Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Montana G.I.: A Simple Act of Valor


My grandfather Jack O'Neill passed away this morning.  Please keep him and my Grandma Jeanne in your prayers. I remember  a conversation we had over a couple of beers on a spring night somewhere around 2005. We were talking about William Faulkner and that led to a broader conversation about race issues.

Grandpa Jack begin a story. "I remember when I went down to Texas after being drafted. It was a three-day trip by Army train. We got two meals a day; flapjacks for breakfast, a hotdog and a scoop of ice cream for dinner. The train was modern and went fast, but our car was old. It swayed back and forth the whole way, making everyone sick."

Welcome to the Army, I thought. I mentally tried to put myself in his Class B uniform. Riding away from Montana on a cramped train to Texas. Preparing to fight a war in the hot island jungles of the South Pacific.

He continued, "Our basic training was at Fort Wohlers, outside of Dallas. It was hot and I didn't like Texas. I remember one weekend they let us take a tour around Fort Worth. This was back before I drank, so it was more of a sight-seeing trip for me than anything. Most of the other guys went to the bars."

"At the end of the day, they picked us up in a bus, kind of a converted trailer. I went to get on and there was a sign right above the entrance, 'All negroes in the back.'" Grandpa pointed up from his recliner like the sign stood above the TV in front of us.

"It made me mad. I started to give the bus driver an earful. I guess he didn't know any better and was just doing his job; but I shook my head and him and went to the back of the bus to sit down. The black soldiers in the back thought I was crazy and was going to get myself killed. The white guys in the front were going  ballistic, saying that I was a 'know-nothing Northerner' and plenty of other things; but I stayed back there all the way back to camp."

I looked at Grandpa and saw him again as a young soldier with close cropped hair and press Class B's walking through the rows of hollering drunken men to sit in the back of the bus. A young soldier from Butte, Montana who didn't hesitate to do the right thing when confronted with racial bigotry even though the civil rights movement was barely in its infancy.

I can't describe how proud I am to share the same blood as that young soldier. Rest in peace Grandpa.


NOTE: Here is a picture of Grandpa meeting my son Bodie this Spring.





Friday, July 19, 2013

Running with the Current: Psalm 36's Description of Divine Providence

Another "Running with the Current" video.  I hope you enjoy it. I dedicate this one to my Grandfather Jack O'Neill who is really struggling right now. This video was taken at Kootenai Creek where it runs by their house in Stevensville, Montana.

Thank you,
matt



Text: Psalm 36: 6-11
Background: Kootenai Creek near Stevensville, MT
Read by Matt Kuntz




Thursday, July 11, 2013

Hanging Clothes Between Storms: Accepting Adversity




June 2013

I pulled the shirt from the bundle of clothes in my left hand and placed it on the white line. I pulled the fabric apart and it expanded in the breeze.

Five minutes before, wind would've whipped the shirt to the ground. The rain hammered onto our roof well into the clothes' spin cycle. Thunder rumbled. It threatened to hail. Then the storm gave way to calm.

I looked up from the clothes line and watched the storm push over East Helena to the Spokane Hills. Rain drops poured down in sheets. Lightning rippled and danced between the ground and the clouds. A small rainbow struggled in the middle of the storm. Churning in the maelstrom. It could not build up any more colors beyond a red glow.

I placed another sheet on the line. Not sure whether it would have time to dry or share the same fate as the rain-soaked rainbow. The late spring storms came in legions over Montana's Rocky Mountains. Storm then calm, then storm, then calm.

Still the laundry had to be hung. Like the rainbow, we don't always get to decide between the storm and the calm. Both will come and there is limited purpose in questioning why.

Life is a constant learning process. While I'm at the midway point of life, I haven't proceeded anywhere near that far on the path of learning. I have gotten far enough to be able to identify some of my earlier beliefs that were completely wrong.

Those wrong ideas more than outnumber the spring storms. The most glaring example may be the belief that I held as a youth and as a young man that men and women could work hard for years and decades to reach a point where life wouldn't be a struggle.

Now I realize that life's struggles are guaranteed whether they be personal, physical, financial, spiritual, or a combination. Clearing one hurdle will lead to another. The struggle can be embraced, but it cannot be removed or overcome. For participating in struggle of is essential to our time on Earth, proving our faith and love for the Divine.

It's a lesson taught in the lives of Job and Abraham, but the clearest statement in the New Testament may be when the mother of James and John asked Jesus to have her sons sit beside Jesus in his kingdom. Jesus asked them point blank, "Can you drink the cup that I am going to drink?" Matthew 20:22.

This was not a question about experiencing peace, joy and happy times. Can you share in the struggle, suffering, and humiliation of the Cross?


It's the highest calling, but it can't be gained without the storm of adversity.


Note: Thanks to my sister-in-law Anastasia Gurinovich for taking this picture of the storm.