Force of Life and Love

By Jim Decker-Mahin

A minister's spiritual and theological journey spanning his entire life up to this point, 68 years, including 41 years of active ministry. Included are anecdotes from childhood, dealing with visual challenges, education through books on tape, eventually earning a doctorate with help from his "readers" of various faith backgrounds. He reflects on his successful leadership in large churches and the evolution of his faith journey.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jan 20, 2017
• ISBN: 9781483592961

Book preview

Epilogue

Preface

As you will see, this book contains two alternating sections. One section is called My Story. In it, I recollect and consider certain important events and experiences from my life.

The other section is called My Thoughts. This section is a reflection on and consideration of my religious and spiritual journey, a journey that began with the following benediction from Dr. Mel Wheatley:

"O thou Creative Source of Life, You are the friendly providence in whom our lives need never end.

Become now our daily companion and walk with us between the miracle of our origin and the mystery of our destiny that we might find your light to guide us, your strength to uphold us and your love to unite us to each and everyone here and now, but so much more…a love that includes those we could love and those we should love. For this day and throughout eternity we pray and say, Yes.

My story reflects my thoughts; my thoughts reflect my story.

Chapter 1: My Story

1908 – 1969

My mother, Lucille Lillian Johnson, was born November 9, 1908, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Lucille’s father, Lewis Johnson, and her mother, Lillian Johnson, were loving parents who raised her and her older brother Richard in the church. At the age of 16, Lucille began playing the organ at various churches.

She graduated high school in 1926 and enrolled in McPhail School of Music. In 1930, she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Music with a focus on piano, organ, and choral directing. She was the organist at Lake Harriet Baptist Church (1930-1935). From 1935-1944, she worked as the Director of Music at Lynnhurst Congregational Church, serving as Organist and Choir Director.

From 1937-1944, she was also studying educational psychology at the University of Minnesota. During the same time, she finished a Bachelor of Science in 1943 from Columbia University Teachers’ College in special education for the handicapped.

From the age of 20, Lucille earned her own living. Her mother and father were battling illnesses and ultimately died from cancer and pneumonia, respectively. In addition to her educational efforts and her choir directing, she earned extra income by giving private music lessons and teaching piano, music theory, and organ.

During 1944 and 1945, Lucille took a leave of absence from her teaching position in the Minneapolis public school system. She was tired of the ice and snow of Minnesota and transferred to the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). She drove across the country in her red LaSalle, which she fondly referred to as Lucille’s LaSalle. She never looked back.

At UCLA, Lucille took graduate classes in education and taught at the university lab school, with the intention of obtaining her master’s degree and a doctorate. She found a job at Trinity Baptist Church in Santa Monica as organist.

As Lucille progressed through the early stages of her life, so too did Charles Melvin Mahin. He was born April 29, 1914, in Chicago, Illinois. His parents were Henry Melvin Mahin and Ella Caruthers Mahin. The Mahin family, including Charles’ older sister, Gracie, lived comfortably due to Henry’s success as a warehouser of commodities such as broom corn, etc. Henry’s warehouses were located at the corner of Michigan Avenue and Lake Michigan.

By 1929, two months after the stock market crash, the Mahin family of 4 had lost everything. Piling all essentials into their car, they bundled themselves off to California. They traveled along highways made of wooden planks, arriving in Santa Monica with no money and no prospects. Charles was 15 and Gracie was 17.

Henry went to work as a day-laborer, not earning money because there was no money. He worked in trade, earning a barrel of pickles and then trading it for a few essentials at the grocery store. Many years later, Henry would never say he was going to the grocery store, rather he would say, I’m going trading.

All members of the Mahin family worked in any way they could. One fortuitous opportunity occurred when Henry worked and earned a broken, used, wood lathe. Henry and Charles put the lathe back together and went to the local bowling alley where broken, wooden bowling pins could be had for free. They took the broken pins, cut off the ends, drilled holes and turned the bowling pins into wooden rollers that could be used in lawn edgers and mowers, and as rolling pins.

Their fortune began to turn and Charles and Gracie went to school at Santa Monica City College, continuing to work at the same time. Gracie graduated from University of California at Berkeley with a degree in Library Science. Charles attended UCLA, studying meteorology, completing all but one course. He hated the subject so much he transferred to nearby University of Southern California (USC), eventually earning a Bachelor’s degree in Music Education and Church Music.

The Mahin family attended church every week: Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Congregational or Brethren. They attended church wherever Charles was singing as bass soloist.

One of the greatest challenges of Charles’s life came when World War II was declared. He was a member of the Brethren church at the time, a church that objected to violence of any kind. As a conscientious objector, he was sent to Tacoma, Washington, where he served for 4 years as an occupational therapist for mentally ill soldiers who had been badly broken by the war. At one point, Charles was attacked by one of these soldiers with an axe. The blow to his head left a scar that was visible the rest of his life.

Charles returned home to Santa Monica after his 4 year ordeal as a conscientious objector. Gracie returned from college, newly married to Clyde L. Jackson, a Southern Baptist minister, who was a chaplain in the army. Grace and Clyde eventually settled in Texas.

One Sunday, the family went with Charles and Gracie to Trinity Baptist Church in Santa Monica which was under the leadership of Rev. Fred Judson. Charles noticed an attractive soprano soloist in the choir. As he went to the choir room to meet her, he instead introduced himself to the organist, Lucille Johnson. Their courtship began, culminating in marriage on July 2, 1946.

In 1948, I was born at Santa Monica Hospital. My mom (Lucille) was 40 years old and had a very hard labor. Her young doctor did not have a great deal of experience in child birth. This was the era of giving premature babies pure oxygen in an incubator immediately following a difficult birth. As I grew older, it became obvious that I had vision challenges. At the time, no one knows exactly how it happened—perhaps early childhood measles, being given pure oxygen upon birth, hard labor, or some other traumatic eye event. Eventually, it became apparent that an entire generation of blind or partially–sighted children, had been given pure oxygen.

At the age of 4, surgery was performed to straighten my eyes and Dr. Nugent diagnosed optic atrophy, a degeneration of the optic nerve in each eye. This condition resulted in 20/200 vision for the rest of my life. (The good news is that since then my vision has been stable. The bad news is that since then my vision has been lousy with bad central vision and good peripheral vision.)

One of the greatest gifts I have received was being dropped into a family as a partially-sighted boy with a mother who had spent most of her education preparing to teach the blind and partially-sighted. It was a major coincidence and I have often thought I won the lottery at birth!

Mom spent a lot of extra time helping me adapt to my challenges. She continued teaching at UCLA and private schools in the area. Dad and his father, Henry, created Mahin’s Manufacturing in Venice, California. Products included fence parts, lawn mower replacement parts and most uniquely, becoming the largest distributor of rolling pins on the west coast. Going to the movies with Mom and Dad to see Breakfast at Tiffany’s, we saw Audrey Hepburn pick up a rolling pin with the intention of stealing it. At that point, I stood up in the theater and cried out, That’s my dad’s rolling pin! This success