Heart the Mission Podcast
Heart the Mission is a podcast for pastors and church leaders navigating the challenges of ministry. Each episode offers practical coaching, honest conversations, and encouragement for the journey.
Heart the Mission Podcast
Episode 6- Dwight Easler: Loss, Identity, and Leading Through the Unthinkable
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What do mission and identity look like when grief has taken everything from you? In this episode I sit down with pastor and AMS leader Dwight Easler, who lost his son Benji in a tragic accident. We talk about the overwhelming weight of that loss, what it does to a leader's sense of calling, and how Dwight has continued to show up faithfully in ministry in the middle of his own devastation. This is not a how-to episode. It is a testimony, and it is one worth hearing.
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All right, man. Well, Dwight, thanks so much for being here uh today, man, all the way from Gaffney, South Carolina. Right. Did you pass the peach on the way here? Uh no, I went through the country. So you missed it, man. That's right. You missed it. Dude, when I passed by there when my boys were real little, right? Yeah. That um we would pass by, and the first couple times they were just enamored that it was a big peach in the sky. Well, then when they got just old enough for me to make their mama mad, I would drive by and I told them one day when she wasn't with us, I said, Hey boys, here in South Carolina, that's what we call the big butt in the sky.
SPEAKER_01It's like everybody that has lived there long enough would be like, Why didn't they not turn it the other way?
SPEAKER_00Exactly.
SPEAKER_01Why did they turn it the other way? The little Dingleberry was my favorite part. I could have just turned it 180 degrees and it would have been fine. Why did you do that? Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_00We're just such middle schoolers. We cannot drive. My boys are in the car and we drive by that thing. I mean, we're laughing for 10 minutes. It's just I feel like such a child. So I don't know how I would live in that town if I were near there every day. It'd be too much. Learn to ignore it. Oh man, Dwight. So you currently are the DOM uh in Gaffney for the area churches. Name your association Broad River Baptist Association. And um, if you're if you're watching this, you don't understand Baptist life. We don't really understand Baptist life all that well either, but um local associations are are made up of the local churches, usually either from that county or the surrounding areas. You're you're in more of a rural area.
SPEAKER_01We have both. We have a lot of in-town churches. We have 58 churches total in our county um and our association. Um and many of them are in town. They're old Mill Hill churches or attached to old mills and communities. And then we have community rural churches as well as others that are scattered out everywhere. But um, it dates back to 1803 uh when Cherokee County was divided between York County and Union County. Um 16 churches came together to form the Broad River Association before the county ever existed at that point.
SPEAKER_00My goodness. Well, that's that's that's unbelievable. I didn't know that history. I didn't know that history. So now you guys are 58 churches. Um and and man, we all kinds of churches. Yeah, that's one of the things I think a lot of people that don't maybe understand like what it's like to to work and just support pastors or support churches. You've got a wide, wide mark, wide margins for what kinds of churches, what kinds of pastors, and your responsibility is to help and care for them and support all of them. That can be challenging, I'm sure.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah, much different. Uh the churches are much different. Um, everybody thinks they do things the same way. I tell I tell our pastors all the time, like, I visit your churches, and I promise you, nobody does it the same way. Right. Uh you may have the same hymn books uh in places, uh, you may have um the same type of committees in your structure sometimes, um, but everybody does things differently. Um nobody's a carbon copy anymore. Uh maybe in the 50s and 60s, maybe, but no, not anymore.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, man. Well, thank God for you and all the guys like you out there supporting pastors. I don't I don't think, you know. I mean, one of the things that one of the reasons we do we do this podcast is I I want I want that guy who who pulls this up. One, he can he sees guys who are pastors having a real conversation about real life and ministry. And I want him to feel like, man, I am not alone. Yeah. And that there are other people out here maybe struggling with some of the same things I'm struggling with or trying to accomplish some of the same things I'm trying to accomplish. And I want this to be a resource to help them, to support them, to encourage them, to challenge them. And and you know, I I really believe like a firm I like understanding of your identity, like who it is God's carved you out to be, is is the role that we have to play in the world. Like, how has God carved and formed your identity to let so you can leverage that for the sake of the gospel, wherever you wherever you live, work and play. And so um that's why we do this. That's why we have guys on like like you. And I'm I'm excited. And man, I'll be honest, I'm a little nervous to uh to interview you today, not because you're famous, which you you are in Gaffney, but um we're gonna get into the story. Uh but you and I have a you and I have a similar um path in life that that God's brought toward us and that we've been chosen to walk. And uh we're gonna we're gonna get into that a little bit more. Um but but you are um the husband to Tabitha. How long have y'all been married? We have been married 30 years. 30 years? Man, we are. I ain't far behind you, bro. Yeah, I am not far. We're t I think we're 28, about you know, 28 years, and that makes me feel so old. It gets there. So old. I don't feel like I should have been married that day.
SPEAKER_01It's like I I told Tabitha this last uh anniversary. I said, it doesn't seem like it took any time to get to 30 years. Right. Like where has time gone?
SPEAKER_00I feel young. Yeah 100%. Like I feel I feel like when I'm in the room with people who are that I look at and I go, man, look at that guy. He's like, he's got gray in his beard.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00He's old.
SPEAKER_01And I think I mean you go through so much in 30 years, but at the same time, it's like it goes by so quickly, you look back and you're like, man, where did the time go?
SPEAKER_00Um my barber trimming my beard, I see the gray on the on the um on the um apron, and I'll be like, where'd this come from? Did you not clean this apron before you put it over here? He's like, bro, you you need to look in a mirror. Right, right. You are you are old. And I'm like, man, I'm I'm getting there. But dude, I feel that's great. Tabitha, your your wife, great, great lady. So, so cool. Uh uh, you are a husband, Tabitha, and father to four kids, which are Seth, 26, uh Matthew, 23, Hannah, 14, and also uh also Benji, which we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna talk about him here in a little while. So um, dude, where did you where did you grow up in this world? I mean, I hear the accent, so it's somewhat near where I grew up.
SPEAKER_01I grew up in uh Spartanburg, South Carolina, um, right up next to the Peach Valley golf course. If you're oh if you know uh anything about Spartanburg and Peach Valley, yeah, uh you know about the Peach Valley golf course. I I could actually walk to the golf course, play par three. I tell people that's why I'm so bad at golf to this day, uh, because I taught myself how to play at Peach Valley.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which for the record is a hundred percent a cattle pasture. It is with holes drilled in the end of the pastures. That was that was what it was.
SPEAKER_01Every green is elevated and every ball will bounce on that green and off of it. And off. Yeah, so uh strange place, but I miss it. Um but I was raised about uh a mile and a half from where my great-grandfather farmed. Um the Eastler family were right around the Gosset Road area of Spartanburg. Uh they uh my great-grandfather was a school teacher and a farmer. Wow. Um my dad was uh the middle child of seven children. Um he uh grew up tough, fighting with his brothers, fighting with everybody else, um uh farming, uh trying to get through school. Um when he was 18, he ran off with his high school sweetheart and joined the Navy, and they moved to San Diego, uh, California. And um he told me for years growing up that the Navy saved his life. He left the cotton field and um went to the Navy and they taught him things, helped him finish high school, uh, made him a diesel mechanic and really um firefighter. And uh so I was raised by um very hardworking people, blue-collar people that you know had no inherited wealth per se. Um but they um my dad owned the business for a while until I was 10 years old. He owned a trucking business and uh he was a diesel mechanic, so he regularly worked a hundred hours a week. Um I would follow him around and ride on the trucks with him, and he would tell me very regularly, don't end up like this. So uh even though I I viewed it as man, this guy's making a lot of money, you know. Yeah, we're we're doing really well, but I didn't I didn't looking back, I didn't realize how hard he was really working. Um oftentimes he would work all day long working on a truck and then take a supper break and jump in the truck and drive all night because his driver didn't show up or whatever. So um he did that for years. Um kind of the Reagan Jimmy Carter economy transition um changed a lot for him. He he ended up quitting uh that business because of being on the verge of bankruptcy and uh going to work as a diesel mechanic with Spartanburg County. Um my dad was a very tough person as a middle child. He was a caregiver. He felt like to a lot of his brothers, and um he he was a fighter. So um that developed very unique leadership skills in him that I felt like he kind of pushed on to me a little bit. Um my dad could make a decision and not grieve very long about it. Like this is what you gotta do, this is the right thing to do. Yeah, we're gonna do it. And um move on. Right. We're doing it. Right or wrong, good or bad. Uh which made him a very good firefighter, made him a very good diesel mechanic. Uh, but he was also very loyal to friends, loyal to family. Um he would tell me often, like, uh, I don't know everything, I'm not a very educated person working on these trucks, but I have a notebook filled with friends. That's wisdom right there. And uh I he he did. And they were very loyal to him, he was very loyal to them. Um so that that produced in me a lot of things that I think still come out. Uh even though I don't have his personality per se. Um I'm not near as much of a fighter as he as he was. Um, but um I'm I'm not more of a non-confrontational person, I think. He didn't mind controversy at all. He uh if it was the right thing to do, we're gonna do it. Um but um he did teach me a lot about decision making and um and and knowing how to build relationships with people that's gonna last thirty years.
