“Why? Oh, why did he have to do this to himself?” the anguished cry came sobbing through hands covering the woman’s face, beseeching no one in particular…indeed, no one had the answer.

The experience had begun 45 minutes earlier. I had just arrived home for a quick lunch, and was just about to sit down to eat, when the phone rang. It was a friend of mine, an officer with the state police.

“I need to ask you a great big favor,” he began. “We just received a call from the Clovis Police Dept.,” he continued, and my heart leaped because I have family in that town.

“Okay…” I said gingerly, not wanting any bad news.

“I need to go up to Sugarite State Park (just northeast of us) and find a retired couple camping up there, and then I need to inform them that their son has killed himself.” He paused for a second. “And as the department has no active Chaplain, I thought I’d ask you to ride up there with me to meet with them.”

“Sure. When?” I asked.

“Right now,” he answered. “I’ll be by in a few minutes.”

I hung up the phone, and quietly put my lunch back in the refrigerator.

The officer came by my house and picked me up, cleaning paperwork and things off the passenger seat of his cruiser. “My guests usually don’t ride in this seat,” he said. I joked with him that if it was easier I could ride in the back, thereby really give the neighbors something to talk about. I realized I was only trying to take my mind off the sobering task at hand, and so on the 15 minute ride up the canyon, we talked.

“How many of these calls have you had to do?” I asked. “Four or five,” he answered, “and they’re never easy.” He went on to say how he never, ever knows how his day is going to go. He had started out this day chasing some cows off the interstate on the Pass…on foot…; went on to arrest and take some “bad guys” off to jail just a bit earlier, and then got this call.

We stopped at the Park office to find out where our people were camped, then drove on up to the campsite. An older, but spry, lady came out of an RV, wearing sensible summer slacks and blouse, a cap to keep the sun off, and a beautiful smile. “I didn’t do it,” she quipped, holding her hands up in mock surrender. We exited the cruiser, smiled politely at her nervous attempt at humor, and asked if her husband were also here. She said he was, and the officer then asked if we might visit with them both inside.

How do you break such news? What tone of voice does one use? Do you stand or sit? “Your son was killed today…” Words all of us at some time or other have imagined would be so horrible to hear; but unfortunately words many have heard, and experienced first hand.

And here I found myself in a rare, somewhat unusual role. During the entire conversation I kept being struck with the thought that I was going to be, forever, indelibly imprinted on this nice couple’s memories as being the bearer of terrible news; the person who stood at the dividing line, at the exact point in space and time at which they passed from being blissfully ignorant of what had happened, to the swift plummet into despair and grief.

(“Oh dear Father, give me the words to say,” I whispered in my spirit).

“I don’t think I can do this!” sobbed the mother who had never intended to outlive a child, even at this age. “I don’t know how to do this!” Her stoic husband, tears also streaming, reached over and lovingly, wordlessly, stroked her beautifully silvered head.

“You’re not expected to know how,” I said to her, taking her hands in mine. “Neither do I,” I continued, “but God knows how to do it.” She squeezed my hands, and peered wetly, intently, into my face, searching for something…for anything.

“Then I’ve got to keep my faith strong,” she whispered. “Please pray for us.”

And I did.

“My friends, be glad, even if you have a lot of trouble. You know that you learn to endure by having your faith tested. But you must learn to endure everything, so that you will be completely mature and not lacking in anything.” James 1:2-4