A Series of Goodbyes, Part 1 - The Missed Opportunity

A good person died just a couple months ago - Christmas eve, actually.  I could have written this then, but the at the time I didn't know what to say.  Little would I know that this would be the first in a series of goodbyes that have affected me more than I realized they ever would.

David Myers was home from school to celebrate Christmas with his family.  It was early in the morning, around 2, and the wet weather and freezing temperatures had made the roads slick.  I don't know many of the details, but I do know that he was in his own neighborhood when his car left the road and struck a tree. He was wearing his seatbelt, but the impact was too much and he died.  He was 21.

When I found out, I didn't know how to react.  I didn't know David that well, but I had gotten to know him over the course of a few months when I was helping him get back into diving after he had taken some time off due to some serious injuries.  The fall of his senior year of high school I coached him off and on for a month or two, encouraging him to stick with it and make the most of his senior year.  He had so much talent, but had severely injured his back, making diving painful for him.  Yet he loved what he did, so he fought through it.

At the time I worked with him David was already taking college level science courses, as he was preparing to go to college to study Pre-Med, I assume to someday be a doctor.  I had heard that he did at one point have a wilder side to him, but he had calmed down and was beginning to take life more seriously.  I didn't pry into his business, but rather tried to remain a positive example for him as I encouraged him to improve as an athlete.  In all this, however, I never sought the opportunity to share my faith with him.  He and the rest of his family were aware of my goal of getting into the mission field, and, being Catholic, they understood.  Yet I never talked with David about his faith, about what he believed.

I missed the opportunity to share with him what really matters.  And now I will never have that chance.

For several weeks I beat myself up about this as I continued to wrap my head around the fact that he was gone.  I pray that he heard the Gospel from somebody else, as he had not heard it from me.  In this grief, however, I am reminded of the urgency to share the Good News of Christ with anybody and everybody I can, for we never know when it may be over.

So goodbye, David.  I'm sorry I let you down.  I pray that lives may be changed forever by your life and death, and by the revived sense of urgency for sharing the Gospel that I now have.  You were a good person, David, and there were many who cared about you, including some of us who never told you, and it was only in your death that we realized we missed that chance.