Getting Off the Ground

Well, here we are again, known, stories to make sense of it all. My name is Dick Foth. It's 2019. It's upon us. And when I think of the start of a new year, I think of new things. Springs just around the corner, new life, budding and all that. But the beginning of something, the launching of something always has exhilaration to it for me, whether it's starting a new project or buying a new car or initiating some new endeavor, that just something about that, isn't it, that just sort of grabs you. One of my favorite verses in the whole of Scripture is the first one. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. What's fascinating to me about that is that there was a beginning. And secondly, that that Hebrew verb, Baram, means to create something out of nothing. Now I'm one of his creations, right? You're one of his creations, so we're creators, right? But we create something out of something. He created something out of nothing. Anyway, with that as sort of a perspective or a context, I want to share a couple of stories, a couple of moments in time that capture this idea of launching something new. There was a 12 second time frame on December 17, 1903 that changed the future of the world. The world could never be the same after that. And that's where I want to begin. The 12 second centers on two brothers. These guys lived in Dayton, Ohio, and they had a bicycle building company called the Right Bicycle Company, Wilbur and Orville Wright. Apparently, they were very adept at making bicycles, but they had this fascination with flight and with manned flight. And there had been attempts at flight around the world. There had been unmanned flight, but never manned flight. In 1899, they got serious about it, and they were tinkering with all kinds of things. And of course, flying is a fascinating thing. We get on airplanes that they don't think anything about it, really. But just the concept of flight is how to birds fly. We're in a location where I see hundreds of geese in flight every day. I'm fascinated by how they cluster and how they take off and how they land. But the thing that birds and airplanes have in common is the airfoil of the wing, where because of the curvature of the top side of the wing, air molecules spread out. And it's more dense underneath the wing. And so that's where you get your lift. And it depends on wind speed, it depends on speed on takeoff, all of those things. But the Wright brothers were playing with that, trying to figure out how to do it. And it took them four years, actually, and lots of tests to be able to do this. And in December of 1903, they had driven down to a place called the Outer Banks on the coast of North Carolina near Nagzhead. There was a place that they selected called Kill Devil Hills. And there they created a track from manned airplane to run on to get started. And they did it. On that day, they did it. Last year about this time, I took my grandson Sam Clemens from Eugene, Oregon, with me to the Outer Banks, and we went to that place. And it was about the same time of year, late January, early February. And we stood there on the site, and we just looked at it because it's a flat, sandy place. They had gone there. The Wright brothers had gone there because it was a place where the winds were decent. The space was available. And on sand, you could have a soft landing, if you will, or a soft crash, as the case might be. So, Sam and I were there, and we just chatted about it for a few moments. Now, Sam, yesterday morning, you got on a plane at O'Dark 30 in Eugene, Oregon, and you flew all the way to Washington, DC, so 3,000, some miles, whatever it is. So when you stand here and look at this, we're just in a big open field with some markers and this boulder. What comes to mind in your thoughts? I think it's pretty interesting that, like before, this field was a field with some boulders that people like to look at. It was just a normal field with two brothers. People probably thought they were crazy, and it's weird being here, like, over 100 years later, and you can almost look and feel the energy that these guys must have had on the day that they were able to be successful. We're standing here looking at the length of their first flight. There's a marker down there. How far was that? 870 feet about. All the way. That's the ultimate flight. But the first one right here was 120 feet, right? I think so. In 12 seconds. And the second one was, I think, 150 feet. Anyway, they're ultimate flight. We're looking at the brochure, folks, they were doing this baby on the fly. Just to be precise, the first flight was 12 seconds, 120 feet. Second one, 12 seconds again, 175 feet. Then 15 seconds, 200 feet, and the final one was 59 seconds, 852 feet. When you think about a launch, so many things have to be in place for a new thing to happen What are the conditions that are needed for a launch to be right? In the right brothers case, you had to have the team that helped construct the plane who helped monitor and maintain the equipment, all of that. You had to get there, you had to create the track for it to run on. And then the winds, the offshore winds had to be right. They didn't know if they could do it, actually, because the offshore winds that day were 27 miles an hour in their face, but they were able to get up. And their top speed was 34 miles an hour. But just the idea of conditions being right for a new thing to happen is true for almost anything. After we left that site on Kill Devil's Hill, we drove down a few miles to an area called Wanchise, North Carolina. It's on Rowland, right there. I wanted to introduce Sam, my 19-year-old grandson, to a friend that I had met on Cape Hatteras pier in 1972 when we were on vacation with our family. The friend was an outer bank's fisherman by the name of Charles