I recently read “The Last Lecture,” the autobiography of a rapidly dying man, Randy Pausch. He had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He did try a new hail-mary operation, but it didn’t work; the cancer was terminal. Pausch was a certifiably crazy character, had incredible wisdom to share, and wrote it out very well. Understandably, The Last Lecture became wildly popular. I definitely recommend it–I’m not sure that I agree with all his ideas, but regardless the wisdom he shares is amazing and inspiring.

I was first amazed by how he’d lived truly–his life story is one full and rich experience after another. However, far more amazing to me was that he continued to live as so after finding out he would die soon. It’s amazing.

As always, my ego began to play its foolish tune. By the end of the book I was fully sure that if something like that happened to me tomorrow, I could definitely handle it as well as he did. Sure, I’d be different, but I was all “oh yeah, I could do this.” Then it hit me the other evening, and it hit me hard. For some reason, I began to think, “what if I suddenly felt some odd pain in my chest tonight, and within a week had been given a few months to live?” Suddenly I felt very different about the matter. I wasn’t imagining myself in somebody else’s life, I was imagining my life, and it was scary.

What would I do, how could I feel? It shook me to the core. Sure, everybody thinks about dying, but I guess I’d never thought about it earnestly enough. While my mind was still reeling, two things came to form, slowly:

1. Randy Pausch was an incredible man.

2. . I tried to do the “Ok, what’s important in my life?” route, and it took me far, far too long to come up with answers. That is bad.

After some time, some ideas became clearer in my mind–well, no–heart. If I had only three months left to live, I would pour every bit of myself, my heart and soul, into relationships: with my savior*, my family, and my friends. Individuals in whom I’ve invested during my time here, I would do all in my power to solidify what I’ve done; I’d give everything I could with my last being. Those who’ve invested in me up to date, I would do everything I could to show them my gratitude. I would also want to fly at least once, preferably an ultralight or helicopter (fly, not ride in).

A third thought occurred to me:

3. What would Joe White have said, if he could’ve given a last lecture?

Shortly thereafter a possible answer came to mind:
Randy Pausch was a lecturer by trade, so that was his choice way to stick something here before he moved on. Joe wasn’t a lecturer, he was a soldier, writer, child of God, husband, brother and son, and friend (no particular order). I would guess that he wouldn’t give a “last lecture.” Pausch’s last lecture was rooted in his desire to leave something truly good. Joe loved and lived in the deepest way I’ve ever seen–this shines through in the lives of those that were closest to him, and will continue to shine on. That is the great good he stuck here before he moved on. Thank you, Joe :’-).

*Savior? From what? Death? Well, not really, but kind of…a kind of death, but not physical; death of being, which is sorta like not truly living. If I were dying in a few months, it’s likely I wouldn’t not die (“no duh Dave,” you say, and I agree). And even if I didn’t die, I would later. We humans kinda have that condition…our bodies wear out, then we die. It’s a severe misconception that God is all entirely about us mortals magically becoming immortal and going to heaven when we “die,” making things all hunky-dory. That misconceptions propagation badly bothers me. Great books have been written about it (The Great Divorce, for example; or A Severe Mercy), and if I were to try to explain it all, I wouldn’t do as good of a job as they have done, so I won’t try. Essentially, I firmly believe that God’s big idea was (is?) to make awesomeness and beauty by giving us pure and incredible potential to BE. To live, laugh, cry, hurt, be hurt, forgive, think, and BE–all relational things. But by nature, the pure potential to be comes with the condition of flaw–if it didn’t, it’d be fake and mechanical. But that’s the beauty here with us humans, we can choose to deal with that condition as we please–ignore it, address it, embrace it, et cetera. That’s the ONLY reason being is worth anything at all, and why it’s so beautiful when we do choose to accept help, Christs help (which is NOT simply “let me make you better than the sinners”…that’s silliness). I am, richly, and this is expressly through the love of God. The love of god was struck into my world by Jesus, by his making a way for justice (and so peace) between God and I…between God and any human. By this justice, I have peace and identity, both deeply rooted. Jesus was, is, and will be. So yes, I have a relationship with my savior, and that’s my horribly simplistic explanation of why. “How” is a trickier question…more on the topic to come later, surely. I tried to make this (terribly long) paragraph broad and vague, just to be sure that it doesn’t give any impression of a specific and complete account, which it is precisely not.