Snapshots In the Stands

 That night when the older locals from my youth became me. (Photo: Heather Whipple-Simard)

Back in the day, when I roamed my high school’s gym wide-eyed and full of youthful enthusiasm, the younger me would look up into the stands and shake my head but smile at the older locals—regulars at the games who still enjoyed watching the hometown team’s game like they had watched it or played it many years ago. I imagined them beginning every sentence with “Hey, remember when?….” That younger me would think, “Geez, stop living in the past, you guys. Times have changed.” Because all smart-aleck me could see was a bright future ahead, full of who-knows-what surprises and goodness.

This week, the tables turned.

That once younger me was one of those older locals in the stands cheering on the hometown team. And in between the action, right on cue, one of the guys next to me leaned over and launched into, “Hey remember when?…” And it was beautiful. Because he described a childhood experience of growing up in our small town—a time when grade school kids excitedly raced downtown after school to buy snacks and then raced back up to the athletic fields to watch the big kids play soccer or baseball. A time when every grade was in one sprawling building on High Street and when there was no social media but when little kids really followed and looked up to someone—in awe of being in the same hallway with those huge high school kids on their way to class, and wanting to be like them someday.

A time when your heart raced when you walked into the gym for the first time in your life on a Friday night and saw teachers and classmates and a lot more of those high school heroes, and even the man who sold you the snacks downtown, and neighbors sitting and standing together to root for the hometown team. And out in the hallway, an unforgettable aroma of freshly popped popcorn, stale cigarette smoke on clothing, and a hint of spearmint gum or breath mints in the air. To this day, the aroma of popcorn at a sporting event takes me back like incense to those wonderful Friday nights.

The older me went to bed that night wondering why that is so, and why that “Hey, remember when?…” story had triggered something so deep, something beyond basketball games and growing up in a small town. It was not so much wishing I could go back in time, but it was realizing that it was a marker God had used in a young, impressionable mind to remind me later on in life of something greater and incredibly important—His undying faithfulness love and goodness through the thick and thin of childhood, youth and adulting, and the importance of community. Something so easily taken for granted.

That night in the stands was a marker of remembrance that was not unlike the stones that Joshua’s men pulled from the Jordan River to serve as a monumental reminder of how God had faithfully led His people across it and into safety… 

“Then Joshua explained again the purpose of the stones: ‘In the future,’ he said, “when your children ask you why these stones are here and what they mean, you are to tell them that these stones are a reminder of this amazing miracle—that the nation of Israel crossed the Jordan River on dry ground! Tell them how the Lord our God dried up the river right before our eyes and then kept it dry until we were all across! It is the same thing the Lord did forty years ago at the Red Sea! He did this so that all the nations of the earth will realize that Jehovah is the mighty God, and so that all of you will worship Him forever.’”—Joshua 4:21-24, Living

Markers like that, if only I will notice them, tend to show up in lots of other everyday settings, like basketball games, time and time again to drive a point straight to the heart where it belongs—to, as one pastor has said...

“Remember not to forget…Don’t forget to remember…

Remember to remember!”

Pay attention to the snapshots and photo albums from the past that parade through the memory bank—many fun, but some not. Because these are permanent markers to remind you that you need one another, and of God’s faithfulness in provision, guidance, love, grace, mercy (oh man, lots of that!), and getting through long desert seasons. As author Mark Batterson puts it: “The primary reason we lose faith is because we forget the faithfulness of God. Maybe that's why the word 'remember' is repeated 250 times in Scripture.”

By the way, I still have a something in common with that younger me (hopefully, a lot less snarky) because even though I often sit in the stands now, there is still a bright future ahead—one so bright, in fact, it has no end. But now, what that younger me didn’t know back then but was reminded of after being in the stands the other night, the way ahead while roaming this planet will have many more markers of remembrance that God will use like stones to inspire gratitude for life, and faith-building perseverance, resolve, hope, encouragement and joy for the road ahead. Markers that will shout:

“Just remember, you often won't realize you're making progress on the Journey until you pause to look back at how far you've come.”

Looking back after this week's snow, Old Dublin Road.

[ADAPTED FROM PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED, JANUARY 2020]