Under The Olive Tree

Jack

It seems that there are some people on Earth who are only here on loan. They are the kind of people that light up every room that they enter – and seem to be able to touch everyone they encounter – from the bus driver and the waitress to the business mogul and the official – they don’t seem to have any fear. If you are ever privileged enough to call one of these people your friend, then you are privileged indeed.

I first met Jack in New York back in 1976 – and he seemed to have the energy of a group of people. Perhaps that is what his gift was. Buckminster Fuller, the inventor and visionary who gave us the geodesic dome, is credited with “discovering” the word synergy. Synergy is where different entities cooperate advantageously for a final outcome. When we talk about synergy we think of a group of people, who when they find the keys of working together in harmony and enthusiasm are able to sort of channel a form of energy that is greater than the sum of their individual contributions. It is what happens when a really good band finally hits their stride – and the music becomes powerful and engaging. Jack had synergy all by himself. He didn’t need anyone else to participate, although he was the first one to open the doors and let others enter into the delight and the wonder.

I can still see him, just like it was this morning, stepping right up to me – face to face, and looking in my eyes – with that little bit of mischievousness that he always employed when he started working the magic of the muse. It was not about what he said. It was the way that confrontation with the spirit required your participation.

With people who are on loan, you seldom get the opportunity to spend as much time as you would like to with them. The gift that they have to give is just much too valuable for you to be allowed to hoard it. They belong to everyone. Jack belonged to everyone, and God sent him to influence as many as he could. Through the tears of having to say goodbye – I was always able to smile – even laugh – knowing that Jack would not really be very far away from me even when he was half way around the world in some distant land – and knowing that whenever I saw him again – he would be the same man, with the same gift.

The last time Jack and I walked together was some years ago. We were both attending a music festival. Like every other time I have been around him, my time with him was brief, and the things we said are now forgotten – except one.

During the Second World War when the Japanese invaded the Philippines, the final stronghold of the Allied Forces was Corregidor – the island fortress at the mouth of Manila Bay. A story is told of how an important message for reinforcements had to be taken up the Bataan Peninsula through the Japanese lines by foot – all radio communications had broken down – and the commander had to try to get a message through to reserves behind enemy lines – though it was almost certain death for the messenger. Assembling his exhausted and wounded men in a single rank, the commander asked for a volunteer to step forward, and after momentarily glancing down at his communications, he was shocked to look up and see the rank unbroken. Leaning to his lieutenant he remarked, “Sir, has not a single man stepped forward?!” The lieutenant’s reply? “Sir, you do not understand. Every man has stepped forward.”

I can’t tell you when Jack heard the call to step forward, to carry his light, to be faithful to his calling and his commission – to reach out and touch the hungry and the heartbroken and the needy. I can’t tell you what price he paid to fulfill his mission. I can only tell you what he said to me in those few steps we shared before our last goodbye. “You and me, we are the walking dead.”

Jack had no other purpose than to be what God had called him to be. He had no other destination then to be sent. He had no other desire than to share God’s love with everyone he met. His life was not his own, he gave it freely. I am one of the privileged few who can say that Jack called me his friend. It is an honor that I will not soon forget, and it is a constraint that I pray I will not fail to answer.