You're Saved: A Spiritual Perspective from a Doctor and Military Spouse

By MD Lara Tigler

This inspirational memoir is all about one woman's journey of spiritual enlightenment. Based on Dr. Lara Tigler's life and her mystical Salvation experience with the Holy Spirit, her story shows how someone can go from having no faith to having such complete faith that they become saved. Her journey brings the reader through many harrowing life

• Language: English
• Publisher: Palmetto Publishing
• Release date: May 2, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685158071

MD Lara Tigler

Dr. Lara Tigler was born and raised in Illinois, then settled in Las Vegas, Nevada, after completing her medical training. She has won numerous academic awards related to the medical field and is a fellow of the American Board of Family Physicians. Dr. Tigler is also an Episcopalian lay eucharistic minister and lay eucharistic visitor. She has served on the vestry of two separate churches, and enjoys participating in a variety of outreach activities through her church. Dr. Tigler is a military spouse. Her husband is a pilot and helped evacuate the last refugees from Afghanistan in 2021. They have two children. In her spare time, she has designed a functional clothing line and enjoys sewing at home. She often goes camping with her family and dogs. She has published medically related articles and some poetry. This is her first novel.

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Prologue

It has taken me decades to realize that the purpose of life is to be saved. I look back on my life now and wonder: If I had known the purpose of life back then, would I have done anything differently?

This book is essentially a positive answer to that question. The truth is that I do not really have any regrets; that is not what this book is about. This book is about how we can help one another in our path to salvation. It is about the power we have to love each other and to build each other up. And that can make all the difference!

I am writing this book partly for you but also partly for me. Now that I have found salvation, I have something worthwhile to give, something more precious, more hard-won, something greater than all the wealth you could ever hope to accumulate. It has been several years since my salvation experience. Ironically, perhaps tragically, nothing much has changed in my immediate outside world. It is hard for me to see any real difference in my relationship with others. I have peace inside, but my outside world still seems to be in the dark.

No one in my intimate circle is saved, except for a few close friends. After my salvation experience, with time and reverence, I did share the wonderful news with my closest family and friends, but for the most part, it fell on deaf ears.

In writing this book, I hope to connect to people who can actually use my experience to their advantage. I feel I have something worthwhile to give, and I hope someone can use what I have to offer.

I had to find salvation the hard way; it was a long road. It would have been helpful if someone I had trusted had clearly explained to me that I was lost and that I could be saved and exactly how that could be done. No one could have been more surprised than me to find out that all along salvation was my ultimate destination. I just did not know that until I had arrived.

I have also found out that Salvation is not an end point but an incredible beginning.

Perhaps, knowing you ultimately will be saved, you will be able to make smarter choices than I did. Perhaps you can immerse yourself even deeper in God's word than I did. Perhaps that peace, which passes all understanding, can come to you one millisecond sooner than it did for me.

I wish that for you. I hope for you. But most of all, I love you.

SECTION ONE

Before I Was Called

CHAPTER ONE

Secular Childhood

I grew up in what I thought was a secular household. I have since learned that it might best be described as a religious household but unaffiliated. At least that is the best description I could find when looking at a recent religion survey of the United States. You see, there was some belief in God as the Supreme Being of the universe, but it was never mentioned much or emphasized. It certainly was not taught as a belief that I should also share. It was just mentioned very rarely.

Suffice it to say, there was virtually no organized religion in my home while growing up. There was no talk of Jesus as our Lord and Savior. There was no praying at night before bedtime. There was no praying before meals except at rare special holidays like Thanksgiving and maybe an Easter dinner or two. There was no going to church weekly. No listening to sermons. No singing with the church choir. There was virtually never any talk about or mention of the Bible. There was no regular Christian fellowship with others in the community. There was no community or group prayer. There was no Eucharist, no Holy Communion, no baptism, no godparents, no church retreats; there were no church camps or outings.

In short, I was nearly completely ignorant of Christian doctrine by the time I entered high school. I had virtually no knowledge of the Christian vernacular. Even the phrase being called was completely foreign to me. When I finally was called, I certainly did not know the term for it at that time.

The concept of being saved was also completely foreign to me. I do remember Mom saying once or twice that if you are going to remember anything in the Christian religion, you had best memorize the Lord's Prayer. But she did not explain why. She did not instruct me to read the Bible. I had no knowledge of where I might even find the Lord's Prayer. She did not help me learn the prayer. She never double-checked if I had memorized it. She showed no interest at all whether I even remembered her sage advice.