Daniels. At the time of our meeting him last year, he was 90 years old. It's great fun to introduce a 19-year-old to a 90-year-old. Let me just step back a moment and tell you about Charles. Ruth and I had taken our family in June of 1972 down to the outer banks of North Carolina, because I had been there as a boy in 1950. And I wanted to introduce them to that whole area. It's sort of a wild, beautiful area. And I'm sitting on the pier at the tail end of a hurricane. The wind was still blowing pretty hard, but you could move around. And so I was out there. And this fella comes strolling down the pier and I said, hi. And he answered with this accent that is distinct to that part of the world. That's the first place that the English came under Sir Walter Raleigh. And it's the place where they have what they called then the Lost Colony, because a couple of years later they came back to find the people they had left there and they were gone into this day. They don't know what happened to them. But they have this distinct English accent on the one hand, sort of mixed with North Carolina drawl. And this fella said to me, my name's Charles Daniels, how you do it? And I said, I'm good. And we started this conversation. And he ended up the next morning, early in the morning, taking me out long net fishing in Pemlico Sound, which is the area between the mainland and the islands. It's an area about 100 miles long and it's some places 30 miles wide. And it's teaming with all kinds of fish. And you take two boats and you string a net, a mile of net, a mile wide. And you drag the sound for four hours and bump up the net as they say. And you capture these fish. Anyway, he took me with him. First time ever had grits was on his fishing boat. And it turned out that he had had a spiritual experience back in his earlier years as a fisherman that coincided with a similar kind of experience that I had had different part of the country, different time frame, all of that. But Charles Daniels has become over the years a great friend and I get to see him every once in a while. And he isn't a person who went to college. Sam was a college freshman at the time. I've gone to college longer than I want to talk about. He never went to college. He fished all of his life. But he went to the school that teaches you things by being immersed in the day-to-day challenges. Even more than the University of Hard Knocks, I think it was this. There's something about farmers and fishermen to me that is many of them that I've met have perspectives on life that are deep just simply because they've spent a lot of time on tractors or on fishing boats and they have time to think. So here's Charles Daniels. So you ever just been sitting on the pier that I never saw any boat cold on the pier? On the fish I was dying. And so I walked up and I leaned against the pole to help the river and I said, where are you from? Starting a conversation in him. He said, I'm from Urbana, Illinois. I said, my Lord, I don't know where that place is. And that little exchange with Charles Daniels was like a 12-second launch. It was just the start of a tremendous friendship that has been maintained over these years. Now I wanted Charles to talk to my grandson, Sam, about a bit of his history and his story. And he tells about coming to faith, having come out of the merchant marine for the last 10 years. And in it he uses language that may not be language to which we're accustomed. He uses language like saved, which means for someone to come to faith in Jesus. And it's a word we don't use as much today, but the point of it is that it's a transformed life. It's the launch of a whole new thing, if you will. One of the words he uses is revival, which in churches across the country of a certain kind over the years, these were times where special speakers would come in. Things happen in people's lives, they really did, and do. And so just have that as a context as Charles talks. And so then I asked him, what kind of work do you do? He said, I'm a preacher. And I said, well, I ain't no preacher, but I just got saved a few years ago. Maybe we were just on the same page. So Sam and I left, killed Devil Hill, drove down to Wanchise, met Charles, and we met at his daughter, Ruby's house. And Ruby was so kind, she fixed us lunch as a North Carolina lunch. And the centerpiece for me was North Carolina cornbread. She learned, I think, from her mother Molly, Charles's wife, who had gone on to be with the Lord. She learned how to make North Carolina cornbread. I asked Molly one time, how do you make it so rich? And she said, my secret is to put, I don't know, how many tablespoons of sour cream in the mix. But those of you who are bakers who are listening, just give it a try, you'll like it. But there we were, we had fish, we had shrimp, we had North Carolina cornbread. And I just, I wanted Sam to hear something of Charles's story. So that's where we'll pick it up with all the sounds of sitting around that good table. How old were you when you first went fishing? Did you go with your dad when you were a little boy? Yes, sometime, yeah, I would go with him. How old were you? Were you 12 or five or? Yes, I'm like that. Tell him, you used to work for Uncle Camm. You used to work for Uncle Camm, he used to do the fish house in jail. So Charles is telling his story in the various parts. He told me one time, not in this conversation, that when he was a teenager in World War II, they were so concerned for German submarines off the coast that they would take turns patrolling the beach at night with a rifle, 16 year old kid with a rifle on the beach. He told me that the various villages were so distinct. And these are villages that are maybe five or 10 miles apart up and down that coast, that each village had its own accent. Had its own accent, you