SPEAKER_00And and now in your job throughout ministry, your ministry career, man, how valuable is all that? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well and I and I tell our pastors a lot when uh uh no not a lot, but I tell them often when I meet with pastors, uh particularly people I've known for a long time, like uh the goal of of what I want to be for our pastors and our association is what they were for me. Like you you guys were there for me. So the model that I'm trying to project into the DOM role is how can I be that for a pastor? You know, um I had pastors that um and we'll talk about the whole story with Benji uh in a little while, but I had pastors after he died came and visited with me, sat with me, told me their stories, uh not only pastors but other people. Um I had one pastor that came to my house and uh I went out and sat in his truck and um he said, I don't really know what to do for you. And I said, Well, just let me sit here for a while. I can't hear um my wife cry anymore. Oh my gosh. And um, I look back on that guy and um uh I would go to war with him for what he did for me in 30 minutes.
SPEAKER_00Um value of present. Right.
SPEAKER_01So um there's a lot there, you know, with my dad and my mom. She was a hard worker, managed a cemetery for twenty years, um, built relationships with people in the community and Chesney area, could sell you know anything. If you can sell cemetery property, you can sell anything. Just about anything. Um so they were just uh blue-collar, um, you know, figure it out yourself kind of people. Um started a church there at Peach Valley. Um we stayed there for a a number of years and uh we ended up going to Fairview Baptist Church um in the eighties. And uh W.K. Metters was the pastor there. He pastored there 31 years. I I was the seventh pastor that came from his tenure there. Wow. Um just an expository preaching every sermon. We're gonna go right back to Jeremiah chapter two because we were in Jeremiah chapter one last week. There you go. And he did that for 31 years and um had a radio program uh every every night 15 minutes uh on Waggy. I think it was in Gaffney at the time. But uh he taught me so much about what it meant to be a long-term pastor, um the ups and downs of that, and uh modeled a lot of faithfulness before me. And um really when I was in middle school, late middle school, high school, I started really dealing with the call to preach, you know.
SPEAKER_00That's early, man.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So um and he he didn't really encourage that, but he nurtured that. Like you just need to keep praying about that, you need to keep seeking the Lord. Um and it was good to be around that kind of influence. Um I I felt like it led me well into college and and seminary. Um but that uh Fairview is where I met Tabitha the first time we met. I think I was in the third grade. Um so uh um we uh we grew up together and um you know she she would tell people I saw uh I saw Dwight as like a brother.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Don't you love that? When I didn't feel that way for for uh several years. Uh so um, you know, we uh I talked to her quite uh a few times uh during the high school years about dating. She would not. So but we started dating in in uh in college. She went to USC Upstate and I went to Gardner Webb. Uh so um we dated for five years.
SPEAKER_00So she was shutting you down pretty much all that time, just the third grade. Yeah, and you just were singular focus. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01You must have been smitten with this woman. I was, I was very, and she was not smitten with me. I will say that. Um but uh uh strangely enough, yeah, um we we started the dating relationship playing golf at Beach of the B.
SPEAKER_00I was gonna say, what did it take to break through? I said, well, let me go past you.
SPEAKER_01Let me teach you how to play golf, even though I had no idea what I was doing. So anyway. Um we got married in June of '95 and moved to Southeastern Seminary the next month. Uh, neither one of us had ever lived away from home. So uh that was uh an emotional thing for both of us, but it was a good experience. We had a great time at seminary. Uh we kind of made the decision early that we would kind of live poor. So uh she taught school uh full-time and I went to school full-time. Well, for most of us, that's not really a decision.
SPEAKER_00It just happened. Right.
SPEAKER_01But uh a lot of my friends, you know, they went and got jobs at UPS or almost full-time jobs, and they extended it out five or six years, and uh I was able to get the MDiv done in two and a half years, but all I did was go to class. All I did was go to class. That's a commitment, bro. But we uh looking back, uh we were talking about this the other day. I think our monthly budget was eight hundred dollars. Wow. So we had uh she made pretty much $700. I think I made a hundred bucks at the Sumeneer Gym working there or whatever. So we lived off of $800, and uh we our family helped us some and sent us money, and uh but it was just a good experience.
SPEAKER_00$800.95. You were broke, bro. We were broke. We were, but we lived somehow. Beanie Weenies. What is that? What's Dave Ramsey say? Beans and rice.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we uh we had beans and or not beans and chips, we had uh cheese and chips every Sunday night, rotel and uh Velveeta and chips.
SPEAKER_00Oh man, feast. Yes, sir. That's right. That's a $15 meal. That's brilliant. That's so good.
SPEAKER_01Um but as soon as I finished in '97, a church started talking to me in Fayetteville, North Carolina, um, Eureka Baptist Church, and they had met one of my friends at a restaurant down there. And um we uh there was a pastor there that was about to retire, and he retired in February of uh 98, and I began the end of March. So they had one month of an interim. So it was uh an interesting transition, uh, but and and people warned me because the pastor was gonna stay in the church, his wife had died while he was there and he wanted to stay, and um, but it was one of the best experiences, I think, for a 26-year-old. Yeah, yeah. I followed a 66-year-old and he was young enough to have energy and still, you know, um mentor me uh in some ways. And um he didn't really make a mess for me. Um, he wouldn't share an opinion. Uh he would say, You need to go talk to your pastor. You know, that kind of thing. But uh he was always there to help. Like uh he would say, Come by the house and sit in a rocking chair and I'll I'll tell you about this uh personality that you're having struggles with, or I'll tell you why they say that. Um So I I learned um I learned early on in the process that if I was gonna be there long, I had to manage honoring the past and also leading to the future. Uh because the the church wanted to go into the future, but they were also pulling behind their history. Like we we don't want Pastor Keefe was his name. Like we don't want Pastor Keefe to think we're leaving him behind, right? Or we don't respect him. So I had to learn that in my mind as well.