My father also gave rare religious advice. Honestly, I do not recall any specific religious advice that he ever gave me as a child, but he was the only one in the family to ever show an example of how to live a religious life; he was the one who spoke the prayer before those family holiday meals. I do not recall him mentioning even once the importance of me praying. When he led the grace before that family holiday meal, he never asked us to join in, although I am familiar with the tradition of only one person saying grace at a large family meal, and that is of course a beautiful tradition.

He never explained why he was praying or saying grace before a meal. It was barely a ritual to even say a prayer at those special family holidays.

I had three sisters, and none of them were any more knowledgeable about the Christian religion while growing up. I went to a public school, and there was no mention of the Bible, no praying except that we routinely chanted the Pledge of Allegiance in grade school. There is a phrase in the pledge that says under God. No one in my school ever mentioned the significance of that phrase. My parents never mentioned anything about it either. It seemed perfectly natural to say that phrase, so I also never mentioned it.

We did celebrate Christmas and the Easter holidays while growing up. But it was almost entirely secular. As a child, there was never any mention of attending a midnight mass. If we did attend a church service for Easter, it was rare and not well understood. Actually, I did not understand the significance of it at all. Of course, I did hear Jesus's name mentioned in the rare church services.

I grew up in the 1970s, and that was the beginning of holiday cartoon specials for kids. There was some mention of what Christmas is all about Charlie Brown. It sounded good. But that was as far as it went. In the ‘70s you did not hear politicians talk about religion very much. There was not the extensive TV coverage that you have now. There were only a few channels, and for the most part, the news was pretty much secular as indeed it should be. There were not many TV evangelists in the ‘70s, and even if there were, those were not the shows that I watched. There was no internet, and I did not listen to the radio much as a child, except to listen to the latest tunes. I liked American Top 40.

Our family was regularly active with our neighbors while growing up. Or more precisely, we kids were highly active with the other kids in the neighborhood. The parents were friendly, but they were all working for the most part. Those long, lovely, carefree summers were only for us kids to enjoy. There were no backyard barbecues with the neighbors, a chance to hear from the grown-ups, maybe hear what their plans were for Sunday morning. In our relationships with our neighbors, there was virtually no mention of religion. Really no knowledge of what anyone's beliefs were at all.

To further put the nail in my secular coffin while growing up, my extended family was not religious either. Well, my one grandmother did attend church, but when we visited her, it was not expected that we would attend. It was not a major part of our visits with her. In short, there was no hope of learning about salvation from pretty much anyone.

If I was dead to religion as a youth, I was also dead to many things that can come with organized religion. I had virtually no significant exposure to hypocrisy as a girl. My parents were consistent, reliable, and responsible. I had no firsthand experience with corruption. I did not know anyone who was self-righteous. I really did not even know what that term meant. Mostly because I had no idea what it meant to be righteous in the first place. I had no knowledge of perversion in the church.

You might argue then that I was better off without religion in my life as a youth, even sacrificing spiritual study and practice. I certainly had an idyllic childhood in almost every other sense of the word. And in many ways, I have benefited from my lack of spiritual discipline and instruction as a child. I was not given false instruction. I was not lied to. These are certainly advantages that many people in the world cannot claim.

As a child, I had security, but it was provided by my parents. My parents were extremely loving and good. I had a powerful sense of safety and peace. I remember thinking as a girl that I am devoted to my family. I remember my mother saying to me once, I think you are going to be the daughter that cares for us later in life; you seem to care for family or something to that effect. I was happy.

The problem with security that is provided by someone other than God is that it does not last.

If someone offers you security based on their love, their money, their experience, their vision, their goodness, even if it seems great, my advice to you is run! If you put all your faith in money, family, business, or education, eventually you will see your faith shattered. Instead, run to God first; then you can have all these wonderful things, and all of it will be that much better for having sought God first. Jesus told us to seek God first. He said that all things will be added to you. Run straight to God; do not let anything stop you from obtaining salvation, and then all things will be added to you.

What we are talking about in this book is real security: the kind that lasts, the kind that really matters. The kind that you have been searching for since you originally lost it.

And that brings us to the heart of the matter, the Truth, which you will find if you get some good spiritual instruction. Right now, if you are not saved, then you do not have real security. That is because you lost it. A long time ago, a very long time ago, somehow or other, you fell from grace. Now the truth is that I do not have many more details to give you about this subject. I have studied this subject of course, but I find it somewhat painful and difficult to speak about it; I personally try not to think about my fall from grace. I try to just focus on the good news of my salvation. Maybe one day I will write a book about my fall from grace, kind of like a prequel. But for now, for the purposes of this book, it is sufficient to know that we were lost, and thanks be to God, we can be found.

