I Won’t Take No For An Answer

My newest book, Southern Grit: Stories from My Grandparents, is a marriage of memoir and life lessons from two of the most influential people in my life – my Mamaw and Papaw. I wanted to mine treasures from their lives and stories to show how they influenced and inspired me—and everyone around them—with their selfless, no-nonsense approach to both good times and hard ones. I tried to bottles up their humble wisdom, preserving their vivid stories to pass their legacy to the next generation.

Some of the stories will have you laughing, while some, like the one of my Papaw dying in 2001, will have you reaching for a box of tissues. I hope these stories inspire a new generation of people to see the impact they can have on their families and community by following Paul’s instructions to live “quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and honesty.” (I Tim. 2:2)

This book is a perfect gift for anyone who loves a good story, grew up in the south, or wants to look at servant leadership in a new light. I’m happy to come speak at book clubs or writing groups about how to capture and write your own stories. Grab your copy here.

Here is a sneak peak at the book, with one of the stories that inspired it.

A streak of stubbornness runs thick in my family, leaving deep heel tracks etched in the dirt as evidence of digging in and holding ground in a variety of circumstances. If my Mamaw makes up her mind to do something, it is easier to help her clear the path to victory than to try to oppose her. She is a master at digging her heels into proverbial hills—ones of major and minuscule importance depending on what strikes her that day. Thankfully this stubbornness is not doled out in equal measure or the whole clan would be intolerable. (A marriage with equal doses of stubbornness between parties would be like a southern backyard on the Fourth of July—primed and ready for an impressive explosion.) While Mamaw possessed the lion’s share of stubbornness in their relationship, Papaw had his own well of stubbornness he could access when a fitting situation presented itself. If he set his mind on something, he would not take no for an answer. 

In the early Fall of 1951, Papaw heard that the Lockheed factory in Atlanta, Georgia was hiring. He immediately turned in his hoe and shovel, borrowed a car, and drove the 200 miles through the thick pine forests of north Georgia to another bustling city where his younger brother Winstin and his wife Bertha had moved a few years before. He had barely dropped his bags in the house before he drove to the gate of the Lockheed factory in Marietta, in south Cobb County, on the northwest side of the Atlanta suburbs. 

The sprawling 4.2 million square foot facility was built in 1941 and produced B-29 bombers for the US Military. While airplane production stopped after the war, the building was used for storage until airplanes were again in demand during the Korean War. Lockheed’s announcement in 1950 that they would be reopening the facility is what led to Papaw’s hearing of its massive hiring campaign a few months later. 

He pulled up the gate as the sun peeked over the horizon, a fitting image for the anticipation building in his heart. 

“I’m here to apply for a job.” His hands tensed against the steering wheel as the man in the guard shack waved him through. The wide, bellowing Chevy looked like a matchbox car as the narrow gate opened to the expansive lawn framing the enormous building which towered against the pink hues of the sunrise. He parked his car and filed in line behind ten other men all wearing some form of a white shirt and brown pants with black loafers. Papaw could feel the rough edges of the gravel through the well-worn soles of his shoes. 

At 8:00 AM a heavy-set, balding man with thick-rimmed black glasses turned the lock and swung open the door. The line had swelled to over thirty men and they each took a clipboard and scratched their information into the boxes filling the paper. After methodically filling in each line of the form, Papaw approached the desk, his shoes squeaking against the tile floor. 

“We will keep this on file and let you know when we have an opening,” the man’s eyes didn’t break from scanning the newspaper on his desk. Papaw deposited the paperwork onto the newspaper. The man’s eyes met his. 

“I need this job. I’m a hard worker. I can do whatever job you ask me to do.” 

“I said we would keep it on file. Next.” 

This scene would repeat itself day after day, week after week. Each time he would fill out the paperwork only to be told it would be kept on file for a later date. He knew the potential of a company like Lockheed. He knew it was his way off the farm and onto a better life for himself and his family. And he certainly knew it was better than digging ditches. 

On one particular occasion, the stubbornness indicative of our family showed its colors through my even-tempered, measured grandfather. 

“I’m not leaving until you give me a job. I’m a hard worker. I won’t take no for an answer.”