SPEAKER_00Like I need to speak that language, navigate that tension, and here here you are now, so many years later, pulling from all those lessons that he was teaching you way back then in the rocking chair.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So I'm I really, really appreciate him staying there. And um he died a few years ago, but his family to this day still uh we have a good relationship. Uh every time we go to Fayetteville, they want to see us, and I just really appreciate that that opportunity to um to grow and learn is right out of seminary, you know, the old saying, they don't teach you that in seminary. Yeah. So you are learning it. So I made I made some mistakes there and ran into some walls and uh you know, but the church was always gracious and and and helped us so And in 2004, um a third cousin of mine calls me on the phone who uh retired from Corinth Baptist Church, and he said, uh I'm doing an interim here at the church I used to pastor, and I'd like to know if uh I can put your name in. And and his name was Jerry Ford, he pastored Corinth for 16 years. And um I said, uh let me pray about that. And I said, Can you tell me anything about the church? And and he said, Well, they're tired of fighting. So uh Perfect. So uh, you know, that's quite a difference between following a retired pastor in a very stable situation where, you know, he retired literally that first of that year, and there's like no upheaval or no drama to a church that had lots of drama for three or four years. And um so that was another learning curve, you know, going into a church where everybody's tense, everybody's wondering what the future holds, and uh we want change, but we don't know what that means because every time somebody changes something, it turns out the church is gonna split or whatever. So um it was a good experience coming into Corinth um and learning through that um and learning how to figure out how to what do we need to do to build the confidence of the people. Um and looking back, we did some things that worked and some things that didn't. Uh it was a rural residential church, the average age of the community is 36, they've got two kids, they make around $40,000. Uh most people are in service work or industrial work. So very I'm very comfortable with those kinds of people. That's what I was raised in. You know, so I um I I I Corinth was a natural fit for me as a leader. Uh, but what I had to do was I went from a church where I was honoring the past and leading to the future to okay, if I'm gonna stay here long, I've got to help them realize everything doesn't have to be a drama. And good luck with that in the Baptist church. Right, and and and also you don't have to um you you you can feel good about your future. God does have a uh a future here for this church in this community. Um and really one of the things that came out of that was uh a book by John Cotter. I was in the middle of a D-Men process at that point and I was uh given a book in a class to read uh by John Cotter on leading change. It's a business book, actually. But he talks about building a coalition of people who are willing. And um goes back to the George Bush principle of the Gulf War, you know, the coalition of the willing. Um so we began a process of how do we put together uh almost like a vision committee is what you would hear, of people who are willing to go forward. Um leading people in this church who've been here, have proven track records, people will listen to them. And out of that came some very good changes. Um and and a renovation that we were able to complete in a c in a few years. Um and they had not had any renovated buildings in 30 years, and that boosted immediately the morale of the church that these leaders were speaking into people. Um and I I think that taught me a whole lot. Um and through the years trying to recast that and re refine that kind of thing that happened in 2005 to 2008. Um once you get there, you can't you can't just stop and say, Well, we did it. Yeah, there's another generation coming. More work to do.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um, so you know, those that 2004 to 2010 was as far as for me as a pastor, was a was a learning uh curve of how do I rebuild the confidence of the church and restructure the church to grow. Um so that kind of leads us into 2011 at that point, but uh there was a there was significant growth in the church at that point. Um the renovations were were going well. Uh, we were trying to uh restructure and rebuild some of our leadership uh there.
SPEAKER_00Um it was just a good time. And and you pastored that church for 19 years. Right. So you I mean you came in from the beginning ground level and began to think about how do I how do I take this on for the long haul?
SPEAKER_01Right, right. And and you begin to, you know, I I think when we come out of seminary, we're taught five-year plans. You know, what one year, three year, five year, ten year maybe. Um the longer I was there at Corinth, the more I thought uh more as a leader in decades. Um what's gonna happen in ten years when these 70-year-olds who are now the focal leaders of the church when they're gone. Um and I was able to see that and um in some ways learn from that. Like that next generation of leaders will surprise you, both both good and good and bad. Like uh we we had one particular deacon that was the chairman of the search committee. His name was um Joe Porter. He was actually on the same aircraft carrier as my dad in 1957. Neither one of them knew each other until my dad visited Corinth Baptist Church and they got to talking about the Navy. And he was like, I was on that ship. No way. That was across the country, right? Uh San Diego. Yes. So they spent six months on the ship together. Uh they went to Vietnam and back, basically. Um, my dad was uh an elevator operator and an engine room operator, and uh Joe was something else. I can't remember exactly what he did, but you know, that that many hundreds of people on a aircraft carrier, you never know everybody. Now here he is in your church and right. But Joe was a deacon at Corinth Baptist Church for 50 years when he died. So you know, when you lose a Joe, um you're like, who's gonna replace this guy? Because if you needed someone to go talk to somebody that's upset or to go say, This is what what we need to do, this is the right decision, you talk to Joe. You know, so um that development of the next generation, I think, is something that kind of sneaks up on you. Like uh if you're only thinking in three years, you don't realize, hey, I've got to have a Joe Porter in ten years.
SPEAKER_00What what do you think it takes for a young, especially a young guy, yeah, to to make that transition in his mind to start thinking about the more long-term impact he could make in a church?
SPEAKER_01Um I I think it's easier when you come from a background like I have where you had a long-term pastor. Like I when I left for seminary, I knew my pastor was getting older. He retired at 71, but I could not imagine any other pastor. Like he had been there so long. He um so I think for me and and the and my friends who ended up in ministry from Fairview, uh, we all stay in churches a long time. Hmm. Because that's what Preacher Metters told us to do.
SPEAKER_00So that's been consistent with the like you mentioned earlier, there were what, seven of you out of that church called the ministry. And you if you look at their tenures, you're telling me that most of those guys were able to stay a long time.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, I can think of uh two people in particular, um, well, three. Uh John and David Lancaster, who both are in Spartanburg. John was uh a pastor for 20 years. Uh now he's he d does evangelism, but he stayed in the same church for 20 years. Uh David uh pastors Greenpoint in Boiling Springs. Uh he's been there probably 30 years now. And uh and Keith Davis at uh um Zion Hill. Is that yeah, on 29, uh he came out of Fairview. Did he really I didn't know y'all had that history? Yeah. He was a good bit ahead of me. Um I think you know he I don't remember him like uh very much uh beyond like going to Fruland and you know um but but all of those guys um you know we we talk about that when we see each other like you're still there you know that's why the preacher preacher of Metterns told us that you know that's what we figured this out by now, right?
SPEAKER_00That's good.
SPEAKER_01Well I think a lot of it has to do with modeling, but also the benefit of staying. Like what is the benefit of staying? And and my prayer as I as I pastored uh longer and longer there at Corinth was Lord, don't let me leave too early, but don't let me stay too long. Um and you know, as I thought through that, the older I got, um you know, I did get to a place where I thought they need a new voice. Um it's not more it's not as much about the church as it's about is the church really following the leadership and do I have the proper voice and vision now? Um so I think that kind of struggle led me into the AMS role. Um and also the the whole concept that uh Henry Blackaby said, and and and I believe this is true for everybody. Henry Blackaby uh said once um the Lord doesn't necessarily call you to the same thing all your life. You know, maybe he's developing something in you now that will help you do something else. And um you know, I I really have taken that to heart in my life. My identity is not I'm the pastor of this church. My calling is to be in a pastoral role. My calling is to to utilize my gifts and what God has given me for his glory, but I think a lot of people orient their identity to their position, not to how God has made them.
SPEAKER_00You know, I find that a lot of and and what will happen? I should say it this way. What will happen is if they if they orient their identity towards the position, what happens when the position is no longer there? It doesn't work out at the church, or they run you off, or you decide to leave and you go to a new place and you what does that mean? Now you got to find a new identity? Like if there if you know if there's a way for us to understand exactly who God's created us to be, understand that identity. Hey, here is the blessing you've been given, and here's where God's calling me to leverage that blessing. Like for my own life, I can tell you it is with calling and identity, the crossroads of those two together, calling and identity, that I've been able to find like a fulfilling journey forward. And for me, that hadn't been the easy journey. It's not the one that always pays the most. But man, as far as knowing and having confidence, courage that I'm living out my calling, it's exactly what you're talking about. So not only are you pastoring, but there's this other part of your life too. I saw I saw you post on your your uh Facebook page recently, you know, you're all suited up in your fire, your fire gear. You are the the chief of the East Gaffney Fire Department. No, the Corinth. The Corinth Fire Department. Yeah. Tell me tell me about how did you get involved in the fire business?