This is the good news that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, brought to us. Jesus said that the Truth shall set you free. He wants you to be saved. Remember Luke 19:10, NIV (in the Christian Bible), For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. He wants you to study and understand the Truth. He wants you to excel in Christian wisdom, beauty, and faith. This is why he took such pains, literally, to bring you the Truth.

He sacrificed everything for you.

I like to watch TV evangelists on Sunday morning before I go to church. Some of my favorites are Joel Osteen from Houston, Dr. Charles Stanley of In Touch Ministries, and Benny Perez of ChurchLV in South Las Vegas. One time I heard Pastor Perez say, You can’t be good enough and you can’t be bad enough to earn salvation; it is a gift. I believe that.

However, I do have something to add to that wisdom. Actually, I have two points to add. And these two points are essential in understanding my motivation in writing this book.

First, if someone wants to give you a gift, I believe that it takes a certain amount of faith and trust in order for you to accept it. Search your own experience, and you will see that this is true. If a stranger were to say to you, I want to give you this painting; I have cherished it for years. What would you say? Many thoughts might go through your mind. Why is this stranger even talking to me? You might just have an initial feeling of being uncomfortable. You might look away briefly to see if there is a way to escape this strange encounter. You might naturally say to yourself, Do I need a painting? What if it is ugly? And so on and so on.

Now, imagine the scenario above but replace the giver with a trusted friend. Depending on how close the two of you are, you might automatically say, Of course, I will cherish it all my life or something to that effect. The reason you are so much more likely to accept such a precious gift of art is because you know the giver. You trust him. You have faith in him.

The second point is this: it is somewhat difficult to be a receiver. It takes a certain amount of humility to receive. Everyone feels comfortable, to some degree, in giving. But not everyone feels comfortable in receiving. Of course, when I speak about receiving, I mean doing so with grace and love, not with greed and pride.

Imagine the same scenario with the painting; you are again the receiver, but you are an artist yourself. You take considerable pride in your work. You want others to praise your work. You would appreciate recognition for your efforts and talent. The stranger offers you a painting. You are confused. You want him to appreciate your art, not the other way around. Maybe you even feel anger, resentment, or the like. Maybe you feel suspicious that he might want something in return, just as you might want something in return for all of your efforts in your painting. And so on and so on.

Now take the two points I have explained, and imagine that you are ignorant of your need for salvation. Or imagine that you are aware of the belief that salvation is important in some religions, but you do not have any idea that that might apply to you. Or imagine that you have a prejudice against Christians who teach that salvation is important for your soul. Or imagine that you do not believe that you can have a personal relationship with God. Or imagine that you are a Christian, but you never gave salvation much thought. You get the idea.

Now imagine that God himself speaks to you. He offers the gift of salvation. Accepting such a gift might be difficult for you. In fact, it might be impossible for you to do. You do not know God. You certainly do not trust him. You do not have faith in him. You do not even know what salvation really means. Or you might just feel that you really do not need to be saved. You might think that you are doing fine. In fact, you might even believe that God should reward you for your great works—things that you have done without his help. You might even resent his interference. You might be angry at him for allowing evil to exist. You might want to brush God off.

You can now see that although salvation is indeed a gift, it does not necessarily follow that you are a willing recipient of that gift. Of course, God is constantly offering it to you, free of charge, no strings attached. But for many reasons, you might not even realize that fact. And even if you do, you might have many reasons why you are not yet ready to accept it.

This is where good, constant, devoted spiritual discipline and instruction come into play. This is where studying the word of God, the Truth that Jesus laid out for you, will pay off. If you constantly and consistently study the word of God, it is more likely that you will develop a trusting relationship with God. This will bode well for you once you are ready to accept the gift of salvation. Also, with constant study of your own character, both the good and the bad, you are more likely to understand the importance of receiving.

The thing to remember is the Truth that nothing that does not come from God can give you real security. Salvation is your real security. It is your only way out of the predicament that you find yourself in—that is, your fall from grace.

The thing is that without spiritual discipline and study and instruction, you might not realize this Truth. And more importantly, without a relationship with God, you might not be willing to accept your very own salvation when the time comes.