could tell the village the person came from by how they spoke. So this is the cultural context, for a more specific context, the men who fished between the off islands and the mainland in what they call the sound for all those decades, perhaps hundreds of years, fished with these nets and they were cryptically called long netters. Are you the last of the long netters? Yeah, I think so. There is a long net rig at Avon. I believe just one more. There was in the 70s, the decade of the 70s, there was about 28 long net rigs. They got so many that we had to have a list. And the charts, we marked them all putting numbers on them. And then they would have to whoever was at top, he went from the top to the bottom. I forgot his first choice. I see. So the top got the choice of where they went in the sound that day, or that week or just one day. Yeah, one day. That's a lot of long net rigs. Now, some folks are going to be hearing part of this on a podcast. What's a long net rig? What does that mean? Because that's where you find out long, two boats, one boat on either end of them. Put it on the ground. OK. That's what it would be, two boats on the ground. I need a mile long. And you dragged the sound for four or five hours. When I went with you in 72, two things I remember. One is the first time I ever had grits. It was on the Miss Debbie. He fixed me grits on the Miss Debbie while we were dragging the sound. And then the other one was the huge long nets that you've bunched up and staked them out. So ever you slice it, being on the water on the high seas or in the sound is a challenging life, a difficult life. And Charles told me about that some. But there came a point in his personal experience where at a moment in time, when the conditions just came together, just like the right brothers, launching that aircraft, Charles essentially launched a new life. Even a point had a special appointment with me. It was a time that I had been to see on the Merchant Marine for 10 years. I was on six different ships. Really? In the Merchant Marine? Yeah. I don't think I did that. I was in the Merchant Marine. And I went on that ship and all the rest of them, they weren't no Christians on that. And I'll tell you, it was a bad 10 years of my life. And at this point, Charles told me about a moment in time when he was in his hometown of Wanchi's this little village. And he met a relative who was in town for some of these special services. And that moment in time changed everything for him. And he was coming out of the car, jumped on the porch he did. And when I saw him, well, I just happened to mean him that if it had been a minute's different, I wouldn't have seen him, wouldn't go on. He wouldn't have invited me to church. And as I talked to him, he said, we're starting a revival. He said, come on and go to do it. And I said to him, making excuses. I don't know where I can go to revival or not. 10 years I hadn't been to church hardly. Just at sea. And I wasn't getting no clothes or to get in save or to every trip you make, you know. And so I went around and after we had our meeting and a few words, I went on up the road and I was driving around Ain't Live, that next corner of our Ain't Live store. I said, maybe I'll walk the girl. He probably won't have many priests to do now. Maybe I'll walk the girl. I've been to church in a long time. So I decided I was good. And when I went in that door of that church and they started singing that first song, God's presence, just wanted me to cry like a little baby. And I was doing everything I could to hold back tears. And I didn't want to be a cry. And while I was singing, and I wanted to get out of there. But God's presence was there in such a way. And that church, that revival. That was on a Thursday night. I never forget them and on a Friday night, nobody invited me. I had to go again to see if it would do the same thing again to second on it. And then it was the same thing. Just wanted to cry so bad. And I wouldn't go to the old ride. I wanted to get out of there again. The next night was Friday, Thursday. I went two nights and Saturday came. And that was my last drunk. I went to the shrine club. Got drunk. But I was a miserable drunk for me. I couldn't enjoy it. So just they weren't the same. And as we move by that Saturday night, the church, I've never looked at it, Molly. I said, Molly, that's where I ought to be going to sit at this dance. She said, my Lord, you've been two nights. I don't be enough religious for anybody. That's what you did. So we went to the dance. But I'll tell you, it was a miserable drunk. And that was the last one I ever went to. I never forget it. I don't know when I went back, whether it was Sunday or where it was Monday. I don't remember the day. But I do know one thing. The next Saturday came, I was in church. Come home and told Molly. I said, Molly, I've done it. I've gone to an old room. And it was a dead silence. You could have heard a peen drop. First thing she said, she didn't say it. It went to her mind. My Lord, it's gone, got religion. I'd rather he come home drunk again, she said. So I finally she said, did you get saved? I said, I don't know. I went to the old room. I told him I wanted to. I didn't feel nothing and see no bright lights and didn't hear nothing. I don't know where I'm saved or not. I said, I just told him. But I ended it with this. And this was true, weren't it? If God ain't done nothing, I ain't saved. When I heard Charles say that, single statement, it really struck me. There's an old saying, the proof is in the pudding. If we talk about a transformed life, if we're talking about something that's new and the old doesn't go away, then it's not new, essentially. And I don't know that you could talk about transformation anymore succinctly than Charles Daniel saying. If God ain't done nothing, I