So it’s July 20, almost 16 months from Sam’s death.

‘Sam’s death’… it still sounds virtually incomprehensible, Our boy was here on March 23 and then on March 24 last year we were called to the Mandurah boat harbour to identify his body.

It’s been 16 months, and it will be many more months without him…

It seems he is still in my thoughts every day – sometimes just a glimpse of a photo foofs the sadness in me back into flame. Sometimes it settles and I barely notice it. Those settled moments rarely last, as there is too much of him still present in our lives.

This week the Coroner’s report came in (yeah 16 months after the event) and it told us he drowned. Thanks for that information… It also told us he may have had some sort of issue with his heart that contributed to his death. An email describing your son’s death at 1.43pm on Monday is like a grenade launched into your life. I read it guardedly, as I had stuff to do that day, but it still slipped thru and punched me in the guts.

At 16 months I reflect on how we are all going – Danelle, Ellie, Cosi, our families, friends, the random people I still stumble across who knew Sam and who were impacted in some way by him, even the people who just hear the story second hand.

How are we going?

I don’t think there is a collective ‘we’ response I could give as ‘we’ differ greatly. I imagine I would appear to be one ‘least affected’ by his loss, largely because little has changed in my day to day life, or how I appear to those around me. I probably look like I’m doing fine – and in a sense I am. I have come to terms with the awfulness of what has transpired in our life and accepted it’s reality. I also feel and hold enormous hope for the life to come and I anticipate that life more than I ever have before. Were I to get a terminal cancer diagnosis tomorrow, as terrible as that may be, there would also be something wonderful to anticipate when this stage of life ends.

Last week at our Yanchep church I spoke of what happens after we die – of the hope we have and of the questions that surround that hope. As much as the biblical record is somewhat vague on exactly what heaven / new creation will be like, I have enjoyed imagining the re-union and the possibilities that will be in that future reality. I hadn’t spent much time in real focused thought here, but I when I did it was a beautiful experience. I genuinely look forward to what is coming next.

That actually does ease the ‘here and now’ pain somewhat. It’s probably because I operate firstly from my head. I have been able to look at the situation with some degree of rationality and a) accept the loss b) look forward to the re-union in probably 30-40 years at most (that would make me 91-101… very old…)

Of course, being able to process cognitively doesn’t negate pain – but it seems to give me a place to put it. This week I was chatting with my mate Morro, who wrote that beautiful song for us shortly after Sam died. He needed a video for the recording he is doing, so we began to skim the old footage we have saved. I checked out after a few vids as it was searingly painful, but Danelle kept going, sorting and processing. As we chatted about it later she said it was possibly because she has entered into those spaces more often over the last 16 months than I have. My ‘memory bank’ has largely been courtesy of Facebook memories – a daily recap of where we were and what we were doing up to 16 years ago – one of the upsides of social media for sure.

But most of those pics and memories have been of ‘little Sam’, the cute kid who followed all the rules, was obsessed with science experiments while also being scared of Heffalump. When it comes to 21 year old Sam the bite is much harder, more searing because this was the version of him we lost. I looked at a photo of him on Danelle’s bedside table this morning – the last one we have of him and Ellie – and my heart skipped a beat. Again… that question… ‘How can you be here today – gone tomorrow?’ – just no warning.

And as I look at 21 year old Sam, I wonder about 25 year old Sam, 30 year old Sam and so on… the Sam we will never get to see or know in this lifetime.

So 16 months on I’m doing ok. I have no problems working on caravans, with speaking around the place, meeting with people, with daily life tasks, or with exercise, although the tell tale that I am not firing on all cylinders is that I haven’t got on top of my eating habits. It’s so socially acceptable that no one would ever see it as a problem, but it’s a glitch in my life that before Sam died I had been starting to overcome. For now it’s a comfort thing and I’m just saying ‘whatever’ to it, all the while knowing that I can’t accept that as a long term response. Yep I’ll have another biscuit, cheesecake, brownie whatever… but hopefully in the next few weeks I will find the grace and will to put this issue to death one more time.

I also have moments of scouring realestate.com.au looking for an idyllic rural property where we’d have surf and forest, mountains and ocean… possibly some sort of a co-housing project that would be both creative and communal – and it excites me for a short time. I enjoy the dream…Then I think of the red tape and bureaucratic BS we’d need to carve thru just to have a chance of creating something innovative and I shudder.

And while we probably could do something in that regard if we wanted to, I also have moments of walking my dog and bumping into local people, appreciating the beauty of where we are and of the life we have been blessed with over the last 14 years in Yanchep and I realise that to have all this again would be nigh on impossible. We live in a beautiful place and we love the people who we get to share this life with. The mental image of ‘another life’ always has a lot of allure, and I will probably always tinker with alternative ideas… all the while recognising that sometimes you just have to look around and see how good you’ve got it… As I pondered in my recent reflection of the new creation, perhaps that will be time to implement all the things I will run out of time for in this life.