That brings me to the final essential point of this book. We can help each other find salvation. Maybe not in conversion to Christianity, although that would certainly be a good first step. But we can foster a healthy environment for one another. We can pray for one another. It does not have to be perfect, just sincere and persistent. We can build each other up. We can search within ourselves, daily, and try to figure out how we can best love the people in our lives. And when we fail, our faith will give us the courage to get right back up and try again.

Let us pray:

Dear God, thank you for my life. Thank you for the gift of grace that you freely offer. I know that my life is a gift of grace. It is your prerogative to offer that gift. It is your sweet mercy that sustains my life. Give me the wisdom and faith needed to praise your holy name day and night. Let me always give glory to God. Let me accept your gift of Salvation for now and always. Let my soul be renewed each day in faith and wisdom so that I may go out into the world with your peace which passes all understanding. Amen.

CHAPTER TWO

Mystical Mother

I think I knew my mother even before I was born. My earliest memories of her are familiar and filled with love; in large part, the security that I had as a girl stemmed from her bottomless reservoir of patience and presence.

You might know some mothers who lose patience, who snap at their children, or who have some other such folly. That was not my mother. I cannot remember a time when she lost patience, was unjust, or rocked my foundation of love. Of course, there were times that it was clear that she was sorely tested. I do not mean by me or my sisters necessarily, although that did happen. But I primarily mean by circumstances outside of the family, circumstances creeping up in the outside world. But by and large, my school-age years were filled with happiness.

My mother chiefly communicated by storytelling. It is a mystery then how she ran her home with such clear precision. Unlike my father, she never seemed to feel the need to discipline us girls. There was no stern face, no look of disapproval, no punishment, no verbal or physical rebuke. She led mostly by example, and the rest kind of just followed. I remember her sometimes saying, with her musically soft voice, A place for everything and everything in its place. Then she might show me where the broom or hairbrush belonged. She made it seem like the most natural thing in the world to put those items in that particular place, as if they were happy to be perched just so. She started us on chores so early that I cannot even remember a time when I did not have some part in helping the household. She looked on our home as a big team project and made everyone feel as though they had something important to contribute to that team. She would even say, We are in this together.

As I was very young, she earned her master's degree in business. I remember an ability on her part to detach emotionally to the point where she acted in more stereotypically manly ways. I remember going up to her when I was six years old and telling her that it was time for my fingernails to be trimmed. This was a ritual that I thoroughly enjoyed. Being a child in a large family, it was a treasured moment to have such one-on-one time with my mother. In those days nail scissors were more commonly used than fingernail clippers. To trust a young child with curved, tiny nail scissors was certainly a milestone. She told me, If you are old enough to know that your nails need to be trimmed, then you are old enough to trim them, and then she left the scene.

I was a bit shocked. I was alone. In my six-year-old brain, I briefly doubted whether I was indeed ready to be independent in this area. I was still holding the nail scissors I had brought to my mother. Sadly, and bravely, I decided to trust her, and I trimmed my own nails. I was taking a risk because I was a bit afraid of using the scissors on my own, but all went well.

Looking back, I realize she probably knew it was past time for me to learn this particular life skill. She might have grieved over losing that connection with me while she performed the mundane task; she might have mourned the loss herself. But she knew it was time to let me go. As it turned out, her approach was exactly right. I gained confidence. Soon, with her guidance, I gained more independence. Through the years she shared many life skills with my sisters and me. She taught me how to cook, to sew, to clean, to do laundry, to garden, to balance a checkbook, to pay bills, to manage money, and to do many other practical things.

But it was not what she taught me that really mattered. It was how she taught me. She had this innate ability to bring joy and laughter to a subject. I remember cleaning the house countless times. Do you know that each time I did it I enjoyed it? I took pride in a job well done. This lasted well into the years, even long after she stopped supervising. I remember my favorite chores were cleaning the kitchen and the bathroom. I loved the details and layers. I loved the shiny counters and glistening sinks. Often when my sisters and I would be doing chores, we would play music. I believe this was a natural extension of the presence of my mother. My mother had the most beautiful voice. She sang often when I was a young child. Not just a lullaby to get us to sleep but throughout the house and spontaneously on trips. In those days eight-track tapes were still popular. My mom and dad had a favorite eight track, which was an album of the classical baroque composer Bach. I remember playing that eight track over and over and never tiring of its ethereal melodies. We also used to play Billy Joel's albums a lot. Only I remember dancing to his albums more than I remember cleaning to them.