He stared the man in the face, daring him to blink first. His calm, determined stance let his intentions be known. Wayne Taylor wasn’t leaving without a job. 

That day, his persistence paid off. The hills of the Appalachian Mountains would be in his rear-view mirror from that day forward. 

“All I can offer you is the night shift. You’ll start after the first of the year.” 

After such persistence and groveling, you would have thought he would have graciously accepted whatever job they offered, even if it had been the janitor, but his pragmatic, level-headed response showed an unusual speed of delivery. 

“I had to sell the car to buy our house, and the bus don’t run that time of night. I’ll work the day shift until I can save enough money to buy another car.” 

Maybe Lockheed needed day shift workers as much as they needed night shift workers or maybe they were so intrigued with the persistence and boldness of this farm boy from North Carolina that they agreed. 

Over the next two months, he bought a house in the suburbs and moved his family, which now included baby Martha, down from Tennessee. Burton, Mamaw’s little brother, made the four-hour drive in the middle seat of the moving truck. Coming from a family of fourteen, Burton doubted his presence would be missed at home. Helping your sister move may not have been exciting for some, but a chance at a road trip promised enough excitement to lure him along. A bus ticket back to Tennessee felt like a fair payment for a weekend of adventure in the big city of Atlanta. 

With his family settled, Papaw went to work. He honored his word and switched to the night shift after he saved enough money to buy a car. He spent the next thirty-eight years working at one of the largest airplane manufacturing facilities in the country. He helped assemble the C-130, C-141, and the massive C-5 cargo planes for the US Air Force. 

His ambitions were never self-serving. He didn’t dream of seeing his name on billboards or amassing a fortune, he simply had a drive to provide for his family. He didn’t consciously plan to achieve the American Dream. He didn’t leave the farm out of anger or pride; he just didn’t want to dig ditches or milk cows at 4:00 AM. He set his hand to the plow to find a job that would match his intellect and skill, and he wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Who was Helen Keller? 

If you are over the age of thirty, you probably learned about her in middle school history. The blind and deaf girl who, at the turn of the century, with the help of her teacher Anne Sullivan, overcame impossible odds to learn not only to communicate with those around her through sign language, but to read and write through braille as well. She stands as one of the most inspirational figures of the twentieth century. 

But do your teenagers know who she is?  Go ask them, come back, and finish reading. 

Chances are, your teenager knows who Helen Keller is; however, they likely didn’t meet her on the pages of a history book. They probably met her on TikTok.  My teenage girls (18 & 15) did, in fact, meet Helen Keller in homeschool history class. My girls don’t even have TikTok, and yet, they, too, were introduced to a version of Helen Keller my fellow Gen Xers wouldn’t recognize. 

According to TikTok lore, Helen Keller did in fact exist – she just didn’t live up to the character portrayed in The Miracle Worker. I’ve talked to multiple teenagers, and they all tell me the same thing: no one who was deaf and blind could do what she did. They simply don’t believe it’s true. 

I applaud these teens for thinking critically and developing their own thoughts. But eyewitness accounts and primary source documents, the gold standard for historical data, stand in direct contradiction to their collective conclusion.

Why do teenagers believe strangers on TikTok over their parents or history books?  As parents, we should be concerned with how quickly seeds of doubt can sway a generation. What if someone said that there’s no way a human could rise from the dead? Yes, maybe he lived and was a good person, but there’s no way someone could do what He claimed He did. 

It is the same logic, and it is a dangerous path. Asking your kid if they believe in Helen Keller is just a litmus test to see who they consider credible sources of information. We can’t make our kids believe anything. It is not our job to try to force them or shame them into a set of beliefs, but it is our job as parents to first know truth ourselves and help present it in a compelling way to our kids. Kids ask questions like they are getting paid to be investigative journalists. We owe them answers to the straightforward questions of early childhood to the deeper, more substantive questions of young adulthood. 

We have to build credibility with them from a young age by asking questions and doing whatever it takes to answer theirs. We need to guard the voices they are listening to because ideas are powerful. Powerful enough to erase an icon of the twentieth century from the history books. 

Before we moved to Spain, I had never considered living outside the US.  While I knew it was always within the realm of possibility as a military family, we were never actively pursuing it.  