ain't saved. And lots of us have been around religious institutions and churches and synagogues, all of that over the years. But for some reason, for some of us, it just doesn't take in Charles, it charts, related this moment with his mother when he was 15 years old, because she would make him go to his any school and so forth. When he was 15 years old, she wanted him to join the church. And this was his response. His mother, I don't know what it is, but it wouldn't be no good for me to join the church. Me and God don't have a thing in common. I said, it'd be more than joining the church to get me to have something with God. So Charles went on, we had this discussion about how Molly reacted when his life started changing. And the truth of the matter is that she turned around and she went and her life was changed. She told him, he said, that next night or two, after this happened to him, that he was supposed to stay home as she put it and take care of the young ones, and she was going to go. And what happened was that her life was transformed. So just to rewind for a moment, as we were having the conversation, I said to Charles, so when did you first meet Molly? How did that happen? Tell us a bit about that. I met her, but she was dating another boy. But nevertheless, Charles apparently forged ahead and had a wonderful line when he did ask her out for a date. I might want a date with you. I told her, I said, but I don't know where you'd be interested. If you went for me one night, you'd never want to go to that boy you're going with no more. So that was the line I shot her. That's a good one. Yeah. So I said, let's leave this beach to get this sand on us. We'll ride over to the airport, Vanilla. And the water's warmer, you know. That ocean water's cold. So we were swimming and we swam out to this piling with a line on it, hanging on it. And then I kissed her. Kiss on the first date. Well, the sun isn't going down in the end. So I kissed her. And I tell you right now, you kissed a lot of girls when you're growing up, but I don't never remember the first kiss, but Molly's I remember. So that was their first encounter, Charles and Molly, swimming in the sound, hanging onto a rope by the piling, having a first kiss. Charles said they got out and he wanted to see her that night. And she said, well, she had a date with that other guy that night. And he said, well, if you're going to do that, you know, you're going to have to hitch-eye comb. I'm not taking you to home to your home to have a date with that other guy. Long story short, it worked out. They hung out for the next couple of months because Molly was visiting from Pittsburgh, where her stepmother lived, I think. And so she was gone within the next two months. They talked on the phone, probably wrote a letter or two. And then Molly came back for Christmas. And when she came back for Christmas, they, again, picked up where they left off. And one day, around that time, he was taking her, he was going to take her back to the airport after Christmas, up in Norfolk. And he said, I needed to stop by the hospital to give a friend of mine a pint of blood. You couldn't put it in the bank at the time. You had to go there personally. And they had not talked about marriage at all, essentially. But they're sitting with a friend waiting to give blood. And the fella's name was Chester. And he had this thought. Chester said, why don't you even Charles go in yet married? And don't put her on that plane, take her home with you. I said, Chester, she's got boys waiting up there for that plane to stop, put a girl like she is. And he kept talking, talking next thing I know. I saw her boy. He said, you can, oh, she's got this good on you. You get a blood test. You were in Virginia. And you go down time, get your marriage license, go get married. Next thing I know, I saw her walking down the hall to get her blood test. I'm having this conversation with Charles a year ago. And Molly, sometime before, had passed away. And he just started reflecting on Molly because he said she was a wonderful woman who chose to marry a poor old fisherman. But his reflections on her are just wonderful. And I'll tell you right now when I think of her, I couldn't give her much, but God has given her everything. When you've got to heaven, you've got everything that the world could never give you. I wonderfully did say that one day I could go see her again. I'm nearly 90-year-old. May I'll be 90-year-old. And I'll tell you right now, I don't want her to come back here. I want her to go to that or she's there. And that was it. Charles and Molly married, had children, and all the rest of his days, up until this recently, Charles went out on one fishing boat after another that he built with his own hands. I love those kind of stories. I love the stories of firsts, of new things, of launches. And whether it's the launch of first manned flight, whether it's the first steps in the launch of a new and transformed life, or whether it's that first kiss, there is something profound about seeing something new, doing something new, changing the direction of one's life and the future. And Charles Daniel's story, in particular with Molly, informs that in a profound way. I'm so grateful to have known Charles and Molly Daniel since 1972, but a great couple. I love this verse. You find it in the last book of the Bible when it says this, in the book of the Revelation, the one sitting on the throne said, see, I am making all things new. Write this, these words are trustworthy and true. Stories to make sense of it all. This is one, Charles and Molly Daniels, and the stories that provide the basis for us moving new and fresh and hold some directions. Are like the best stories of all. I'm so grateful for it. That's it for now. Catch you next time. Thanks for listening in.