Although our weekends were filled with chores, they were almost always filled with fun. This is where my mom particularly shined. We had all sorts of outings, many quite educational. When I was young, she took us often to the pond to watch the ducks. We went to parks and beaches. We went to museums, plays, and theaters. We went to amusement parks. We drove through the country and had spontaneous picnics. I particularly loved eating my mom's meat loaf sandwiches while sitting at the lakeside on the dunes of Lake Michigan. Even now my vegetarian palate still drools thinking about my mom's meat loaf.

My mother was the cheerful glue that held the family together. Although she worked outside the home while I was growing up, there was always the strong feeling that she was with you. You just knew that she supported you, and there was no doubting her love. Even if she worked late, we would always eat dinner together as a family. This was so well understood that no one would ever think to eat dinner without the rest of the family. It was never done. Also, there was none of this eating different meals at the same table business. Not like you see with families nowadays. And it was certainly unheard of for family members to eat in separate rooms of the house. We ate dinner together, the same food, around the same table. This may have just been a sign of the times, as there were no microwave ovens back then, no cell phones, no texting, no iPads, and no distractions except the rare telemarketing phone call. Most middle-class families did not have the budget for eating out frequently. We ate what Mom and Dad prepared, and we ate it together as a family.

It was during these early years that mom's storytelling was at its prime. It was in this way, chiefly at the dinner table but in other venues as well, that she left her moral mark. She told us stories about her upbringing, stories about her college life, stories about her friends and adventures. The common theme throughout all these stories was a strict moral code. If you looked closely at the story, she always sympathized with what was right rather than what was easy. She was saddened when she or others did not rise to the occasion, and she was bolstered when there was a triumph over moral struggle.

I remember particularly a story that she would tell about Emanuel Swedenborg. He was a Swedish scientist, philosopher, and Christian mystic, who was born in the seventeenth century. She would reminisce about her experience while reading his book Servant of the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe she told us that she read his work while she was in college. But as she spoke, a transformation would occur in her entire demeanor. She would be overcome with the Holy Spirit and only words of awe and love would spill from her mouth. She was never able to articulate much else. But it was clear that the book made an indelible impression on her. I use the words Holy Spirit while recounting this story. I am sure you realize by now that I certainly did not know or use those words as a girl. And in recounting her story, my mother never used the words either. In fact, she never mentioned the title of the book. The word Christian never escaped her mouth. But throughout the years, whenever she was feeling particularly safe and open, she would recount this experience. I knew it was a turning point in her life.

Unfortunately for my mother, she was insecure as a girl. She tells that she sucked her thumb until she was twelve years old. Apparently, right in front of her classmates, she accidentally urinated in first grade. She also says that as a baby she was temporarily separated from her mother for a few months; that might have played a role in her insecurity. The details of this story are less clear to me as I think they are not very clear to my mother either. Despite these obvious bad memories, overall, my mother recounts a happy childhood. She and her sister were voracious readers. My mother excelled at school and in leadership roles. She shed her outward signs of insecurity and went on to become an overachiever of sorts.

My mother was born in the 1940s, toward the end of World War II. This was a time of great sacrifice and great uncertainty. My grandfather, Mom's dad, served in that war. Grandpa was not religious at all. By all accounts, he was either an atheist or an agnostic. His father (my great-grandfather) was an atheist. My great-grandfather's name was Alfredo. He was born in a small village in Northern Italy sometime around the end of the nineteenth century. Alfredo was a teenager when he learned that the village priest allegedly raped a young girl. Apparently, this caused a great crisis of faith for the young man, my great-grandfather. You see, in that time, in that part of the world, the priest was thought of as an actual representative of God on earth. It was then that he became an atheist.

Not long after the alleged rape, Alfredo left for the New World. He married and had several children and settled in Central Illinois. He lived out the rest of his days as a farmer. By all accounts he was a rather harsh man.

My grandfather (Alfredo's son) was the youngest of seven children. His name was Nicholas. Grandpa Nick took on the same skepticism and unbelief as his father. He was not baptized. He lived out his days without ever accepting Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. Grandpa Nick married a beautiful and highly intelligent woman named Marie. She came from Michigan; her ancestors came from Finland and Norway. Her religious background was not clear to me as a girl, but I have recently learned that she came from a Lutheran background. However, at some point in her life, she also found herself to be an agnostic. My mother then was raised in a home completely devoid of religion. Like me, she was not baptized as a child. Also like me, she never experienced church life. Unlike me, her parents had no definite belief in a Supreme Being.

