To God be the glory

I have written today’s column about 1,000 times in my head, for I knew the day would come when I would be penning my last for Roanoke.Com – when I would somehow have to express all this journey has meant to me and some of my hopes for what it might have meant to some of you.

Going into this endeavor in 1999, I had no idea what to expect. I had very limited writing experience relative to producing a creative piece every week (“theoretically”), and adding the goal of inspiring the reader to new ways of considering spiritual truths (whenever possible) brought an even greater challenge to the mix.

I soon discovered that my experience with it – the consideration and formation of topics, the writing, the receiving and sharing of thoughts with readers, etc., was pretty much like owning a good hound dog. There are days when the hunt is on and the dog takes you places you could never go on your own, and there are days when you might just kick him out the door if he wasn’t your own.

Sometime we howled ... sometime we scratched ... sometimes we walked comfortably and easy like old friends.

From October 1999 to October 2001, I wrote 103 straight columns – it would have been 104, but after writing the one about my buddy Mark’s “near life experience” I needed a week off. This column appears to be number 188, but I’m never sure. My webmaster and friend Elizabeth Hill did her best to keep them straight over the years but I wasn’t always timely in making sure she had the copies when she needed them. Thank you for all you have done, E.

If the above number is correct then I somehow came up with 215,000 or so “words to say,” which is about two novels worth, according to folks who count such things. That is a statistic that will not surprise most of my friends and family. I talk too much. I suspect most writers do.

In October of 2001 the column began to be hosted on the Second Presbyterian Church website after “contract issues” developed with Roanoke.Com. The lawyers at Landmark were insisting on the copyrights to my work, and I refused. In September 2002 the Whisper1.com website came online in support of my book “Whispering Loud and Clear.” It hosted the column until December 2002 when Roanoke.Com called and said they’d like me back under revised terms that would allow me to keep my copyrights. All was forgiven and my editor, Jim Ellison, and I renewed our sometimes-rocky relationship as he pulled to have me “at least get close to the rules” of writing and I pulled back in the name of a “more relaxed and free-form voice.”

“EDITOR!”

“WRITER!”

“EDITOR!”

“WRITER!”

“FINE THEN!!” (In unison.)

Thank you, Jim. Dealing with a collection of many rookies like myself was surely never easy.

And Roanoke Times Editor Mike Riley certainly deserves a good word. He not only helped give me the confidence to land this column, but he tolerated my often “contraire” viewpoints and allowed me to “whack” the Times itself over local political and coverage issues. Say what you will about our local paper, but not many institutions will continue to pay people that hold their feet to the fire.

Which brings me to you, the reader, and my goal of saying something about what this thing might have meant to me and hopefully, in some ways, to you.

That first part will be easy because there are simply no words. I have felt my own heart leap. I have been told of yours sometimes doing the same. The Spirit has chosen to move among us. What an extraordinary blessing, that I have not and will never take for granted. Further, this column has allowed me to share some of my most intimate and strongly held beliefs and in doing so I have managed to create a record of some of the most important moments in my life. What a blessing, indeed. As I have been want to say in this space, “God is exceedingly good.”

And he is.

Have my hopes for you been reached? I don’t know – certainly not every week. But I know, at least on some occasions, they have. And when the “magic has worked,” as old Chief Lodgeskins said it sometimes would, it has had very little to do with me. I mean it. I do not write those words with the vain humility of one who seeks self-deprecation so that others might think something more of him -- but rather with the true conviction that whenever the words lifted us to something new and real and holy, that the Spirit was fully responsible.

If you and I have played any part at all in such an experience, it has been because we have simply trusted ... trusted that there is truth to be found ... trusted that after all is said and done life is ultimately “good” ... trusted that God has his plan so far beyond our reckoning that our only response is to be joyful in the very knowledge it.

Perhaps “exceedingly” was too light a word to use in reference to His goodness -- maybe “eternally,” “extravagantly” or “infinitely” -- would have been better choices.

I use them all now to his glory.

The love of Easter to you always.