Our move to Spain was unique because it would put us eight hours from the nearest base, fully immersed in the culture.  

Well, almost fully immersed. I didn’t anticipate fighting the battle of living with one foot in America and one foot in Spain.  

The military allowed us to move all of our belongings, except for major appliances like our washer and dryer.  So, once our stuff arrived, inside the walls of our house felt like America, minus the bread drawer and jamon slicer in my kitchen. 

The first few months, I fought to make my surroundings feel like I had never left America.  Wal-Mart and Amazon shipments filled my pantry with peanut butter, Kind bars, Triscuits, and even Bounty select-a-size paper towels.  We kept our online homeschool classes and piano lessons in the US, giving us afternoon and evening classes. We stationed multiple transformers around the house to use things like our keyboard, TVs, and Instant Pot. We bought what felt like hundreds of plug adapters for dual voltage electronics like our phones, computers, and sound machines (a necessity in every Monroe bedroom). Even outside of our house, we screamed “American,” driving the only Honda Odyssey on the streets of Valencia.  The discomfort was tangible as we sought to squeeze our American life into our new Spanish reality. 

As we began to meet other non-military Americans and ex-pats, I realized that our situation was unique. All of the ex-pats we knew rented furnished apartments, only bringing with them clothes and other essentials.  They stepped off the plane and never got to escape into an American cocoon. I began to look at them with a bit of envy. 

Living with one foot here and one foot there isn’t wrong; it is just my reality. While I do love my monthly Amazon shipments, there have been times it would be nice to not have to reach back to America for so many things to operate day to day.  I have to order print cartridges, schoolbooks, printer paper (if I want the paper to fit in a three-ring binder), stamps, oil, filters, and parts for the cars. While we did buy some European items like a coffee pot, hairdryer, fans, and a space heater, I hit a point several months ago where I refused to buy anything else with a European plug. (Our nomadic lifestyle tendencies kick in as we start to look ahead to the next place, months before we actually leave.) 

I wouldn’t change our circumstances.  I’m thankful for the experience of being immersed in a culture.  And I am grateful I could order my kids a box of cheerios to give them a little piece of home when everything around them changed so quickly.  Nothing gave me the comfort of home when I needed it most than when my van arrived in Spain.  However, some moments parking a European car into tiny spots would be far easier than my Odyssey. I love the oasis of our house in the suburbs, but I know my Spanish would be far better if we lived in the city and I had to interact with more people daily.  Our kids being in school this year has at least provided more interaction and language skills for them. 

One foot on either side of the ocean was what I needed for this move. We have adopted some Spanish ways, learned the language…all while eating off American paper plates. While we will miss so many things about our lives here when we move back to America, looking for a plug adapter when we need to charge a phone will not be one of them. 

During our sixteen-year nomadic journey from one home to the next, we have lived in everything from a cookie-cutter three-bedroom two bath, to a 100-year-old apartment, to a sprawling Spanish villa. The highs and lows of each house have given us a clearer picture of what we would like in our “someday house.” From big-ticket items like a basement to small things like plenty of outlets in strategic places, we have begun to determine what matters to us and what just doesn’t. 

We typically live in military housing, which isn’t always known for its innovation or frills like sitting rooms and basements. Contrast that to the past three years where we’ve been incredibly fortunate to have an overseas housing allowance that has afforded us things we’ve never had in our houses in the states – a spacious backyard, swimming pool, a collection of fruit trees, five bedrooms, and garage that could fit six cars if you parked them just right. It even has a stone tower worthy of Rapunzel. We would love to incorporate the basics of this floor plan, a five-bedroom, one-level house on a basement, into our future home with some American updates, like central air. 

In preparation for our return to the US this summer, we recently put a contract on a new construction house in South Carolina (sight unseen, which is a bit scary!). Since military housing wasn’t an option, we had the opportunity to look at many floor plans in new construction neighborhoods in this growing area.  Floor plans, 3D models, and virtual walk-throughs gave us a crash course in what appeals to buyers in our demographic.  

We noticed one thing repeatedly in each house we looked at: the square footage spent on the master suite. When did master closets become the size of football fields? Why exactly are master bedrooms so enormous compared to other bedrooms? I totally get that the people paying the bills should not get shafted in the deal, but why have so much square footage in a bedroom? 