Sometime during my mother's later childhood years, my grandparents had a falling out. They did not divorce though as it was not the custom to divorce back then. But they led somewhat separate lives. This had to have had a devastating effect on my mother. At some point my grandfather began to drink somewhat heavily. It is not clear whether the memories of war or the stresses of business or even the rebuff of his estranged wife played the larger role. While he certainly was not an alcoholic in the strict sense of the word, his wayward habits must have taken a toll on the family. Ironically though, it was my grandfather who was the main moral support for my mother in her teenage years. Apparently, my grandmother was going through difficult mental times of her own. I get the sense that throughout my mom's early life, her father was her main ally, her rock.

When the time came for my mother to go off to college, she did not have a whole lot of practical and moral support. Not much from her family but also not much from society. I would venture to say that educating a woman even as late as the 1960s was not looked upon as a very prudent return on investment. Nevertheless, her father, ever her champion, paid for her college tuition.

She met my biological father (the father who raised me is my adopted dad) at college. She became pregnant with my oldest sister. In those days if a woman got pregnant, the couple tended to get married. Not to oversimplify my mother's situation but for the sake of brevity for this book, she did end up marrying my biological father. Unfortunately for my mother, although he did have some teaching on the Christian religion and although he was apparently a baptized Christian, he was not a very good Christian by any stretch of the imagination. They had a total of four children, my three sisters and me, all in a span of less than five years. Soon after my youngest sister was born, he left my mother. After that he does not really play in my story at all. This is probably the last we will mention of him.

For a few years, my mother was a single mom. When she recounts this time of her life, she usually says, I was tired all of the time. No doubt. She talks about diapers and sleep and the fact that she was working and in school. She talks about sadness and rejection. Not just rejection from her first love but isolation from friends and family. And yet you get the sense that these were the years that tested her soul. She persevered, she was pummeled to ashes, and she rose as a phoenix.

Toward the end of her aloneness, when she was dating my dad, when I was five years old, my mother joined the Presbyterian Church across the street. She put my sisters and me into Sunday school classes.

To say that this was quite miraculous would be an understatement. There is no person in her circle that would have influenced her to do this remarkable thing. Not my father, not her father. She would have had no family precedent to join a church.

Also, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, there was less societal pressure to join a church. Although her parents had taught her something about the world's various religions, she really had no practical knowledge of what it meant to have church membership. It was a foreign world to her. She was a woman alone, raising four children. You must remember that in those days, it was still illegal for women to own their own property or business. Women were not able to have credit in their own name. Back then, it was even unusual for women to drive. So as a single mother, to take this action of joining the church was really quite a brave undertaking.

However, as brave and resilient as she had become, she still had no foundation of belief in God. I believe she was called by God while in her college years; I think that call nagged at her for several years, and she finally took a definitive step forward in answering that call.

But she did not have anyone in her circle to turn to for advice and support. She did not know how to lean on God for support in her Christian walk. She had had mystical experiences in her life, not the least of which was her Swedenborg epiphany, but she had no way to reliably reproduce that kind of faith. She had no background and discipline of spiritual study to fall back on. She had no lifetime of daily prayer to embolden her. She had no church community that had seen her grow up in front of their eyes to pray for her. She was left to her own devices.

So she drifted from faith in her dad, to faith in her first husband, to faith in the church across the street. Her faith in God was not well developed nor well understood. And as I have told you, if God is not the foundation of your belief, then you have no foundation. If your faith is in anything other than God, then inevitably it will follow that your faith will be shattered.

And as is often the case with faith, it was soon tested. The pastor at the church was apparently quite disapproving of her divorced status. Being a single mother with little cash flow, she also felt undue pressure to come up with the quarter donation expected for each child during Sunday school class. It did not take my mom very long to withdraw our family from the church, never to return. Thus, my Christian education had ended nearly as quickly as it had begun.

Remember Jesus's parable from Matthew 13:5, HCSB (The seeds) fell on rocky ground, where there wasn’t much soil, and they sprang up quickly since the soil wasn’t deep. But when the sun came up, they were scorched, and since they had no root, they withered.

Let us pray:

Dear God, we pray that you will help us persevere in our daily prayer and meditation. Let us meditate on your goodness and mercy day and night. In times of discouragement, we pray that you will uphold us by your strength and keep us in your way. We trust in you, O God, in you alone. You have given us life and breath, food to satisfy our hunger, and faith to nourish our souls. We pray to always keep others in our prayers, especially those without faith, those without a personal relationship with you, that they might gain faith and that peace which passes understanding. Amen.