When I read and watched the dvd of Cloudstreet many years ago now I remember writing this – even then I found it beautiful. Today it says all I want it to all over again:

The spirituality throughout the series is fuzzy and eclectic, but the final scene is a beautiful one. I forget how the novel ends but the DVD concludes with the two families – the Lambs and Pickles – enjoying a picnic at the river. Sam’s hand has healed… Everyone is enjoying being together. Two young aboriginal girls who had suicided in the house play in the river alongside the white kids, Ted (who also died) is resurrected there with his wife and kids and all is well. All is good and what you imagine it would be like in the kingdom come.

Fish takes off for a swim – the swim he has been longing for – and it is good… even though he ‘dies’. He has been waiting so long for this…

Subtly but clearly we hear the narrator tell us of ‘ the river – the beautiful the beautiful the river’ and you can’t help but see beautiful hope as the ‘saints’ gather by the river.

And some don’t seem so saintly and some really don’t deserve to enjoy the river, but then maybe that’s just how it is… Winton grew up in my own flavour of conservative evangelicalism so he knows what he’s writing even if many won’t pick it.

Yes, we’ll gather at the river, the beautiful, the beautiful river; gather with the saints at the river, that flows by the throne of God.

And one day we will…

One day…

So, again, a big thank you to those people who stay in touch, who ask the questions and who remember Sam with us. It’s been a steep ‘grieving curve’, but I think the very worst of it may be over.

And – if – like me – you are new to the world of grief, then perhaps the one very simple word of advice I would give, is to not hold back on either asking how I am going or on talking about Sam. The reality of his death and absence is never far from my heart and mind and I really appreciate when people take the leap into that space. What’s more noticeable and difficult is when people shy away from any conversation here – either because of their own dis-ease or because they don’t want to make it hard for us. My learning has been that ‘it’s hard’, but it’s ‘better hard’ when we talk and reminisce than when we avoid any difficult conversations.

Last week I spoke in church about what happens after we die – heaven (I didn’t get to hell) – new creation and all that stuff. I only decided to jump into that subject when I was about half way thru a busy week, so I knew that I entered the room with some gaps in my knowledge.

Then again if there was ever a place for gaps then this subject would be the one. The Bible speaks quite a lot of heaven – but rarely with clarity and articulate descriptions. We are just told ‘today you will be with me in paradise’ (Jesus to the thief next to him during his crucifixion) or ‘I would rather go to be with Jesus which is better by far’ (Paul in Philippians Ch 1). There are various other statements made, but there is no schedule of events taking place each day in heaven and no description of how we will spend our (infinite) amount of time.

Even to jump from heaven to the idea of new creation, we make inferences from the information given rather than speaking with absolute clarity. That Jesus had a new body that was ‘similar but different’, suggests that may be on the cards for us too. His new body bore scars from his crucifixion. He needed to eat… so maybe we will too… I think…

I opened the night by asking who would like to go to heaven immediately. I was guessing there may have been a 40 (yes) 60 (no) split, but in fact it was more like 95 (yes) to 5 (no). I didn’t have time to ruminate with people around their choices, but I was somewhat surprised. It’s only been in recent years that I have anticipated heaven, possibly a function of aging, or possibly a result of grappling with it as an idea and coming to appreciate it a little. I guess I could go there now… but I feel like I have stuff I’d like to do here. In fact my biggest struggle is feeling like I’m gonna run out of time and not get around to all of the things I’d like to do.

Which then led me to thinking if perhaps new creation is the time when I get to work overseas for a few years or live in a country town for a while, or even do a working holiday thru Europe. I’d like to learn kite-surfing, foiling and a few other skills, but I may have left my run a bit late in this lifetime. Will the new creation be a place where we can keep pursuing dreams and ambitions?

One person gave me a hard time for not being able to ‘imagine eternal life’ on Sunday, but I really can’t imagine how we will spend an eternity. I wonder if there will be ‘work’ in the new creation – surely there will be purpose and focus to our days – but will some people have elite high paying jobs while others drive tuk tuks in Bangkok?

What we can know is that God will be making all things new – restoring the world to factory settings and beginning again in a sense. Could we stuff it up again?… In theory not, because there will be no sin, suffering and pain, but that’s a complexity all of it’s own. If there is only peace, joy and righteousness then I wonder how we grow and learn? Do we even need to learn? I’d imagine the eternal realm would be a great space to pursue the things that have been out of reach in this time round.

