The Age of Miracles is Over.
So says conventional wisdom. But that January in 2008, the Reverend Steve Bolen had a different perspective.
"My goal… my dream, is that each one of you will experience a miracle in 2008," he said, his voice steady and resolute. I sat in the pew, listening. Steve Bolen is no sideshow charlatan; he is the über-discerning overseer of a large flock of thoughtful people. What? Miracles? I listened and tried to tune into his frequency. He said many things, but the way it came home for me was this: to accomplish a miracle, you must allow -- more than allow, truly enable -- a thing to happen that you think is literally impossible.
Immediately, I knew what Kathy's "Miracle" was. To be reconciled with her father, with whom she has not spoken or seen since she was 11 years old.
Thirty five years is a long time without your father. There was a bitter divorce. A mother who remarried and moved her far away from her life in Kentucky down south to Texas. A heart-stricken father who felt that his youngest was slipping away forever. Terrible words were exchanged -- "you will never see me again." Difficult for a child, but also impossibly difficult for a father in pain. When I first met her as student in Denton many years ago she was 22 and had spent half of her life without her father. She is one of the strongest people you will ever meet, but the hole in her heart over her father was palpable. After being married some years, she sought counseling to "get over it. "I’m going to have to let him go, without regrets," she said. Any notion of a reconciliation became a dim memory of lost hope.
But Steve Bolen's inspiration suddenly opened the possibilities wide. Reconciling with her father? Impossible, wasn't it? When we got back home I asked her what she thought of Steve's sermon.
"I thought it was intriguing," she replied.
"I know what your 'Miracle' is," I said quietly. "We are going to Kentucky in September for your grandfather's 95th birthday. Your dad will only be a few hours away. Let’s -- just show up at his door. This is your business and it's up to you, but I have to tell you, it seems like the right thing to do. Well, if we are going to believe in a Miracle."
She stared at me, speechless. The conversation was short. I didn’t bring it up again, but she did about a month before we left for Kentucky. "I think we should do it," she said. She spoke to her sister, who had maintained a relationship with their
father, and who agreed. What we didn’t know was that there would be an angel in the middle of this exercise to help bring this Miracle to life -- her father's girlfriend, Karen, a delightful soul who would be let in on this secret and help set the stage.It’s a great idea to surprise him, she conveyed through Kathy’s sister, putting us all more at ease. She cooked up a feast beforehand and even had the piano tuned so that the Scott kids could show off just a little. And as Karma would have it, the weekend we planned to arrive, her dad’s siblings were visiting, a sort of mini-family reunion setting the table for a much more dramatic one.
It was a long drive there, and when we rolled up the hilly driveway to Ken's house that day, I felt somewhat sick. I can only imagine how Kathy felt. Thirty five years of absence and hurt sets the stage for grand drama and a real case of butterflies. I will never forget walking up to the door and knocking, or the look on Ken's face when he saw the daughter he had not seen in so many years.
Kathy had always said of her father, "we loved each other so much. He was so funny and full of life." The man I
met that day, the father-in-law I had never met, was a delight. Keenly intelligent. Funny as hell. And, most importantly, immediately accepting of a long lost daughter and her family. Whatever had caused years of hurt and pain melted away like the cold ice of winter into the green leaves of spring. It was a moment bright with love and redemption, and it was an utter miracle -- for neither Kathy, nor me, nor anyone in her family, probably including Ken -- thought it even remotely possible. Thank you, Steve Bolen. I write with moist eyes to tell you that from your words sprang the realization of an impossible dream. Had we not been there to hear your words that day, this amazing Life Moment would never have happened.
Kathy and her father have stayed in close touch since. There is no dwelling on the past, for as the jazz musician Babatunde Olatunji said, “Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, and today? Today is a gift. That's why we call it the ‘present.’” The joy of living in the midst of a Miracle is that it evaporates old painful memories, leaving the old nostalgic ones in their place as a backdrop to the happiness of a new Today.
"The sun never says to the earth,
'You owe me.'
Look what happens with a love like that.
It lights up the whole sky."
-- the Sufi mystic Hafiz
And even I would not be shortchanged in this year of Miracles. That January day “my” impossible miracle popped into my head, but I quickly dismissed it. My brother Dan, lost to me so many years, far over a decade. Not literally a brother, but more literally a brother than most brothers. We had lost touch, both moved around the country, and I couldn’t find him. I am good at finding people -- I spent years tracking down my Ohio family -- but I could not find Dan despite many, many hours of trying. Finding him seemed impossible, although listening to Steve that day, I thought "I'll find him, eventually." Somewhere in some distant place there was a "click," because sometimes The Universe -- God by any other name -- has surprises in store for us.
About a month later, I received a message on my Batcave site. "Guess who?" it said. No idea. An email came in the next day... “Que Pasa?” from sender “Dan Endres.” I sat staring at the screen. In the midst of my impossibility, it seems that Dan had been looking for me for quite some time. When I started Blogging some years ago, leaving a crumb-trail to be found was definitely one of my reasons why. And as it turned out, this was a critical piece of making it happen. Seeing him and his daughter Alie in Austin that summer was my highlight of the year.
What should you make of all this, Gentle Browser? Perhaps it means that whether you are a hymn-singing Baptist, a loyal Catholic, a mystical possibilities-oriented Unity practitioner, or a confirmed Agnostic, there is a Principle which can affect and change your life. “I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you,” Jesus said. Part of such Faith is the very active act of putting-your-actions-where-your-thoughts are. The Buddha echoes this sentiment: “However many holy words you read, however many you speak, what good will they do you if you do not act on upon them?"
Miracles come to those who Believe. And even more so to those who make it so. Blessings.
With much love and gratitude for my friend Rev. Steve Bolen, a true and sincere light illuminating the path...
Steve on a recent local Fox News 7 segment:
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