CHAPTER THREE

Disciplined Dad

My earliest memory of my dad was when I played a Christmas angel in the church holiday play. This was that same church that I mentioned in the previous chapter. I remember walking up and down the stairs in that church. I remember the preparation for the Christmas show. I remember attending the Sunday school classes, seeing the larger-than-life biblical pictures of the main protagonists in the Old and New Testaments. As a five-year-old girl, I had only a vague idea of what the Christmas show was all about. But there was clearly a powerful sense of emotion and joy during this time. Not the least of which was the joy my mom must have felt with her new husband-to-be by her side, taking part in this adorable family event. I remember my dad was there, supporting the family. I can still see his face shining with pride and joy. Considering the great happiness and love that we all shared and still do share as a family, I find it incredibly fitting that my first memory of my beloved father was in a church. Thanks be to God.

My next clear memory of my dad was several months later, at my parents’ church wedding in August 1974. My parents got married in a church designed by the renowned architect Frank Lloyd Wright. It was quite spectacular and special. I always got the feeling that my mom and dad took considerable pride in the location and uniqueness of their church. The few times they did talk about religion, they seemed to have a mutual fondness for the Unitarian Church they were married in. I remember hearing them talk about the fact that they might be comfortable attending services there. But they never did.

The wedding ceremony itself was nice. My mother looked simply gorgeous in a traditional off-white wedding gown. The gown was remarkably similar in A-line style, elegance, and appearance to the gown that Duchess Kate wore at the famous British wedding of April 2011. My mother, having a stunning figure, looked just as lovely, if not more so. My dad was dapper in his 1970s tuxedo. We four daughters had on adorable pink floor-length dresses with tiny bits of lace to make you feel quite dressed up. My youngest sister was the flower girl; being only four years old, she did not quite make it down the aisle successfully, but that was the only real glitch in the whole event.

I remember particularly that during the ceremony Mom and Dad made a special point to reach out to us and ask us four girls if we agree to have Dad as our new father and part of the family. I was really quite awestruck to be included in such an obviously grown-up-type ceremony. It was apparent that Mom and Dad, although deliriously happy, were quite serious indeed. When the time came for our participation in this most reverent ceremony, we also took our part quite seriously. I remember I said yes.

Mom and Dad found a lovely house in a near-west suburb of Chicago for our family home. This particular neighborhood was changing fast as the laws were changing to keep pace with new civil rights for blacks and people of color (we did not use the term African-American back then). The Civil Rights Act of 1964 had paved the way for a great many changes in the nation, including correcting racial biases in Realtor practices. Lovely, old, gracious homes that used to be predominantly owned by older white people soon were occupied by people of all colors and creeds. Our small block alone had white, Hispanic, and black. Down the street were Asians and other minorities.

Through the years, I learned that my parents were very purposeful in choosing our home. They wanted to support civil rights; they wanted to walk the walk. My father was a vocal supporter of civil rights. In 1963, he, along with many other brave white people, took part in a weeklong voter registration drive in the South. He was threatened but thankfully nothing untoward ever happened to him. He had close college friends who were involved in other aspects of civil rights, including promoting free press in Jackson, Mississippi, and supporting workers in Selma, Alabama. When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. marched in the Chicagoland area in the notorious Cicero neighborhood, my dad was walking in that same group. Unfortunately, my dad was hit with rocks during that march. But again, thankfully, he was not majorly injured. My parents shared this conviction of putting your money where your mouth is, so to speak. So we moved into what would be our family home for many years.

My life prior to this move was tinged with sadness. My mother was often tired, sad, and alone. I had no father figure to speak of, and it was not as full and happy as it might have been. Eleven months before Mom and Dad were married, I started kindergarten. When Mom recounts the story of dropping my twin sister and me off to kindergarten for the first time, she always sounds freshly surprised that I cried inconsolably. In fact, she says I cried so hard and inconsolably that she was forced to take me home. She says she was surprised she had to do that because my twin and I were usually so cooperative and understanding, even at an incredibly early age.

My twin did fine however and enjoyed her first day of kindergarten without me. Whenever my mom or I tell this story, I like to joke that the real reason I cried so hard was because I knew that I had twenty-four years of school ahead of me (I am a physician) and I was longing for just one more day of freedom.

But now, knowing much more about mood disorders, my family history, and the life experience I had before my father came into my life, I realize that I did not make the adjustment quite as smoothly as would be normally expected.

