DAYS 105 & 106 - Lake Linda & Havana, IL - 2050 miles from home
- Esther Lisa Tishman
- 7 days ago
- 4 min read
In the title of every blog post I measure my distance from home. I’m now 2050 miles from home. I think about home everyday - about my family, about the black locust tree by my house, about the gorgeous Oregon summer that I largely missed. But these past couple of days, I've also just been thinking about what "home" is.
For more than 2000 miles (!!) I've been walking through and around small, rural towns. Farm towns, ranch towns, manufacturing, logging and mining towns. I've seen a lot of stores and houses: abandoned, decaying - but also restored, brand-new. A lot of town squares: decaying, vacant - but also renewed and rebuilt. Whether we walk through a town that's clearly struggling - or maybe even beyond the struggle and now dead - or whether we pass through one that seems thriving with well-kept lawns and elegant coffee shops and boutiques... there's poignancy and longing all around. In a beat-up gas station and grocery in Ipava, IL a woman asks me, "How far are you walking?" I tell her I'm heading to Duncan Mills. "Duncan Mills? That's just a junction. There's no town there. There's nothing between here and Havana.”
What makes for "something" and not "nothing"? Is that the possibility of home?
One of the church leaders at Carthage First Presbyterian invited us to stay at her family ranch on Day 105. "I've been thinking about how to get you guys showers," Carol Brooks said. “And I think you should come to Lake Linda!"
Friends, Lake Linda is extraordinary. John and Bernadette - Carol's in-laws - left this land and ranch to their 7 kids, and their kids' extended families. The sons built (is that even the right word?) Lake Linda - an actual lake - in the 1970s, and now the Lake is stocked with catfish and bass and maybe trout - I'm not sure... but regardless: the lake is enormous and gorgeous, and the Brooks' children have all built homes around the lake, maintaining the compound in common and the large red-roofed A-frame that sleeps 21. Lake Linda hosts hunting parties, weddings, Church gatherings, and (apparently) pilgrims. Bob and I stayed in the A-frame of course - each with our own comfy bedroom and (yes!) shower. Carol fed us hamburgers from her own beef - another perfect cheeseburger in our tour of Ranch America - and butternut squash and potatoes. A dang near perfect evening. We talked about American churches and the problem of growing into the next generation; we talked about teaching and high schools and P.E. past and present (Carol is a retired phys ed instructor). P.E. is still mandatory in Illinois. But mercifully showering after gym is not (writes this former Illinoisian, still carrying the trauma of high school locker rooms).
Pastors Barb and Gerry Sawyer welcomed us into their church home on Day 106: Prevailing Faith Church just outside of Bluff City - which itself is about 15 miles from Havana, IL. The Sawyers can't stop smiling and laughing - warm, full of hugs and stories. Barb is 80, Gerry 82 - and they've lived a full life of mission and preaching, oh and Gerry is also a pharmacist who once worked with Vince Lombardi (I didn't quite get clear on the details; the team needed a pharmacist I think?) and he managed a CVS and they've of course raised kids, planted churches, and traveled widely, including back to Gerry's ancestral home in Poland. "Havana is the smallest town we've ever lived in," says Barb - a Chicago native. Gerry tears up when he starts talking about Nazis and the Soviets and Poland. "Do you know that black & white film, Schindler's List?" he asks. His people are from Krakow. I'm not so surprised when Gerry tells me that his pharmacy mentor was Jewish, and when he casually drops the Yiddish word "schlep" into one of his stories.
For Barb, especially, ministry is about mission. About being willing to make the world your home, through the work of evangelizing. About discipleship - creating new Christian leaders. Over the doorframe as you leave their church is a prominent sign: "You Are Now Entering the Mission Field." Barb thought God was telling her to go to China. It turns out he was just telling her to go to Havana. Illinois. Her Mission of HOPE (Helping Others, Practically & Evangelistically) has been at work in the area for decades.
Meanwhile: today there are more than 2600 gatherings across America. I will be walking along Route 136. I think we're all really just trying to find our way home.