SPEAKER_01Uh in 1988, uh my dad was a volunteer firefighter for Cherokee Springs, uh, there on the 221 corridor. Uh and my cousins were in the fire department, so I wanted to be tough like them. You know, so I was 16 years old, and um I signed up to be a junior firefighter, and I got uh where I could I got to where I could drive, and uh my dad let me sign up for the fire academy in Duncan. Um so uh for about a year I went to classes um and um went through the fire academy in 1989, finished in November of 1989, and um a few months later I was able, uh you had to be a certain age to be insured. So I was able to kind of fully be a firefighter um then. And um been doing it ever since. I've been a part of four fire departments. I was with Cherokee Springs until 1995. Um then when I moved to seminary, I took a few months off and I was at Youngsville, North Carolina, just north of Southeastern. And um I went to the Youngsville Fire Department and said, Look, I'm a I'm got certifications in South Carolina. Can I fight fire with you? Did that for two and a half years. Uh when we moved to Fayetteville, North Carolina, there was a fire department around where the church was, uh, not really close to my home. We lived in the city, but um, I went to the fire department and said, Look, I'm a local pastor here, I'm a certified firefighter. Can I be a part of your fire department? Um so I was there for six years. So um had a great time there. A lot of military guys were in the fire department. Uh, we were right up against Fort Bragg. Uh so we had a uh still have some lifelong friends uh from the military uh experience there. Um West area was uh uh I ended up working there, uh took Fridays off. So I would work there part-time just to be around the guys. Yeah, yeah. And um and still talk to some of them. Uh these years, these many years later, and um just some fun experiences.
SPEAKER_00Um if if you didn't, I don't, and maybe it's this way in other places, I don't know. And I I never never went down that path.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But man, was I surrounded by you little dudes with that little beeper on your side? You know, we'd be sitting in fields on Friday night. You got one on Friday night. We'd be sitting in fields on Friday night. We won't be talking about what was going on out there at those times. We'd be sitting in fields on a Friday night, and those things would, you know, they'd go off on seven or eight of those guys, and then all of a sudden you turn around and it's it's me and then hollow dust. All their girlfriends were left behind. I'm here. Oh man, but the the whole culture is if you've never if you've never understood it, it is just that. It's a it's a subculture that includes community and and those and that's really going it's going away.
SPEAKER_01I mean, in a lot of America, uh about 70% of firefighters in the United States are volunteer. Um, and that culture of doing it for free is really vanishing because of the requirements on fire departments, uh but also just the the people available uh is is going away.
SPEAKER_00Um It's that sense of community, really. I mean, when I say we were sitting around hanging out, I mean we were always hanging out, and I I never did those, I never was part of that, but all my buddies were were were into that.
SPEAKER_01And and uh even before I started at Corinth, uh the youth minister at Corinth was actually the fire marshal of the city of Gaffney. No way. So he called me and he said, I'm gonna give your name to the fire chief at Corinth. And uh I was just about immediately uh right after I moved, I was already on a fire truck. Um Wow. So I I've been there uh 21 years.
SPEAKER_00And now you're you're you're volunteer chief of of the Corinth Fire Department.
SPEAKER_01I was uh I was the assistant chief for about a decade um and I've been the chief for about five years.
SPEAKER_00And y'all, y'all, I mean you're the volunteer chief of a department that's got a full-time employees.
SPEAKER_01We have seven, we have seven employees uh that work Monday through Fridays. We don't have 24-hour coverage. Um, but uh we also have 20 around 20 volunteers. I think 19 is what we have on the roster. Uh 42 square mile district. Uh we run about 400 calls a year.
SPEAKER_00Um so we we're busy for our I love that you've got this ministry thing happening. You're pastoring, you're doing this, and and you've always stayed kind of plugged in with the community like that.
SPEAKER_01And that that makes a huge difference when you're a part of the community. And um I I joke around with with my kids um that uh I know the meth heads by name and they know and they know me by name.
SPEAKER_00You know, but if you ever need something taken care of, you show the right people.
SPEAKER_01You show up on the medical call and and uh so and so is as uh is oh deed again, but we can help him. You know, that kind of thing. So um, but uh it you just get to know people. You need to get to know them and their needs, and and um and that's a part of being a ministry in the community. It's something that gets in your blood, like you said, the sense of community, the sense of belonging, uh, the sense of I'm doing something beyond the normal shared mission. Yeah. Right. So that gets in your blood, and um like we had we we had four people join our fire department in the in the last little bit, and three of them are over fifty. And they're retired firefighters are uh they're they're coming from industrial firefighting, and they're like, we don't want to give that part up. Yeah, we don't want to do the job anymore, but we we don't want to give this part up. And um, you know, I I tell people tell myself quite often, I don't know how many more years I've got in in that um putting on an air pack and all the turnout gear and my back hurting for three or four days after. I don't know how many more years I can do that, but I I will miss the culture, um, the community engagement. Um you know, my but my my role now as fire chief is um the same role we would have as a pastor or a DOM or any leadership where you're looking at the long-term, how do I set up the next guy? You know, I told our guys that Tuesday night. I said, you know, my goal as a fire chief is to put a system in place here where the next guy can come in and not have to worry and sweat and uh work their tail off to build a successful system. They can walk in and lead. You know, that's that's the goal. And um and that I think that that's transferable to all kinds of leadership.
SPEAKER_00Sure. And and the fact that I mean, I think, you know, looking at your model, you know, watching your pastor stay a long time, sitting down in the community and staying a long time, and that's putting real roots down. Yeah. You know, and then here you go off or here for two years, you're like, hey, I gotta do it here. I gotta find some roots here. Here's a family I know I can be a part of here. And that's um that's influence. That's influence. I think I think a lot of pastors can really learn because the model's three years, right? Yeah. You three years, you run out of sermons, you run out of ideas, you gotta go start over in, you know, another southern state or or the Midwest or whatever.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and that has extended a little bit, I think. Um, but there is still the thing that if something if this pressures me too much, I'm I'm just gonna run. Yeah. You know, and um and we've all felt that. I d I definitely felt that. Um but not running uh uh has a payoff. Like how can we get through this, manage these relationships, uh keep preaching, keep leading, um doing the right things. Um you know, how how can we get through that? And and that builds relationships in the community and beyond the community that That matter.
SPEAKER_00Um, you know, you um put roots down that gives you a platform and you leverage that platform for the sake of the gospel through all those different relationships. It's a whole point of how we should stay in between.
SPEAKER_01Whether that's the you know, state representative or the county administrator or whatever leader in the community, um that that relationship is built on I can trust you and and we can trust each other and we can talk about stuff. And that doesn't just come from showing up one time, you know.
SPEAKER_00Through that you can have real influence.
SPEAKER_01Well, hopefully, and like my dad said, you can't figure out everything. Yeah, you better have a good phone book. You know, so you go I don't know all the answers, so I better know who to call.
SPEAKER_00It's more about that. That gives us a man, just a great picture of who you are. You know, you're a you're a family man, you're a community man, you're a fire chief, you're a pastor to pastor, and and man, some of those years, I mean, so if we track along through Corinth, um you went there in 2005. Four. Four, two thousand four. And then at that time, how many kids did you have in 2004? Uh we moved there.
SPEAKER_01Seth was uh he was five, uh almost five, and Matthew was uh, I'm trying to think, I'm trying to do the math in my head. Uh Matthew was about three, um, or just to turn three.
SPEAKER_00Um so um And yeah, and and things were going. I mean, once you got in and you started investing in people, the church is growing, things are moving. You took on this, I'm gonna be here for a long time kind of thing. People responded to that. Like it's it's going great. And then 05, your son BG was born, right?
SPEAKER_01Right. He uh he was born in November of 2004. 2004, 2004. So we we went there uh when they first interviewed us, uh Tapitha was just a few months pregnant. We had just kind of found out. Um and uh Benji was born actually during a revival service on a on a Thursday night. Yeah, and uh Gary Rogers was preaching first Baptist Campomello. So I um he always uh talks about that. But Benji was born when he was preaching uh part of the revival.