And then there’s hell… I’ve been doing a fair bit of reading around this lately – none of it from the ‘eternal conscious torment’ camp – I rejected this idea many years ago. Now it’s a toss up between annhiliationism and Christian universalism – although I tend to think the universalists still get tarred with the ‘H’ brush. I haven’t had a chance to read the ‘4 views’ book on Hell yet, but I’d like to open that box up again. I am trying to read David Bentley Hart’s ‘That All May Be Saved, but his castigating tone (maybe its just the narrator on the audio book) makes it sound as if the rest of the world is utterly foolish if they don’t accept this conclusions. I will keep going though as I find this subject interesting, albeit difficult to know for sure which conclusion is correct.

Am I ready to die tomorrow? In one sense, yes. absolutely and I am now anticipating heaven and all it brings much more. That said if I get to hang around for another 20 or so years then I won’t be disappointed either.

You know that thing where you just can’t see something that is right in front of your face?

I had a moment last week where it finally dawned on me what shape my ‘missionary calling’ takes in this current phase of life.

When I was running my irrigation business I had the joy of connecting with people in my local community and working for them. This little business placed me right in ‘the zone’ and every day I was engaging with those I probably would not have been able to connect with as a local church pastor. Some days were more significant than others and at times I worked alone while clients were at their own jobs, but I was aware of being a ‘local’ and being known both as a tradie and a pastor.

Since selling the business and focusing in on the caravan space I have missed those connections that came with the irrigation work, both with clients, suppliers and other tradies. Now I work on caravans, weighing them, installing diesel heaters (around 80% of my work) and installing WiTi security systems. The weighing is done onsite at a client’s home or nearby, but the other work is all on a paved area in the front of my house.

The people whose caravan’s I weigh tend to be ‘one offs’. Occasionally I go back to re-weigh when they change rigs, but the relationships are not ongoing. In fact I have usually forgotten them altogether in the time that passes between weighs… And the diesel heater area is a great little niche, as are the security systems, but generally speaking I work from home, unless a client really needs a job done onsite and these are also discrete interactions.

So I am no longer ‘present’ in the community as I was for the 15 years of running the previous business. I am no longer forming ongoing relationships with clients. I worked for Dawn, an elderly lady for 15 years and each time I attended she would remind me that her grandfather was a Baptist pastor in Tasmania. There was Ted, who is probably gone now, but was a fun bloke to connect with and many many others who were more than just job numbers. I enjoyed that ongoing connection and the developing relationships that were often present.

I had been feeling a little aimless up until last week when it dawned on me exactly where I am now present – in my street… I don’t know why I hadn’t joined the dots on this before, but sometimes you just can’t see what’s in front of you.

It was last week as I bantered with my neighbour while working, as I stopped to chat with a lady walking her dog who is new in the street, as I spoke with the woman across the road… actually when I began to consider the number of connections I have made simply because I am working in the street at the front of my home I started to see where I am present and available to people – in Hackney Way.

When I work on caravans I typically move into ‘task mode’ – there is a job to do and the quicker I do it, the quicker I can go surfing, hit the bike tracks or whatever. But that fresh awareness gives new shape to how I approach my work. There are often people who walk up and down the street, but who I haven’t connected with because I am focused and ‘busy’. But in the last week I have observed that when I slow down I can see them, connect and have conversations.

Janie slowed to chat last week. She is a widow who lives at the top of the street and her caravan was sitting unevenly on the towbar. I was able to go up and help her out by adjusting the tow hitch. Her shed was still full of her late husband’s tools so when the job turned out to be more complicated than I anticipated I was able to use his tools and talk for a while about the experience of loss.

Just yesterday as I was working on a caravan, a car left my neighbour’s home and reversed back up the street towards me. I wasn’t sure quite what was happening, but it looked like the occupant wanted to speak to me. He parked clumsily in the middle of the road and walked over to me.

‘Hi – I’m Dave – Nick’s mate – we met at his house one time’

‘Oh yeah – I remember’

‘Are you still the pastor of the church?’

‘Nah, but I do go to the church?’

‘Where do you meet?’

‘In the primary school,’ I said curious where this was heading.

‘Why are you asking me about this?’ I wasn’t following wherever he was heading.

‘Because I want to come’, he replied as if it should have been obvious. ‘I haven’t been since we moved into Yanchep 10 years ago, but I want to start going to church again.’ He looked a little nervous and I could see this was stretching for him

‘Ah right – no worries’, I said ‘So tell me your story’. What brings you back?

We chatted some more, and he shared a little of his journey and then he hopped in his car and took off. Maybe he will come to church on Sunday. Maybe not… People don’t always follow through on these things.

But it wasn’t lost on me that this man had been in our street many times visiting his mate – and he knew that I had been a local pastor. It had just never been relevant to him until now. But being the guy who works in the street I am visible and possibly even available.

That was last week’s revelation… So now if I am under a van or in a van I am paying attention to those who are walking or driving the street and ready to create space just for a greeting or maybe for a conversation.