All of this comparing and contrasting over the last few months have cemented in our mind our Dream House Wish List.  

1. Basement – this is our biggest dream to have a basement complete with a kids’ hang-out area, dedicated schoolroom, and home gym. 
2. Open Floor Plan – you don’t have to have a huge house for it to be functional. We value square footage in open living spaces. Instead of a master bedroom big enough for three king-size beds, we would use the square footage for a loft or office. 
3. Custom Closets – I know walk-in closets are all the rage, but we have built-in custom closets in our current house, and we never want to go back! Closets with built-in drawers and functional storage areas reduce the wasted floor space of walk-in closets and can completely eliminate the need for dressers. I know this is a far-fetched dream for an American house, but check out my Instagram story for a detailed look, and I promise you will want to abandon team walk-in closet! 
4. Kitchen – this is the hub of our home. I would prioritize money for the kitchen over anything else. Plenty of storage, functionality, a garbage disposal, gas range, double ovens, a refrigerator with water and ice (a luxury we’ve rarely had), and a walk-in pantry are all must-haves. 
5. Outdoor space – area for a trampoline, green space, outdoor kitchen and dining, and a pool all make the dream list for outdoor space. We have been incredibly spoiled with our outdoor space and the climate to enjoy it here in Spain. I was hesitant about the pool at first, but with proper safety measures and a pool maintenance man, it has been amazing! Living in a climate where we can spend a lot of time outside has become a big priority. With stone terraces, fruit trees, and walkways wrapping around most of our house, the green space in the back leaves just enough to enjoy without owning a tractor to manage it all. 
6. Central Heating and Air – when you have lived without it, it makes the list.
7. Bathrooms with a separate door for the shower and toilet.  When kids are sharing a bathroom, this is such a game-changer! 
8. Mud Room – I love this area to organize shoes, snow gear, backpacks, and sports equipment. 
9. Carpet in the bedrooms – We have lived in several houses with hardwoods throughout. While I love hardwoods, I enjoy having carpet between my toes in my bedroom. 
10. Storage – at least one large closet is important for things like luggage. A walk-up attic or space in the garage for shelving for seasonal items. 

Our list is constantly changing as our priorities shift and our family needs change. Only the Lord knows if we will ever get to incorporate any of these into that elusive someday house, but for now, it is fun to dream. What is on your dream list? 

From the outside, military kids’ lives often look like a page out of Oh the Places You’ll Go.  From riding camels in Egypt to surfing in Hawaii, to field trips to the flight simulators and seeing the northern lights in Alaska – on any given day, my newsfeed can be filled with military families’ highlight reels of adventures.  While they have some fantastic opportunities, like everyone else in life, the newsfeed doesn’t always capture the struggle. While struggle isn’t unique to military kids, they have many opportunities for growth built into their little worlds that they may not have otherwise. 

When we decided to move to Spain, our kids were 10, 7, 4, and 1. While we consulted the older kids in the decision, none of them were old enough to truly understand what a move like that would mean in their lives. Packing up and moving was so typical that it didn’t really feel any different…until it did.  

They were shielded from much of the initial jolt of living in a foreign country due to homeschooling.  The real estate agent or the cable guy didn’t expect a response from them. They didn’t have to navigate roundabouts or the grocery store or find a church. Their daily routine had the same rhythm it always had.  Not to say they didn’t struggle at all.  Finding friends felt impossible for the older kids in a neighborhood with walls around every house and a church where our kids made up 90% of the children’s church. However, they did have a foundation of normalcy. 

During a Thanksgiving dinner with friends in 2019, a native Spaniard asked where our kids went to school. Since homeschooling is a foreign concept here, that is not always an easy question to answer.  He replied, “That’s good, but what a pity they will walk away from living in a foreign country for three years without learning to speak the language.” 

Over the next several weeks, I couldn’t shake his comment. We had lived in Spain fifteen months at the time, and our Spanish was weak. (It is totally possible to live in a foreign country and not learn the language, especially when you speak English to each other every day at home, you homeschool your kids, your husband speaks English at work, and almost all of your friends are Americans.) Chad and I prayed over the decision for the next several weeks, and both came to the same conclusion – we wanted to send our kids to school.  Not only were they not learning the language, but they were also lonely. We usually have a network of homeschooling families and activities, but there was nothing of the sort in Spain.  