SPEAKER_00Hopefully, y'all went to a hospital.
SPEAKER_01We did, we did. Um I think we were already at the hospital, but he went ahead and went on with There you go. Um but um yeah, that was a good time. Um and and uh Benji was was born there in 2004, became the church baby, you know. So uh he had uh Gaffney grandmas is what we called them. So he had some Gaffney grandmas that would keep him every week, come by them, get him from the parsonage, and uh take him to their house, and or we would drop him off. And uh so the boys really uh had a good experience there. We had a great time. We lived in the parsonage for 14 years, and uh I still don't know why they didn't kick us out with three boys wrecking everything. Um so uh yeah, they would feel that they would uh they they were talking about that over Thanksgiving when they got uh hold of uh fire extinguishers in the basement and decided to play war with fire extinguishers. How'd that turn out? Uh that was uh a mess, a terrible mess. Um you know, we we had some we had some good times. Paint we learned how to play paintball and uh airsoft and uh all kinds of stuff. We we had a good time. Boys were funny, wrestling and screaming and yelling, and um so we we played uh knee football in the living room, you know, and uh so we uh like it was like it was good. That was our life, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And man, that goes on for a while. Yeah. And then we come to 2011.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01Um, yeah, 2000, March 19th, 2011, is like I've told you before, it's like another lifetime happened. Um Tapitha was pregnant, uh, eight months pregnant with Hannah. Uh, we had just got the nursery in place, put the crib up. Benji helped me put the crib up.
SPEAKER_00Um, Benji at this time is six. Right. And that that would have made that would have made Matthew eight, yeah, and then Seth would have been eleven. Right, right, eleven, yeah. So you you got all young kids. Right. Your your life is wild.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, wild.
SPEAKER_00And then you know another one's on the way.
SPEAKER_01Right. And uh one of the funny stories before everything happened in March, but uh it wasn't very it was maybe February when we went to the doctor and they told they told uh Tabitha that they wanted her to see a specialist across the hallway because of her advanced age. Oh my god. She was 39. Did she love that? Yes. So um she goes over there and uh we're talking to this doctor and and everything. He's talking and talking. Well, Benji's just rolling around on the floor, he's ready to go. I don't I think I don't remember why we brought all the boys. Maybe it was to see the ultrasound. I don't know. Yeah. But uh he finally just uh he goes, when is this guy going to shut up? So that's one of my memories. Benji telling the doctor to shut up. Oh my god. That's the kind of personality he was. He was very outgoing, rough and tough, you know, little brother of two older brothers. He had to be tough to me. Always wrestling, always yelling at somebody. Yeah. Um so yeah, he uh well uh in in March they planned this trip to go to a pottery painting place. Uh the kids at the church went in Spartanburg and and they painted pottery, and then um the the people that were putting the thing together said, and Tabitha was one of them. So let's go to uh Cleveland Park just opened today. Let's go to Cleveland Park and ride the train. Um so I met them there.
SPEAKER_00I So for give people context what that means to ride the train because that's it wasn't like a normal train. If you're from the upstate, you knew you knew about this train. Right. I wrote it as a kid. I wrote it as a kid. I found this out this week. I found this out this week. I didn't know this, but I was I was talking with Renee, which is my which is my wife. I was talking with her about talking to you this week. And Renee says, Josh, do you know I've got pictures of my boys from early March on that train. Wow. And I was like, Renee, you're kidding me. And she said, No, there was something you and I were going to, and our uh her mom and dad, uh her dad was living at the time, but her mom and dad had taken the boys over there to the park. Yeah and with all their uh brothers and sisters, all her her grandparents, the boys' grandparents, their brothers and sisters, they all went over there and just had the kids and uh rode the train. So we had pictures. I still I still remember.
SPEAKER_01It had to be around that time because it had only been opened maybe a week. Yeah. Yeah. Uh they just opened it up for the season uh that that particular week. Um, but I rode that train as a kid. I remember as a kid playing at Cleveland Park and walking beside the train. It was going so slow. Um but um we went there.
SPEAKER_00But but for context, it was a miniature train. It was a miniature train, but it was large enough to carry a lot of people. Right. Adults, kids, and it it was it was, you know, it was like a wild kind of thing to have in Spartanburg that you would do just what you did, go over to the park, ride the train with your kids. It was it was awesome. It would and it would go around a pretty good ride around the whole all of Cleveland Park.
SPEAKER_01It was owned by the county. Ironically enough, when the train accident happened, my dad, who was the shop coordinator for years, told him where the manual was for the train because they did the maintenance on it. Uh so um, but yeah, we all bought a ticket. Um, there were 29 total that were loaded on the train. Um Tabitha and Matthew and Seth sat up toward the front, and I sat in the back behind Benji. Uh there was one seat between us, just a little farther than me and you. Um so I was sitting behind him. He was sitting with one of his friends named Trey Burgess, who still goes to Corinth Church. Um big defensive lineman for Gaffney. But um so they they started the the they started the round, uh the driver did. The first the first lap was a lot like what I remembered as a kid. Very slow, kind of scenic, you know, people screaming, you know, kids screaming. And um the second lap was significantly faster. So we get around the third curve and go through the station, and I remember uh Benji sticking his hand out, and I'm thinking if he if his hand hits the wall, it's gonna hurt him. And uh just that you know momentary dad moment kind of thing. Yeah. So we blow through the station.
SPEAKER_00So you're sitting in the same car with him. Yes, I'm two seats behind him. Two seats behind him, and then where where are your other kids on the train?
SPEAKER_01Uh Tabitha and Seth and Matthew are up toward the engine. We're kind of toward the back. All right.
SPEAKER_00Um so y'all y'all aren't all together at the same place, kind of spread out.
SPEAKER_01So that we go through the station kind of real fast, and when we get to the first curve on the third lap, you can feel the car rocking like it's trying to come off the track. Well, I lean back and I tell the guy behind me, I said, this guy's flying. And um when I lean back around, the train just pancakes into the, I mean, just instantaneously pancakes into the creek bottom there. Uh there's rip rock, uh riprap rocks all laid up on the bank.
SPEAKER_00Um, these kind of big pieces of gravel meant for like irrigation purposes. So the water runoff.
SPEAKER_01When it starts going over, I stick my foot out. I remember trying to stick my foot out to catch myself, and I hit a rock and my leg immediately goes numb. I dislocated my ankle, and it just kind of tips me over head first into the rocks. So I don't see anything else beyond that. I I've kind of maybe for a few seconds went unconscious. I don't remember being knocked out long. Um, but um I wake up and the sound comes back. It's like and then I hear all the screaming and yelling everywhere, uh blood coming off my head. I had 150 stitches in my head uh from hitting the rock. How long do you think that you were kind of disoriented there? I would say probably at most 30 seconds. Okay. Um the guy behind me um that that I talked to picked me up off the ground and um and took me over on the high side of the where the the playground was. But as soon as he brought me over there, I could see Benji laying on the ground and a lady doing CPR on him like that quick. She was a she was a lifeguard um and she saw what was happening, and somebody had picked him up off the ground and brought him over there, and she saw he was in cardiac arrest, immediately started trying to help him. Um, which is a another story of the event. Um her husband assisted with the autopsy on Benji was he worked at the hospital. So it was like we had this relationship for years talking back and forth with the things that she went through doing CPR on him, you know. So just there's all kinds of connections like that that I I I don't really uh can't explain.
