Dennis

 March 20, 2021

Dennis was one of the kids in our first youth group, way back in 1970. When we moved into the parsonage in Alma, NY, we were told there were no kids in the area, just the older folks already at the church. Being young and naive, we didn’t believe it, and went door to door through the valleys that snaked out in three directions from the intersection where was a church, parsonage, general store, fire department, and a couple dozen houses. Within a week or two, we had twenty-five teenagers camping out at our home day and night. Dennis was one of them.

After high school, he made a few bad choices that messed him up for awhile, but he came back to the Lord, and became a leader in his little church down in the Carolinas. God has a wonderful sense of humor! When Dennis was a teenager, we had a youth choir. He and his good friend Charlie were in the back row. The kids would start singing, and we would hear this drone like bagpipes; it was Dennis and Charlie, who didn’t seem to know when a note went up or down. Fast forward, and Dennis is now the song leader for his church.

Over a year ago, he started having trouble swallowing, and was later diagnosed with esophageal cancer. I saw a photo of him at that time; he had lost weight, was thin and gaunt, not the Dennis we had known. He went through the protocol, including surgery, and was soon on the mend, but recently has had complications that required a feeding tube. Nothing by mouth.

Dennis called today to see how I was doing. We talked about the symptoms, about losing my sense of taste and smell, to which he could instantly relate. “Sometimes I take a little sweet tea and swish it around in my mouth just to taste something,” he related. It will be summer before the tube comes out and they can do more surgery to correct the problem. In all this, there was no self-pity, no “Why did this happen to me?” “I’ve seen people lots worse than me,” was all he would say. Then he prayed for me. 

Pastors don’t often get prayed for, face-to-face. People say they are praying for us, but having someone actually pray specifically for me has not been a regular experience of mine. So last week when my son prayed for me, and today when Dennis prayed for me, especially in light of his own trials, it meant a lot. My wife prays for me, I’ve listened in as my granddaughters prayed for me, and friends like Harry have done so. But the prayers and perspective of someone whose physical well-being is more precarious than mine is a special gift. Thank you, Dennis, for your call and prayer, and thank you Lord, for the many years you’ve given us together, though across the miles.