We saw the opportunity to do something for our kids that would benefit them for the rest of their lives.  Beyond just learning a second language (which is a big deal), going to a school in Spain would forever give them perspective and empathy of being the new kid.  It would provide them with the confidence (we hoped) to know that they could do new things even if they seemed hard at first. They would get a deeper appreciation for Spanish culture and have the opportunity to make new friends.  They would also get to ride a school bus, which is every homeschooler’s dream. 

Other friends who had put their kids directly into Spanish schools without their kids knowing the language cheered us on in our decision, assuring us that while the beginning would be hard, three months into school, our kids would be thriving.  

The girls each had the opportunity to say yes or no.  We knew the long-term benefits they would gain but didn’t want to force them into the decision. This wouldn’t just be a new school – it would be the first time they went to any school. Throw in a global pandemic, and everything would be taught in Spanish, and you have a big learning curve staring at them. They would have to navigate learning how to go to school, find their bus, balance homework, make friends on the playground and learn Spanish, all while wearing masks. Three out of the four kids agreed to the idea with varying levels of trepidation. Jake, who was three at the time, did not see the value of spending the entire day away from his mom!

Through the upheaval of Covid the following spring, we enrolled all four kids in school and waited for September to come. We bought new uniforms, backpacks, pencils and eight pairs of new shoes. On the first day of school, I’m not sure who was more nervous.  Having navigated the entire enrollment process in Spanish, I doubted the instructions I gave to them because I doubted my own ability to fully understand the information that had been given to me.  Thankfully they had been to two weeks of summer camp at the school, which gave them a basic knowledge of the layout and some familiar faces.

We pulled up to the school and filed in line behind the closed gate.  As the doors slid open, all four of our kids took a step forward.  They didn’t freeze.  They didn’t run to the safety of the van.  They walked through the doors, understanding how challenging the next few weeks would be.

Addison and Mya quickly found their classes, and Chad and I split up to take Lucy and Jake.  I walked up to the preschool door with Jake tugging on my arm. After a brief exchange with the teacher, I realized we were at the wrong classroom.  

“Mom, that’s not my class,” he had been trying to tell me.  He remembered his teacher’s face from our initial meeting with her and knew that lady wasn’t her. We walked around the building, and he knew when we had found the right class.  

After a brief hug and kiss, he confidently walked into the room, not looking back for a moment. 

I met Chad at the gate to leave, my eyes already brimming with tears, but his face caused me to pause. 

“Lucy’s teacher wasn’t at their line. I’m not even sure if she is with the right class.” 

With Covid restrictions, we were limited to where we could go in the schoolyard and were asked to leave as soon as we dropped our kids off.  Covid or not, we couldn’t leave until we knew she was settled. 

I weaved my way through the throng of kids to the second-grade class lines. She stood at the end of the line, her blond pigtails framing her face. Two blue eyes bulging with tears peaked over her pink mask. I inhaled deeply to keep from losing it right there on the patio.  She needed me to be strong for her in that moment.  I could cry later. 

I found her teacher, told her that Lucy knew very little Spanish (shocking that she had not been made aware of that before), and the teacher, feeling my concern, brought another girl over to stand with Lucy and help her navigate the day. I gave her a hug and whispered a prayer into her ear.  I wanted those kids to be able to see her beautiful smile.  I wanted them to rush to her and make her feel welcome.  I wanted to save her from the pain and discomfort she was facing. 

But I walked away.  I had to entrust each of them to their Heavenly Father, knowing His eyes would be there, even when I couldn’t see them.  I had a good cry sitting in my van and welcomed them with hugs and cookies when they stepped off the bus that afternoon. 

I have never been more proud of my kids than I was that day.  I couldn’t do what I was asking them to do.  They faced their fears and continued to go back day after day.  Days were hard in the beginning.  Their bodies and minds were exhausted by the end of the day. Homework humbled all of us as we were all forced to drink from the fire hydrant of learning a second language. But six months later, we are all still standing.  They are each conversational for their age, and they love school, minus the fish lunches. Addison has jumped into eighth-grade work with no remedial classes for Spanish and is passing every class.  Mya speaks as fast as a native kid.  Our shy little Lucy has surprised us all by loving school more than anyone else.  Jake’s teacher says now she would never know he wasn’t a native speaker.