SPEAKER_00In con in context though, you've got to understand who who you are as a person. You've got this background in trauma and rescue. And so when you wake up, you are fully aware that they're like it's it's like it's bad.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah, terrible. And um I remember the first fire truck that showed up, it was a hilltop fire truck. Uh wasn't a Gaffney or not Gaffney City, it wasn't a Spartanburg City fire truck that I remember. I think it was a hilltop firefighter. Um I yelled at him and told him, you know, he needs help. And and I remember the guy's face looking in uh total terror saying, I can't do that right now. Um but I was focused on Benji. Sure. Um he saw a leg amputation, he saw massive trauma in another boy's leg, he saw head injuries, uh, a pregnant woman that had been thrown into a creek. I mean, there was massive amounts of multi-trauma casualties there that overwhelmed the system.
SPEAKER_00And you're talking about an area about 50 yards where all this took place. Like, and so you've got like in a small area, mass chaos, right? Major injuries, like all kinds of stuff. You you don't have the ability to really walk around, move around. You're bleeding, you don't know about your own injuries, and you look over and you you know like what's happening with Benji. Did you know what was going on with your other kids and your wife at that time?
SPEAKER_01Um at some point I saw Tabitha walking over, and I tried to tell her not to come over there. Um and of course she didn't listen, and that was really wrong of me for saying that. But um she came over and like in a stunned look, she said, I need to call my dad. And I said, Yeah, you do. Um I could see um at a distance Matthew and uh both Matthew and Seth had broken arms. Uh but Matthew had significant facial injuries from hitting the bank uh that required surgery. His face was his eyes were all swollen up and he was just standing there stunned. Like nobody was around him. I remember that. Um I never saw Seth. Apparently they got him into an ambulance and he actually ended up in another hospital from us. Everybody else was taken to Spartanburg Regional, Seth was taken to Mary Black. Cross town, by the way. So um I I can't really describe significantly the horror of that moment. Uming just from watching the EMS personnel work with Benji, um he's not gonna make it. I mean, you know, um I I I was hoping he would. Um he ended up on the ambulance with with Tabitha. They put Tabitha in the front and they were working with him in the back doing CPR. I don't I can't um I I can't imagine what Tabitha saw after that. I d she doesn't talk about it significantly. Um but um the thing that she says most is that she began to pray, Lord, let me know that Hannah's okay.
SPEAKER_00And um she said on the way to the hospital Hannah kicked she's she's watching in horror, losing one child and wondering Yeah do I still have this other one?
SPEAKER_01Yeah um and um one of the pivotal points for me was being there with the MS people and the fire people and watching them load Benji onto the backboard, prepare him for for transport and um uh Daryl Paggett, who was the incident commander um with the city. I I didn't really know him at that moment. Um godly man, uh deacon, uh preaching at his church Sunday, he became a great friend. But I remember at that moment he he looked down at me and he said we're gonna take care of him. Let me take care of you now. And um the the presence of somebody that could talk like that with calmness was what I needed. Now he'll tell you he went back to his truck and cried. But um you know, the the uh the ability to uh to be able to speak that way is what I needed to be able to get through the next uh half hour of being totally separated from my kids, not knowing how any of them were doing. Um they backboarded me, put me in an ambulance, went to the trauma center, stuck me in a room, um uh I had some folks come in there and check on me. But um I don't know that I I may have had a concussion, I don't really know, but all the timeline became very fuzzy in the hospital.
SPEAKER_00Sure, and and not only that, you had a concussion, you had 150 stitches that needed to go in your head.
SPEAKER_01So uh I remember laying there staring at the ceiling and and thinking like what in the world am I gonna do next? And and and I also thought of a sermon series I just finished on the life of Joseph, and I talked and I I talked about in that message some one of the final messages of Genesis 50, which has become a dear passage to me. But I talked about the moment of greatness in Joseph's life when he could look at his brothers and say, What you meant evil against me, God meant for good. And how he said that through the lens of all of that bad stuff that he went through. And uh I I thought I don't want that. I don't want that moment of great. If if I if I titled that sermon, I would not call it a moment of greatness. And I I preach it much differently now. Sure. You know, it was easy to say that through the lens of not going through something like that.
SPEAKER_00Well, you you named it. You said I can't fully describe the horror. Yeah. Like almost like as you describe it to me, like inside that small 50-yard circle was nearly apocalyptic in nature. Like the world was completely broken. You don't know where your kids are. You're going to one place, family's going to another place, they're doing CPR on him, you're unsure of his future. Now you don't know where anybody is, really. Man, the weight of that moment. Dwight, what was what was going through your head like laying on that ground on scene? What what were the messages going through your head?
SPEAKER_01Um I think on the ground it was shock. And what do I I can't do anything. I can't get up, I can't walk. I'm having to hold a somebody's t-shirt on my head. Um I can't even help my wife. You know, so you get to the point of uh, you know, that at that moment it was almost uh a shock. I think the worst parts came later. Um you know, the the chaplain coming into the hospital room and they're they're holding Tabitha by both arms to keep her from falling and uh saying uh you know, Benji had died. Well, I already knew that, but it was like now it's confirmed. You know, so they all rush her out because she's having labor pains and uh trying to keep her from having a baby. So and not knowing about Matthew and Seth, um, that was just a horrible time, but the Lord was there in such ways that um I can't really um I can't look back and say, well, the Lord wasn't there for me. I mean, I was laying there in the worst moment of my life, and one of my best friends comes in, who's now the dorman superintendent, and uh he's still goofy as ever. But one of my best friends comes in and and he said, Man, I'm so sorry that people had to see your ugly toes like this. And because they had stripped me down there, you know. So uh and and I mean I just know him. He wasn't trying to be flippant, it was just like, hey, you know, I'm here. I'm here.
SPEAKER_00That was his announcement that you're no longer alone.
SPEAKER_01Right. And um, you know, just people coming in and ministering to me that the Lord sent. Um, you know, I I tell uh I had a I had an older gentleman tell me one time, where was God when your son died? And you know, I thought about that question, why would he ask that? But I can definitively say the Lord was working because of the things we experienced in the in that day, whether it was you know Daryl Paget walking up and saying that to me, and Barry probably he didn't know what to say. You know, he was just trying to get me diverted from seeing seeing that. Um the nurse before they sewed my head up, she came in and she said, Are you crying because you're hurting that bad? Can I give you some medicine? Or or what is it? And I said, Well, they just told me my son died. And she leaned down and she said, My my parents were missionaries, and um Isaiah 61 was was the passage that I read this morning, and the Lord's gonna give you beauty for ashes. Wow, that was just the Lord. Of all the places she could have been, the Lord sent her there. And I don't even know what she looks like. She was just leaning over into my ear telling me that. Um so you know, that that day, um that day was horrible and multiple levels. You know, one of the things that I remember is being taken to a room and uh put in a hospital room, and they brought Matthew in after his eye surgeries to the same hospital room, and Seth comes in from Mary Black. This is later in the night, and uh everybody's quiet, nobody say anything, and then Matthew says, Where's Benji? And like we both realize that we this is the time we have to tell them. So you know, the the things that um my boys said when I told them will always be in my brain. You know, this is just a dream, this can't be real. You know. Um that was just a horrifying time. My my mom and dad were in Louisiana and somebody from the church had to call them and tell them without telling them the whole story. So they drove 600 miles back uh to the hospital. So um just a rough time. Just a a rough time um that uh, you know, we uh about a month later, uh Hannah was born.
SPEAKER_00Let's let's uh before before we get on to Hannah. Yeah, I want to ask, like they never were able to revive Ben G or were they? Well, what was that?
