Growing up in Northeast Alabama, "the mountains" meant the Great Smoky Mountains in our neighbor-to-the-north, Tennessee. The Smokies look ancient and worn like tired hump-backed giants napping under a blanket of trees and shrubs. Spruce, fir, maple, ash, oak, pine, poplar and hemlock flow down the slopes, seasonally accessorized by showy dogwoods and rhododendrons. Cool mountain water runs in streams, rivers and waterfalls through valleys and coves. Rounded peaks are pillowed against the sky by namesake smoky-looking cloud cover. There is a gentleness to the Smokies evoking peace and serenity. We would go there for a couple of days when Daddy could get away from the steel plant and church responsibilities at the same time. It would be during the week and never very long. The call on Daddy, transferred to us all, was deep and the pull back home was strong.
When I was a teenager, we traveled to Colorado a couple of summers so Mama and Daddy could attend staff training for Campus Crusade for Christ (now CRU). It was held at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, along the Cache la Poudre River at the base of the Rocky Mountains. When they had free time, we would drive up through Estes Park along Trail Ridge Road into Rocky Mountain National Park. If the Smoky Mountains are old sleeping giants, the Rockies are young roaring dinosaurs with sharp ridged backs and switching tails. Meadows skirt along the lower slopes, alpines cling in higher crevices giving way to tundra at the top, hunkered low to the ground. The rivers are wild and unpredictable. Where the Smokies seem calm and peaceful, the Rockies are brash and exhilarating.
On one of our trips into the Rockies, we stopped at the Continental Divide. To my horror, Daddy stood in front of the signage with a cup of water in each hand. He proceeded to pour them out on either side of the Divide announcing to our fellow tourists that one of his cups would flow to the Atlantic and one to the Pacific. I kid you not... there is a picture somewhere. I can't put my hands on it at the moment or I would absolutely share.
He was always doing things like that and I spent my teen years in a state of perpetual embarrassment. I was, in a word, awkward. Country bumpkin transplanted to the graceful sophistication of historic Winston-Salem. So many opportunities to be different... accent, clothes, the anxiety of puberty... striving to find my place and my people (many of whom are still my people - big love to the Calvary girl gang and the Facebook fellows). To top it off, my parents themselves were making their way in this new home, looking for community in the city, fully clothed with generations of rural naivety. Mama approached shyly, Daddy blazed in with a smile and a handshake and a really bad joke. He didn't know he was different. Which is actually a really wonderful thing. I know that now. At the time, it was excruciating.
I remember standing beside Daddy at a lookout point the first time we really saw the magnitude of the Rocky Mountains. I can see him in his dark dress pants and white short sleeved shirt, his casual wear, pockets stuffed with Rolaids, a handkerchief and a gold-colored copy of The Four Spiritual Laws. He was visibly moved and said to Mama and me, "The Smokies are beautiful but these mountains are something else - they're majestic." And then he started to sing. How Great Thou Art. Out loud. Real loud. Every single verse, with the choruses between. I was mortified. Now, he could sing, had a nice baritone voice, so that wasn't the problem. It was the people staring at him... at us... at me by association. I wanted to crawl in a hole, but I stood there in this impromptu congregation while my Daddy sang the Gospel. Looking back, I wish had had courage to join him - no one else did. But it marked me indelibly for I'm still moved to tears that I was there for such a high and holy moment. He finished his song, wiped his eyes with his handkerchief and we drove on higher. (They even let me get behind the wheel along some of those stretches - hence the Rolaids?)
The main thing to know about my Daddy was that he lived his faith without reserve. He was far from perfect and continued to annoy me regularly up till the day he died. But he preached the Gospel in season and out, in churches, in shoe stores, at gas stations, in hospital rooms (even when he was the patient at times), and at home. One day, he pulled that little gold-colored booklet out of his shirt pocket and led my son to the Lord. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Daddy.
I'm coming along, Daddy, bringing up the rear stuttering and stumbling, trying to do my best to live with that kind of abandon... with that kind of faith. In awe. Selah.
How Great Thou Art
O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder, Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made; I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder, Thy power throughout the universe displayed. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art! When through the woods, and forest glades I wander, And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees. When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art!
And when I think, that God, His Son not sparing; Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in; That on a Cross, my burdens gladly bearing, He bled and died to take away my sin. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art! When Christ shall come, with shout of acclamation, And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart. Then I shall bow, in humble adoration, And then proclaim: “My God, how great Thou art!” Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art!
Songwriter: Stuart K. Hine