Months later, after we moved into our new family home, my dad took two of my sisters and me aside. We were standing at the foot of the main stairs of the house. He kneeled down to our very short level (he is over six feet tall) and told us that he has a question for us. He asked us, What do you want to call me? You can call me anything you want—Dad, Don, Daddy—anything you want.

I knew my answer, so quickly it was out of my mouth like a shot; Daddy, I said. I remember his face just beamed. I remember we hugged.

Thus began one of the most meaningful and happy relationships of my life. Thus began the golden years of my youth.

My dad was also born in the 1940s; he was born and raised in New York State. Although he was raised back East and my mother was raised in the Midwest, they had a remarkably similar upbringing. It was a healthy mix of rural living with suburban conveniences. He would tell us that he went to school in a one-room schoolhouse for a long time. It was a small community and a religious one too. He was baptized and raised a Methodist. Unlike my mother, he had the benefit of a formal religious education. This was obvious to us daughters in things he said and did throughout our childhood years.

The few times we did go to church, say for a funeral or a wedding, it was my dad who gave us an idea of what to expect. We knew what to wear and how to act mostly because of his example. If we dressed too casually, it was his look of disapproval that guided us in how to dress up a bit more. If we dawdled a bit, it was his encouragement to move faster that showed us the virtue of being on time.

He never spoke much about his transition from regular churchgoer to almost never attending church. To this day, I am not clear about how that transition occurred. My best guess is that regular church attendance was a task imposed on him as a child. More than likely he never got to feel the joy in voluntarily attending church, probably because his mother did not model that joy. From what he has told us through the years, I gather that his mother was a bit stringent.

I do know that once he went to college, there was a strict code of dress and code of behavior as well. He was expected to dress formally for dinner every night. Perhaps he attended church then as well, and no doubt it was probably just as formal. In the 1960s the colleges and universities still had more traditional codes of behavior and customs. Dormitories would have strict rules such as a curfew at night and restrictions on who could enter the dorms. There was not as much freedom in the colleges as there is now.

Also, my father studied chemistry in college. Science was and still is a much more rigorous and demanding major. He displayed exemplary discipline in performing all his duties throughout his entire college career. In fact, he performed so well in school and life in general that his father (my grandfather) was grooming him to enter medical school. Apparently, when it came time to apply to medical schools, not only did my father apply to many but he was accepted to several as well. Interestingly, my mother is the one to tell the next part of the story, my father threw the acceptance letters in the wastebasket in my grandfather's house, quite a visible act of rebellion.

Having practiced medicine for many years now and knowing my father's great qualities, I am quite sure that my father could have been an outstanding physician. He had the exquisite mind, methodical devotion, strong work ethic, and compassionate heart that every patient wants in their doctor.

After college he did not go on to graduate school. When he became my dad, he owned and operated a community newspaper. Before that though, I know he held several positions; he worked for the Head Start Program in the Chicago area, and even before that he was a salesman.

He was quite a handsome man, quite gentlemanly, tall and debonair. He wore his hair rather long compared to today's standards. Even in the late 1960s and early 1970s, for a man to wear his hair long was not necessarily mainstream but certainly a trend. He was a curious mix of tradition and change. Before my mother he was married twice. I get the sense that these years after college and before my mother were years of experimentation, unfettered freedom, and lacking in spiritual direction.

I have no doubt in my mind that my mother saved my father; just as he probably saved her. I think that true love will do that. Upon marrying my mother, he got something he sorely needed, which was a spiritual rock. I believe God ordained my parents’ marriage. I think that throughout their entire lives together, my parents have felt that blessing and favor. Since my father was married twice before, he certainly could not have been naive to the demands from the institution of marriage. But whether he was as well prepared to become a father of four children overnight is less clear. Nevertheless, I think that traditional husband and father were the roles he was destined to play. He was raised in a traditional home with traditional values. Like my mother, he had a natural goodness, a strict sense of right and wrong. I think he was at a time in his life when he realized it was time to go home.

From the beginning my dad was an involved father. While my mother chiefly managed the home, travel, outings, and our health care, my father chiefly managed our school environment, our behavior at home, and our recreational activities. When we played any sort of sports with our parents, it was our father who led the activities. On those long winter days, we would play Nerf ball (toys modeled on balls from various sports but made of foam) in the house to such a competitive level that Mom would come home and find the entire living room rearranged into a nondescript mess. She was not exactly pleased. But we cleaned it all up, and no harm was done. We played Frisbee around the house. A game we made up. We played touch football on those crisp autumn days. Dad oversaw dropping us off and picking