SPEAKER_01Um and that's a that's a part of trauma and grief that uh I had to learn over the course of years. Like I was obsessed with in the first few months um because there was an investigation. The the driver of the the train um was found to be uh negligent and untrained, um, but the train also did not have a spinometer or any kind of governor. So the driver was allowed to basically resign, leave, and like he actually left the state, moved to somewhere, I think, Tennessee. Was never charged with anything. Um it said on the manual of the train, eight miles per hour maximum speed. Um the highway patrol said, based on the video evidence uh taken that it was going over 20 miles per hour. Um so I can't remember your first question. No, no. Uh but uh that that's basically um I he was never he regained a heartbeat for a short period of time several times. I read the death report. Um, and and it's typical of trauma with children. Uh, if if a child goes into cardiac arrest, there's either trauma or a sickness that causes that. They're not like older people who their heart just fails. So um, you know, it it said over and over in the death report, uh, heart rate restored cardiac arrest, heart rate restored cardiac arrest. So they tried multiple times and multiple ways, but uh he had uh broken neck in a certain place where when he went off the train, he hit um hit probably a cross tie, um which broke some of his uh neck and he had a head injury um that was like an enclosed skull fracture. And um he his actual uh death report was um respiratory arrest, which is typical of spinal injury. Yeah, yeah. Um, so you know, I I don't know. Um it took me a lot of years to be able to say what I just said.
SPEAKER_00I can I can I can imagine.
SPEAKER_01You know, as as uh a very good trauma counselor told me one time, our goal is to get you to be able to say that as a bad memory, yeah, not as something that is guiding your life. And um there's a big difference in those two.
SPEAKER_00Um so you all this time goes by, your wife, they bring her in, they let you know here, hey, here's what happened. You you had already kind of put all that together because you had not heard anything different. You knew you would have. Like if they would have been able to revive him or whatever, they would have come and said, Hey, we you know, at you know, whatever kind of trauma was happening, you know, at least this happened. You didn't know that. So you've been through that as a firefighter for years. You knew the you knew the protocols, you knew what you knew what was going on. You leave the hospital. Was it you were there, were you there overnight? What what was that look like for you and the rest of the kids? I think we stayed about a day.
SPEAKER_01Um I left there with a cast on my leg. Um they reset my ankle. I had no broken bones miraculously. Everything was just out of place. Um and uh the boys left with cast on their arms. We came home to a media firestorm. Um, you know, all the reporters in the yard, um, around the church, hundreds of people wanting to talk to us. Governor called me. Um and the the probably the worst feeling was knowing we have to do a funeral, and Matthew's birthday is that week. So that just compounded the grief of it. Like this is your he's lost his best friend, and now we have to figure out how to do a birthday party. Um and I remember a reporter coming by after his birthday and um and interviewing us, and I I remember how he was playing in the hall and like he was totally quiet. And I'm thinking that is not my boy. Um so um we've talked about that through the years. Um talked about that this past week. Um when you're going through family grief like that, you don't know how to help each other. Like there were things like Matthew uh and Seth. Uh they're very smart boys. They flourished in high school, they did they they found things they were liked and they were attracted to and they did well, but I don't I I was worried about them growing up, and when I saw them figuring it out, I kind of just backed off and tried to help them get get through. Uh but there I know there are things they carry that they never said to me, and I I never probed to find out. And um I I worry about that sometimes. Like, what could I have done? Um, because there were there were differences in in their personalities after, and I think a lot of it too was we had a new baby, I mean, immediately. And uh you said a month later, she went. Yeah, we had a new baby, and that brought so much hope to the family, um, but weirdness at the same time, uh people saying weird stuff like, Well, look, God gave you some uh her to replace, you know that and you're like, I want to punch you in the mouth. Yeah, that kind of thing. But it also that busyness of a new baby also kind of mask underneath like a lot of real pain. What am I talking? What am I not talking about that I need to talk about?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um I think part of that. Yeah, you you're you're you gave us a picture of your son kind of standing there in the hallway, kind of just staring. You when I see that, when I hear that, when I hear you talk about that, and I see it in my mind's eye, I just imagine that when you go through a family member when that loss of a family member like that, you don't only lose that person. Yeah, you lose the other people in your family in the way that they related to that person. Right. So what you lost on that creekside that day was the Seth and the Matthew that related to Benji. Right. You lost the Tabitha that related to Benji, and that that grief is not something that you're even able to understand in those first few months.
SPEAKER_01Right. And and you and you miss so much um because of the pain you're all you're dealing with yourself. You miss so much in other people. And I think that's something I try to help try to help people with uh in grieving grieving parents. And and we we did write a book, a short book, you know, years later to try to minister to grieving parents. But um what what we miss is people grieve differently. So you're kind of encapsulated in your own grief process, and you miss like, why are they not grieving that way? Or you you wonder, like, what's wrong, or why why do they not respond like I do? And a lot of husbands and wives have trouble with that. Sure. Like, you're not grieving like me. Like, I wanted to post everything on Facebook, all my feelings. I mean, I wanted to tell everybody how I felt because I was hurting. And Tabitha was like, why are you putting that on Facebook? No, but I mean, you you know, and and it was just a grieving process and and how we dealt with stuff. But now older, I look back at my kids and think, I don't know if I did that right. I don't know if I helped them enough in those early days. Um, and what did I miss by just going back to work and not hearing? Like um, and even with Hannah being born after, not ever meeting Benji, we tried to shield her from a lot of stuff. We didn't want her to know a lot of the details. And, you know, looking back now, um, does she feel like an outsider to the grief of others? You know, so how do we deal with that? Um, so there's a lot of stuff that even comes up years later um that that you don't realize.
SPEAKER_00Man, what um in those, you know, obviously you had to begin putting your life back together. Yeah. You're pastoring a church, members of a community, you got this mess happening. I mean, I listen, I didn't even know you, and I I remember this. And and in fact, I've I've had a conversation with a couple of friends about, hey, you know, my buddy Dwight's coming on. They're like, oh, that name sounds familiar. I'm like, well, you might you might recognize an event from his life, and everybody's like, oh yeah, oh yeah, I absolutely remember that. I absolutely remember that. And here you are in the wake of that. You got to figure out how to put your life back together.
SPEAKER_01And it was uh it was a struggle. Um, my seminary pastor, his name was Bill Poor. He had moved to Lancaster, and I didn't know who to call. I called him because his son had died at 33 years old. He was an English teacher in Korea, just dropped over from a heart attack. And I called him and I told him, I said, I need some help. I don't know what to do. He came and uh he said, I'll fill in for you if the church will let me uh for a period of time. Um but he brought a book with him by Ron Dunn, which it's called When Heaven is Silent. And um it's kind of a ramble, I tell people it's a rambling book of probably some sermons he preached. Um but it's in the context of his 18-year-old son passing away by suicide and years of depression that Ron Dunn went through. Um some of the things he says in there are so real. When I read them, I was looking back, I'm thankful somebody said it out loud. Yeah. Because, you know, everybody gives you the Sunday school answer. Sure. Um, everybody gives you the most spiritual answer you can face. But you know, I remember one thing he says in that book because uh he was preaching somewhere and a person mugged him and pushed him to the ground and shot at him, and the bullet hit beside his head, and he said, Why couldn't I have been killed? And I thought when I read that, man, I thought that. Why why couldn't I have been killed and Benji lived? You would have done it. And um given the choice. Some of the stuff that he says in that book is so real. Um as he grieves years later, even, you know, and he he talks about you know Romans eight, and um he's you know, he finishes one of his chapters or statements by saying, you know, I've read through Romans eight again, and I'm surrounded by notes and commentaries and books, and there are no loopholes. He said, So if God can work for good, I will stand on the ashes of my broken dreams, and I will say, we are more than conquerors. Amen. And um there's a lot of broken dreams that happen when you lose a child because that's part of your future. You know.
SPEAKER_00It's it's like you have to choose. Yeah. Is he really good? Yes. Is he really? Is he really good? And and then, you know, if he is, is he good to me? Yes. Does he care about me? Like you you come to that point and you have to decide.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, boy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there's so much there. Um he he he has a chapter on Jacob going to meet Esau, and Esau's gonna kill him, or says he's gonna kill him, and he sends out his family ahead of him and everything, and he meets God, and and he his hip is dislocated. And maybe that chapter captured my attention because of that. But yeah, uh the the end of that chapter it says Jacob limped across the brook uh to meet Esau. And uh Dunn says in his book, when Esau saw Jacob coming across the plain, he didn't see a high and mighty um uh brother that had gotten the best of him again. Yeah. He saw a limp, he saw somebody with a limp. Wow. And we don't know why God brings us pain, but we don't know the Esau that's coming either.
