It all began over thirty years ago. My brother was working in a machine shop, utilizing the electronic skills for which he had been trained in the Navy, but hating every minute of it. If all the drama and backbiting weren't enough, the confines of the shop just about drove him crazy, so when he had the opportunity to buy into a farm, he jumped. He absolutely loved the farm life, and worked hard at it. It wasn't his fault that under the presidency of Jimmy Carter, we suddenly saw energy costs skyrocket, along with interest rates that rivaled any loan shark of the Prohibition era. I don't know how many small businesses were crushed beneath the fatal combination of recession and inflation, but I know everything necessary to the running of a farm suddenly got more expensive while the price of milk plummeted. When his boys were not yet teenagers, his dream finally died as they sold off everything for which they had worked so hard, paid all their outstanding debts and walked away with the clothes on their backs.
My brother has always been an honorable man, and was never without work. He drove a streetsweeper for some years, worked in a number of small machine shops, but it seemed to me that the fire in his soul had flickered out. We talked occasionally about the future, but he had been hit too hard to try his hand at self-employment again. To my shame, in my own heart, I judged him, wanting him to get back in the fight. It wasn't until years later when Park church nearly folded amidst conflict that I understood what he had gone through. It took me ten years to really get back on my feet, and I didn't lose everything. So, my brother, I apologize, and ask your forgiveness. You are a better man than I.
Through all this, his faith remained strong. He was faithful to his wife, served in his church, never complained, raised four boys to manhood, and finally retired a few years ago.
Today, Linda and I drove to their home in Churchville, NY, for Thanksgiving dinner with him and his wife, my mother, two of his four sons with their children, my sister and her oldest daughter with her husband and children. We had a wonderful time! So often when families gather, the older folks talk amongst themselves while the younger generation does the same. Today, age didn't matter as we talked, ate, and laughed together, young and old alike. Everyone gathered around their tables is a committed follower of Jesus Christ, and there was absolutely nothing in our conversation that failed to build us up and encourage us in life. I've been to family gatherings where the tension was palpable. Here, there was none.
So tonight, I am thankful for my older brother, for the example he has lived out of what it means to be a Christian man, husband, father, and grandfather. He took what to many would have been a fatal blow, and through it showed his sons how a man of God handles adversity. And not only his sons. He showed me, too.
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