SST in Belize. Her passport picture shows Lois as I first met her. A good likeness!

We've travelled a lot since then, coming up on our 41st anniversary. But here's what we looked like when our journey together began, so many years ago.