SPEAKER_00Man, that's just sitting on that for a minute and thinking about that is um that that that's wild to think about.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and and I I've thought many times, Lord, um I don't know what Esau is coming, but I I have to live with the limp.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's it's you know, and I don't know, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I could imagine that you wouldn't want it any other way now that he's gone. To walk with that limp is the memory of all the love that you were able to share.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I I wish I could change it, but it's uh, you know, it changed all of our family's life. Um and you know, it's like I've I've lived a different life then since then. It's like uh looking back over those days of those three boys in the house and now the fifteen years after, fourteen years after, it's like a different world. Like you know, I I don't know. I can't I can't destroy but that but like you said, I I being able to see the Lord's good even in the pain. Um, you know, Matthew um as a seminary student, Seth as a as a firefighter, Hannah growing up and and and seeing the opportunities that the Lord has brought to help others, um, that's the good. You know, what as as as Joseph said, what you meant evil. Against me, God meant for good, to save many people alive. So that's um you know, that's my goal. Uh there's many times uh I for years I stood at Benji's grave and the only thing I could say was I'm sorry. And I remember counselors and therapists talking to me about, you know, why you say that? Yeah. You know, why why are you saying that? Why did you think you said that at the time? I felt like I should have seen something, I should have done something. Why didn't I notice that train was going fast the time it went before? It went just as fast the time before, but there wasn't 29 people on it. So I lived with that for a long time. Like I'm the protector of this family, and I'm the pastor of this church, and I let all those people get on that train, and I did not notice that this guy was being an idiot.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01That he was just gonna push the throttle to the limit and let it go. I didn't why didn't I see that? But I had to come to a place in my life where I realized nobody else saw it either. No adult, uh no other adult saw that. So I'm not God. Um so my my prayer or my statement at the grave became Lord, don't don't let me waste this. If this is your will, don't let me waste this. And that brought a lot of healing to my soul. But I'm not God. I couldn't see that coming. I couldn't do anything about it. I was a victim just like everybody else.
SPEAKER_00But if this is the way it's supposed to be, don't let me waste it. How do you think, I mean, man, it's been 15 years. You you pastor Corinth for all those years, now you work serving pastors, serving churches, specifically in terms of that moment, in terms of that time. Like how how are you seeing how have you seen God carve out this new identity and ministry for you?
SPEAKER_01Um I think it brought into my life an uh another idea of uh how to understand people. Um not to talk like you have all the answers. And um because a l a lot of people talk to me like they had all the answers. I'm sure that I made those mistakes. Um but there's a lot of times when I sit with people in grief and I'm like, I I cannot make sense of this. And I don't know if we ever will on this side of eternity, and also know the power of a sermon and how that can heal people. Um, I was going back and forth to therapy in Spartanburg, and I was riding up Highway 29, and uh I for whatever reason I was listening to an Adrian Rogers sermon at the moment. Yeah. Um and uh he was preaching in Revelation and Revelation 4 when it said there was a rainbow around the throne of God. And um it struck me uh in that moment, it had been just a few months since Benji had died, but his last school drawing was a rainbow and a half of a rainbow. And uh, like his goofy self, he put himself on a unicorn riding on the rainbow. Uh, but it was just a broken rainbow, which we still have that in our bedroom. Um, and it was just literally a few days before he died. And Adrian Rogers said in that sermon, we only see a partial rainbow on this earth. But if you look at a rainbow from above, it is a circle. And he said, the promises of God are only partially understood on this earth. Even though God promises those things, we don't understand them. But one day, when we see the throne of God, there's a rainbow around the throne. And all of the things, the purposes and the ways and the knowledge of God and the answers to our questions will be fully known. As John says, we will know as we are known. So that moment was a powerful ministry to me. That I had so many questions. Like, why God would you allow this to happen right now in this moment? Why would you destroy us like this? And um we'll know one day. We'll be before the throne one day and we'll understand about our son.
SPEAKER_00If you were to kind of think through maybe the message that God has sealed in your heart throughout these years, if you could sum it up, you know, into a sentence or two or a paragraph, yeah. What do you think that core message is that you're hearing from God specifically about who he is and what he believes about you?
SPEAKER_01Um the verse that became more important to me um through the years than any other was Romans 8 18, when Paul said the sufferings of this present age are not worthy to be compared to the glory that will be revealed in us. And um, that will take you a long way.
SPEAKER_00It's it leaves our minds to wonder and imagine just what that glory could look like. Yeah. Right, the the pain, the the fear, the all the what ifs. Yeah, and I and I listen, I bet I bet they're not over those what ifs can visit. Yeah. And now to know that, man, all of that, yeah, all of that pain, all of that pain, God is using for his glory. Yeah. And eventually, because of the gospel, because of Jesus' life, death, resurrection, everything sad is untrue. Everything sad is untrue. And that's a that's a real promise. And you know, that's uh that's a guy we can trust. Yeah. Like the line between this world and the next world used to feel like a long way away. But it's just a breath.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I mean, I feel like I feel like I can almost kind of kind of touch it. And at the same time, it feels like so far away, it's so close. Yeah. And the only the only thing that bridges that divide, the only thing that is strong enough to carry us through is the resurrection of Jesus. Yeah. That's it. But there's, I mean, we we grew up, I mean, I I can remember now, years and years we would we would argue and debate about things like you know, the sovereignty of God, Calvinism, right? That's that's split churches. I mean, that's split churches we've been part of. And when you think of the ability for us to get focused on things that in the end are not as important as the resurrection of God. Now, now listen, those things are important, yeah, but but what we put our foundation on, yeah, Jesus Christ crucified and resurrected. Like that, I know that now I can trust that that divide, like Hebrews kind of talks about him carrying through. All the way through, all the way through, Jesus carries us. Yeah, Dwight, um, I am grateful for you. I appreciate it. Thank you. I've got a grateful for our relationship. Oh man, I um I um I got a gift for you. And I want I want you to I want you to open it up. Okay, and I want to share it with you, and then I want to tell you a little bit about it. All right. Um, I know you'll recognize this because we are both just as rednecked as as the other. Oh yeah. But that is the um Cherokee County birth certificate right there, which is which is which is which is a case pocket knife.
SPEAKER_01That's right.
SPEAKER_00And um I I love case pocket knives. Oh yeah. I I carry one. Uh it's my it's my Sunday knife.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And that is uh not just any case pocket knife. That case pocket knife was made the year Benji was born.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
SPEAKER_002004. If you look at the box, it comes in the original box, you can see the date stamped on the side of it right there. Wow. Now, I got it for you. Um I got it for you so you could thank you. So you could carry it so you could enjoy it. I hope you don't, I hope you don't put it up and never use it. Yeah. Um I have one of my own from the next year, 05. Um, we we can we can share a memory together, but more than more than the knife, Dwight, I I want to say to you that I I believe with all my heart that what that nurse whispered in your ear, that there would be beauty in those ashes, has been true. And that not only has it been true, but it'll continue to be true. I know that for my own pain, the Lord has sent you to me as a distant friend who's become a close friend in moments that I knew you would understand. And I'm grateful for your ministry. And I know that pastors who are listening to this who understand what it's like to experience whatever pain that they've been through. Because they've been through it, man. Except some of them went through it without friends. Some of them went through it without support, some of them went through it without any kind of clarity about how to move forward. Some of them didn't make it, some of them aren't here today. I know that you took, because of Jesus, you took that pain and you leveraged it for others, and you've done that for the past 14 years. And man, am I grateful for it. I appreciate that. I love you, brother. I love you, brother. Hey, thank you for being here today, man. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. It's great.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, man.