We aren’t perfect parents.  We fall short so often, but I am so thankful we took this leap. As parents, we have opportunities to expand our kids’ horizons for the opportunity of growth.  Sometimes it is not the right time or season for hard growth, but sometimes it is.  We can’t let our fear stand in the way of their opportunities. They are capable of so much more than we think they are.  There are times the Lord is calling us to toss them into the deep end of the pool so that we can watch them swim! 

PS – I am in the midst of a 30-day writing challenge. You may see a few more emails from me than normal, but know it is just temporary and I promise not to bombard your inbox forever!

Is God good even when He says no to our most desperate prayers?

I am a teacher.  Some days my kids probably wish that I weren’t because it makes for longer than average explanations, a sometimes over-enthusiasm for learning, and a high standard for homework checks.  I probably go over my daily word limit when I feel passionate about a subject and enjoy pulling threads of understanding and faith into any topic.  

A few weeks ago, I was teaching an online high school history class. While discussing the empires of Assyria and Babylon, I dove into a discussion about the goodness of God. Through the pages of Scripture describing this time period, we see a cruel and unforgiving world where cities are pillaged, nations destroyed, people slaughtered, and people starving. By the end of class, my pulse quickened, and I resisted the urge to stand to my feet as I implored them to view all of life through the lens of the goodness of God. 

“If we don’t come to these events with a foundational belief that God is good, we can quickly lose our footing theologically. If God is good, then even the worst events in history, from the destruction of Jerusalem to the Holocaust, to childhood cancer and human trafficking, can be seen as pieces of a puzzle that God is ultimately working together for good. Suppose we don’t fundamentally believe that He is good. In that case, we have no basis for how to interpret a God that can allow such atrocities.” 

Days after my resounding commentary on the goodness of God, I walked through a tough week of hardship, sickness, and death in our circle of friends. A dear friend died of Covid. A pastor and mentor died after a painful and abrupt battle with cancer. Another friend, a husband, pastor, and father of four lay in the ICU fighting for his life. It felt like the next wave of sadness crashed before I had a chance to come up for air. 

It is moments like these that our faith, what we put our hope in, whether that is God or something, is tested.  Pain and suffering can shine a light into the deepest parts of our soul, where we learn if the faith we claim to have can handle the harsh realities of a fallen world. 

Grief and concern piled on top of the painful reality of being an ocean away and the weariness of a year of lockdowns and restrictions. The heaviness pressed on me like a dark, wet blanket. Even in the darkness, however, I had a bedrock of truth forged years ago supporting me. 

If you know me, you probably know how much I love my grandparents.  They have been pillars in my life. In 2001, during my sophomore year in college, my parents called and said to come home.  My Pa-paw was dying. I drove the nine hours home from Ohio the next morning with sadness, silence, and troubling anticipation as my constant companions.

When the time came to say our final goodbye, my dad gathered the family in a circle stretching beyond the waiting room to the elevator doors.  His prayer at that moment stands as a cornerstone of my faith.  He prayed the words of Daniel 3:17 (which was spoken by three Hebrew teenagers as they stood up to an emperor in the face of certain death): 

“If it be so, our God who we serve is able to deliver us from this and to raise Pa-paw up and heal him.  But if not…” his voice cracked with emotion. “But if not, O God, we will still love you and serve you.  We know that You are good. You are faithful to us even now.” 

My dad’s faith came to life for me that day.  It wasn’t just a faith that he talked about or hoped would be there one day.  It wasn’t a list of rules and regulations or obligations of service.  His faith wasn’t in a church building or a religious system.  His faith – my faith – stood up to even the most difficult circumstances because it was based on a fundamental trust in the goodness of God.  God wasn’t a vending machine from whom we could demand a particular response. To trust in a God that answers our every demand is to trust in a being subject to our own whims and desires. And to trust in a God that isn’t fundamentally good is terrifying. 

