A Snapshot of My Father

As we approach Father's Day I want to share an image of my father. The snapshot in my mind happened in 2007 and it was too dark to actually take a photograph but I carry a vivid picture of it in my mind. In February of that year my father took my sister, my brother and me to Nigeria, the place of my birth. My parents had been missionaries there for eight years, until my father got very ill and was sent back to the States in 1962.

None of us children had ever returned for a visit. This was a trip of a lifetime for us. We got to return to Nigeria together, along with my son and my niece. I am the youngest child of my parents and I was just under two when they came home. I have no memories of Nigeria. I didn't know what to expect. I really didn't understand my parents' work in West Africa.

After a long flight to Nigeria, a van ride from Abuja to just outside Mubi (which took several days), we arrived at Kulp Bible College (KBC). KBC was my father's dream. He believed strongly that leadership was the key to a successful church. He selected the land, helped build the original buildings, selected the first class of students, developed the curriculum and served as the school's first principal.

We arrived at KBC at 9 p.m. in the middle of their annual pastors' conference. The electricity was out, which it often is. We were ushered into the chapel where the pastors were meeting. They focused all their flashlights on our faces as my father and his family were introduced. Wild applause broke out for the founding principal of KBC. My father asked if there was anyone present from that original graduating class of KBC. One man in the back stood up and walked forward to embrace my father.

There it is. The snapshot in my mind....a darkened chapel in Nigeria crowded with pastors and my father and one of his students embracing. The reason I carry this mental snapshot with me is that in that moment I understood something new about my father.

I have always known the strength of my father's values, intellect, work ethic and faith. I have admired his tenacity and his ability to make friends everywhere and anywhere. But before that moment, I didn't understand the impact he made on the church in Nigeria. All these pastors around us where trained at KBC. The church in Nigeria is larger than our denomination in the United States. Leadership was the key. My father's dream and his willingness to work to make it a reality changed the landscape of the church he served so lovingly. I was proud of my father and honored to be his child as I watched him embrace his student. But the thing that made that moment indelible in my brain was the humility of my father.

How could I, one of his children, not understand the lasting impact he made? Why didn't I know? I didn't know because getting credit was never important to my father. Making things happen did matter. Creating mattered. Doing what needed to be done mattered.

It is 2010 and my father now lives in a nursing facility in Kansas. A stroke in 2008 left him unable to walk and his speech is very limited. He can't tell me how he feels about his losses but I am guessing that the inability to do is the hardest part.

Listening to the Rhythm

In May of 2009, I attended a concert in which a West African drumming ensemble was playing. It spoke to a part of my soul I hadn't heard from before. I wanted to get up and dance. But I sat on my hands and kept from making a spectacle of myself.

I was born in West Africa, the youngest child of missionary parents. But my family returned to the States when I was less than two years old. My mother was born in West Africa to missionary parents. When my mother died in 2006, we did not have organ music at her memorial service. My sister found a drummer who played West African solo pieces.

The music I heard at the concert was so different from what I heard at my mother's memorial service. The concert was loud and it was rhythmic. When the concert was over I rushed home to tell my husband that I wanted to learn to play the djembe, a wooden hand drum shaped like a goblet. I thought my husband would tease me or tell me to sleep on it. He said, "I think you should take lessons."

So now I take lessons every week. For my birthday, my husband bought me a beautiful djembe from Mali. I rarely sound like the music I heard in May of 2009. My Germanic blood outweighs the early years of my life spent in West Africa. My drumming instructor is an encourager but certain rhythms seem so alien to me that I can't seem to duplicate them. Other times the music we make, as several drums play together, is so right and so fun and so unlike the other music of my life.

I am learning to let go and listen. At first I tried to count out each bass, each slap and each tone so that I could perfectly duplicate the teacher's sound. Now I am trying to listen and to feel the music. I am trying to hear the music without worrying about getting everything just exactly right.

It is the challenge of my life....letting go of the search for perfection and instead find the rhythm, the harmony and the balance that gives joy to life.