How can it be well?
I haven't really wanted to blog about Kyle Lake. I don't have a strong personal connection to him or what happened, other than being close to several people affected by it, and belonging to a church community that is closely connected to Kyle's. I've read El Mol's blog, and loved it. It was great to hear from someone who knew Kyle so deeply. I read Winston's thoughts on it. I read Eric's thoughts, and probably relate more closely to his thoughts. I read Kerri's thoughts, and related more to her first post than her second post.

It's hard when these sudden unexplained, tragic deaths occur to not be reminded of all the other deaths that have touched me. I see similarities in the situation, and I think that's why I've thought about it so much. I easily obsess about death because it makes no sense to me, and it scares me. A lot. How are we full of purpose and meaning and breath one minute, then out of breath, unable to feel, touch, hear, speak, the next? Just, nothing. Done. I can't picture it. I can't picture not being able to feel, think, respond.

I can't help but think that even after I die, I will still have tremendous guilt for everyone left having to take care of everything I left behind. Dirty laundry, dirty dishes, bills to pay, things to cancel and finalize. I forget what a blessing it was to go through my sister's things after she died, just as she'd left them that morning, not knowing she wouldn't be back. Since then I've been wary of the condition I leave my house when I leave for the day. You have no privacy once you're gone.

But, I digress.

I didn't really know Kyle. I knew of him, and have spoken briefly with him a few times. But still, I was shaken by his death, and I have some scattered thoughts about it. I don't intend any of this to be wisdom or answers, or to presume any special closeness to the situation other than that it has made me think. It's just what I've thought about this week. My heart goes out to everyone who knew Kyle and is affected by his death.

I wasn't able to go to his funeral. But, Thursday I listened to the recording of it. At work. Not the ideal place for that, but I found it strangely comforting while I worked.

It was great to hear everyone speak about Kyle. It's amazing to me that people can pull themselves together so soon after such an unexpected death and talk about the one who has suddenly left us. It's the last thing anyone expected to be doing on Tuesday.

I love the stories everyone shared, and I loved that most of them were funny. It's so appropriate at a funeral to remember the fun times, and the humor.

But what I clung to most while listening to Kyle's service was Crowder singing It is Well with my Soul. We sang it at Journey last Sunday, too. I grew up with this hymn. I think anyone who has spent any amount of time in a traditional church is familiar with it. It's a beautiful hymn.

But I don't think I ever noticed it until I heard it at my Papaw's funeral almost 7 years ago.

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

It made me angry. No, it was most certainly not well with my soul to bury my grandfather. Six months later, it was definitely not well with my soul to bury my sister.

Now, listening to Crowder sing it for Kyle's service, is it well with the souls of everyone who really knew Kyle and called him a friend? His wife? His kids?

The thing is, I find great peace in this hymn now. It's one of my favorites. I don't think that it being "well" with my soul is about understanding why these things happen. I've tried to make sense of these things, and nothing about it makes sense to me. But I think the key is in the last verse:

And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,
The clouds be rolled back as a scroll;
The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend,
Even so, it is well with my soul.

We don't need it to make sense now for it to be well. And I think "well" will mean different things for different people. It means different things for me on different days, depending on how I'm dealing with any one particular thing. But it will make sense in the end, and that is something we can hold on to to make it well with our souls now. It's about faith and hope.

And yes, that is hard to think about and believe in when you are in the middle of what sucks and hurts the most. And sometimes even after time has passed. It is hard to grieve with hope.

I was told once that when we finish our work here on earth, it's time to go home. As though that's how God decides who is ready to go, and when. I'm not sure how much I believe that, or how much truth that holds. It sounds like someone's human attempt to make a simple explanation out of something that we will never understand until God sits down with us one day and spells out his logic for taking the people we love before we are ready for them to go.

But, I was struck by the words that Kyle wrote for his last sermon, that he never had a chance to give. They were spoken at his service, and posted on the UBC website. Not that his work was finished, but I wonder if he had any idea how profound these words would be. These are just a few of the words posted on the site that stuck out to me:

Get knee-deep in a novel and LOSE track of time.
If you bike, pedal HARD… and if you crash then crash well.
Feel the SATISFACTION of a job well done—a paper well-written, a project thoroughly completed, a play well-performed. . . .

If you’ve recently experienced loss, then GRIEVE. And Grieve well.
At the table with friends and family, LAUGH. If you’re eating and laughing at the same time, then might as well laugh until you puke. And if you eat, then SMELL. The aromas are not impediments to your day. Steak on the grill, coffee beans freshly ground, cookies in the oven. And TASTE. Taste every ounce of flavor. Taste every ounce of friendship. Taste every ounce of Life. Because-it-is-most-definitely-a-Gift.
- Kyle Lake

I don't know why we lost Kyle, or why in such a way as we lost him. But I know it will impact a lot of people, and somehow God uses that. I don't know why He does, and I don't know how He will. But I know it has me thinking again. It's made me angry. It just seems wrong to take someone so young. It seems wrong to leave a family in that way, it seems wrong to take such a close friend and brother to so many. It seems wrong to make Kyle a sudden news story, all over the country, not because of anything he did that day, but because of the way he died that day. And it seems so wrong to take someone while he was doing what God called him to do, in the very act.

But, somewhere there is meaning. A whole lot of people are thinking about Kyle and the life he lead, the example he set, the lives he touched, and why. But, I think it's fair to say that we'd rather do that with him still here. My heart is broken for those who will miss him everyday, every single day, beginning a week ago. They are left to grieve him and to do their best to carry on what he lived out so passionately everyday.

I don't know why we lost my sister, either. So young, in such a tragic way. I've been consumed with that thought again this past week like I haven't been in quite awhile. We kinda figured she'd be famous one day. She was just that type of person who lit up a room, Baylor student, loved everyone she came in contact with, funny, giving all of her stuff away to anyone who needed it more than she did. One day here and bringing life and love to those around her, then later that day all over the news because of the car accident that killed her. Not exactly the fame we figured for her.

There's more to her story, though, than her last day. Some of the last words she wrote in her journal, her last morning, were to God- "I want to see you." Maybe that sentence signifies that she had done all she could do here. I don't know. But, I do know that her last day wasn't the end of her story.

I hope we learn more from Kyle than just his last day. From everything I've been reading and hearing this past week, he had a lifetime of testimony (to use a straight-up Baptist term) that we can all learn from and carry on as we carry on.

That is well with my soul.

My prayers continue for everyone who loves and misses Kyle. Grieve well.

C.T.