A peace washed through my heart standing in that circle.  It seared my faith with an understanding that no matter what I saw around me, I could trust in a God who was good and had good plans for me and those I loved.  

I’ve had a few “But if not” moments in my own life since then. I’ve stood at cliffs of uncertainty where He was asking me to jump and trust that He would catch me. In those moments, I have had to decide if He really would. Each time I have stood with more confidence than the last that my hope in Christ is real and sustaining.  It is what I have when I’ve sat in a puddle with the pieces of my shattered life surrounding me. It is the confidence I can have that He will make all things new one day, even if the answer is not today. One day every sickness will be healed. Poverty and crime will be eradicated.  Whether He chooses to answer my prayers on this day or that day, I can trust that He is a loving, good, and kind God. He doesn’t orchestrate evil in the world, but in His kindness, He uses it to draw me closer to Him. 

PS – I am in the midst of a 30-day writing challenge. You may see a few more emails from me than normal, but know it is just temporary and I promise not to bombard your inbox forever!

I grew up in the heart of the Bible Belt, in a county that, thirty years ago, barely scraped the corner of metro-Atlanta. It’s the kind of place where everyone goes to church on Sunday, waves an American flag, drinks sweet tea, and takes their second amendment rights seriously.  My dad is also a Baptist deacon and choir director. All of these factors set me up for some spot-on stereotypes: 

1. I can quickly discern a good casserole from a bad one in the homecoming buffet line. 
2. I know the difference between culottes and walking shorts and have owned both. 
3. It might be an even split between hours I spent at church and hours I spent at home during my childhood.  
4. I know the words to each stanza of “There’s Power in the Blood,” “Victory in Jesus,” “I’ll Fly Away,” and “Just as I Am.” 
5. I’ve been to a lot of funerals. 

While going to funerals is probably written into a Baptist deacon’s job description, it is also written into our DNA as a family. My grandmothers and mom have modeled how to take care of people when they are grieving.  When someone dies, you take a meal, send flowers, visit the family at the funeral home, attend the funeral and the graveside service.  Maybe this is routine for southerners, churchgoers, or people in a strong community, but growing up, I thought it was normal for everyone.  It wasn’t until I met my husband and learned that he had only been to one funeral in his life that I realized regularly attending funerals wasn’t the norm for everyone. 

Our world has had much to grieve over the last year. While everyone walks through the stages of grief differently, we all need to grieve to move on in a healthy way when we suffer loss. For me, going to funerals is an essential part of the grieving process.  Funerals give an opportunity to share memories with others, grieve together and celebrate and honor the life of the person who died. It provides a sense of closure as I pass from one stage of grief to the next. Since living in Europe, I have missed the funerals of several people dear to me. Each time my grief was compounded by not being able to go to the funeral, like a pouring salt into a tender wound. 

While helping us grieve, funerals also provide a time to celebrate life. No matter how short, long, accomplished, simple, broken, or restored – each God-given life is worthy of remembering. Whether it is a large gathering in a church or a handful of people in field, every person deserves to have those closest to them speak words over them in their remembrance. It gives dignity to their life and death and a chance to focus on our ultimate hope of eternity. On a recent trip to Normandy, I walked through the American Cemetery with my children.  As we passed each white cross, we took turns saying the names out loud of the men who had given their lives there in the name of freedom. I wanted my children to know the value of each life and the high cost of freedom and I somehow wanted those men to know they were not forgotten. 

I’ve bought last-minute plane tickets, driven through the night, stood at snowy gravesides and the hallowed grounds of Arlington because often our presence in times of grief is meaningful not only to us but to others. There is something about showing up to funerals and memorials that shows the family that their loved one impacted others and will not be forgotten. I remember a high school friend who drove a long way to come to my Pa-paw’s funeral. It was a simple but meaningful gesture of support that I still remember twenty years later. 

Whether it’s the high cost of burial, busy schedules, distance between loved ones, or now Covid restrictions, there is a subtle shift in norms in our society on the importance of funerals and shared grief. Now more than ever, I believe we need to walk through grief well.  We need to grieve together, honor the dead, support their families, and share the hope of an eternity free from pain, suffering, and death.  Even if we can’t attend a funeral, we can share a meal, send a card, or make a phone call to support the family and remember the life.