Over the course of the next few weeks I hope to write some thoughts about the adventure I have been on since Friday, September 3, 2010. My hope is what I write will eventually become a book about my great, great grandfather and how his legacy can spark new hope in the lives of those who read about his life.
Installment 1
September 3, 2010 was going to be a Friday just like very other Friday until I realized one important factor. I poured coffee into my favorite coffee cup, one that I purchased for my dad while in Vietnam. As I drank my second cup of strongly brewed coffee, some thing I have done since joining the Navy, I realized I was drinking this cup at about the same time I received a phone call 38 years earlier. A phone call from one of my uncles and it devastated me; it is one that I can remember as if it occurred yesterday. The call was to let me know that my dad was being rushed to the hospital and I should make plans to come home. I stumbled into the bedroom, where my wife and son were laying talking, with tears streaming down my face I told her what the call was about. Then the phone rang again and my uncle let me know my dad had died.
With tears streaming down my face my thoughts turned to the disaster that the last year had been. The shame I felt because of my failure to give grace to another pastor in a heated disagreement and how it destroyed our relationship. The questions about whether God really intended for me to work as a pastor. Doubts that the passions I have really are of God. Heart broken I could feel myself slipping into the beginning stages of depression.
As I finished my coffee I experienced one of those times when an unrelated thought moved through the nerve cells of my brain. I put my coffee cup down and opened one of the drawers of my desk and pulled out a stack of papers a cousin had sent me several years ago. I turned to the Clark part of the family tree and something jumped out at me. The tree ended with my great, great grandfather, Seth Gold Clark.
Since I had six hours before I had to be at work I decided to do some research and see what I could find out about this man. I turned to my computer, brought up a genealogy search site and typed in his name, his birth and death dates. After clicking many of the sites that came up I clicked on one that referred to a book called, “The Church at home and abroad, Volume 24 By Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A.” and the article was "A Home-Mission Enthusiast".
Have you ever had one of those times that you know without a doubt that God caused it to happen? This was one of those moments for me. I knew without a doubt God wanted me to read what was written in this book about the Reverend Seth Gold Clark on exactly this day. The account of his life and his words would renew the dream God placed in my heart and begin to give me hope that all of my experiences in life so far was to prepare my heart for this very moment in time.
The story that follows is about the life of my great, great grandfather and the seeds of greatness he planted. This story is one that God is having written at this moment in time to lift each reader up to move forward toward accomplishing their God given dreams. This story is a story about a legacy that was left by a man who according to his own words, “lived a very busy, checkered life; possibly some good may result.” One hundred and twelve years later that good could be the accomplishment of hundreds or even thousands of dreams, which would not have been achieved without God revealing this story to those dreamers.
Please come back in the next few weeks for more installments. If God speaks to you in any way please share it in the comment section.
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