I finished last week by mentioning stepping out of our comfort zone. This week will deal a lot with that. I feel God puts people in our lives for certain reasons. We may not know who or for what reason, but God does. I grew up in Sentinel going to the Church of Christ there where my dad preached. During my JH and HS years there was a couple there that sat close to where I did every week. Cody and Paula Combs were their names. They would talk to me each week and Cody would always joke around with me. He was hilarious. Paula was and still is one of the nicest people I know. Just a side note, they lived on the end of my block. I had to pass their house on the way to church. Cody had this pewter colored Z71 truck that I thought was the coolest truck ever. I wanted to buy that from him when I turned 16, but he didn’t have it by then. They were positive influences on me as a teenager and I thought a lot of them.
During my college years my dad took a preaching job in Hinton. Since he no longer preached at Sentinel, I didn’t see Cody and Paula as much as I had before. But, as I began my professional career several years later, a coaching job landed me back in Sentinel. Guess who my principal was? That would be Paula. We had a great working relationship. She was great to work for. We started going back to the church I grew up going to and I saw Cody and Paula weekly. A couple of years later, career moves led Kristin and I away from Sentinel. But, unlike before, Paula and I stayed in touch. We stayed close. We would text often and see each other at ballgames or other school events. Cody would always give me a hard time when I would see him and many times he would chime in when Paula and I would be texting. It was great to get to stay in touch with them.
So that is a little background into my relationship with the Combs family. So fast forward several years. My grandpa passes away in July of 2018. Our preacher, Aaron, asked me to teach that Wednesday night Bible class. So I am doing that and enjoying it. I am continuing to ask God to help me grow and help people any way that I can as I grow as a Christian myself. I get to school one day last October and I get a text that shocked me. The person text me and wondered if I had heard about Cody Combs. I said that I hadn’t and asked them what was going on. They told me apparently he died in the middle of the night from a heart attack. I immediately went to Facebook, because that is the source of all the up to date information anymore. Sure enough, that is what happened. I didn’t really know what to say to Paula. I was kind of lost on what to do. I wanted to gather my thoughts before I text her and I wanted to give her time as well because I knew that she was dealing with so much right away. So I waited a couple of hours before I text her. I sent her a text simply telling her I was thinking about her and their son CJ and would pray for them. I didn’t really know what else to say at that time.
So you may wonder where the comfort zone part comes in. Well, it is coming next. So Paula responds quickly with a text saying thank you and that she was going to call me in just a little bit because she was struggling with a decision. I didn’t really think much about that because I knew in the coming days she would be making a lot of decisions. So she called and we talked for a few minutes. She told me what had happened and I listened, still shocked myself. She said that she was wrestling with who she wanted to do Cody’s service. I was honestly thinking that she was wondering if I thought my dad would do it, even though he hadn’t been their preacher for about 15 years. But then she said, “A week or two ago Cody and I talked randomly about who we would want to do our funeral. I said that I wanted you to do mine because I wanted it laid back and entertaining and uplifting and I felt you would make it that way”. I thought man that is pretty cool that she would think that. It still hadn’t hit me what was coming next. Then she said, “So I would like to ask you to do Cody’s funeral if you would be comfortable doing that”. Comfort zone exited!!!
I remember thinking that I was glad she couldn’t see my face because my mouth was wide open and my eyes were about three times their normal size! These are things I didn’t tell her at the time of course. I was blown away, honored, humbled, and honestly and little bit scared. Actually a lot more than a little scared. I remember telling her, “Paula, I’ve never done anything like that, but if that’s what you want me to do, I will do it to the best of my ability”. So we went forward from there. I had spoke to Christian groups before. I had spoke in front of a lot of people before. I had taught school and Bible class for many years. None of that bothered me. In fact, I liked speaking to people. But, I had never done anything like this. So I immediately did the only thing I knew to do. I prayed. I prayed a lot that day and for the next several.
I thought a lot about this the next few days. I had prayed to God for a long time, as stated in previous post, to use me however he could. I prayed that he would use me to help other people, however that may be. This was an opportunity I had to help a dear friend in a trying time. I was determined to do my best to do that. I was absolutely humbled at the opportunity, and just hoped that I could provide their family some sort of peace through all of this. I met with Paula and CJ the following day. We talked about some things regarding the service and some things that they wanted to include about Cody. I felt better after having seen them face to face and talked to them about what they wanted. Really, I wanted this service to be exactly what they wanted and to help their family and make them feel loved and uplifted. I felt I had a better understanding of how to do that after meeting with them. But that doesn’t mean that I wasn’t still nervous.
Over the next couple of days I prayed that God would give me the right words to say and the right way to say them. I had watched my dad do this for years. But, now it was my turn. It made me more confident that Paula and CJ had the confidence and faith in me to do something like this. So finally, it was the day of the funeral. I woke up that day still a little anxious, but I felt good about what we had discussed and I felt prepared. I just continued to pray to God that he would guide me through this. It was held in the school auditorium at Sentinel, where Paula was now the elementary principal. I felt better and more confident that morning than I had all week, until I saw how many people started coming in. The auditorium began filling up quickly. I don’t know if this made it better or worse, but I knew almost all of them since I had grown up there. I said a lot of prayers as the time grew closer to begin the service.
When the service began I was sitting on the stage looking out at the crowd just hoping that when my time came to speak that I could remember what I had prepared. My dad sang at the service. In fact, he sang right before I came up to speak. I had seen him preach funerals countless times. But now he wasn’t the one speaking, I was. As he walked off the stage after singing, I walked up to the podium and the strangest thing happened. All that worry and all those anxious feelings were gone. I had a peace and calmness about me that I have only one explanation for. When I hear “peace and calming” I think about my wife’s oils, but this was before she was really into that. So it wasn’t the oils. The only answer is God’s hand was on me. All those prayers were answered at that very moment. Now, I don’t know if in preacher’s standards how I presented the information was very well done, but I had a peace about what I was doing. I hope that what I had to say as a tribute to Cody at his Celebration of Life did his life and the impact he left on people some justice. I hope that I helped their entire family through the grieving process.
I definitely stepped out of my comfort zone. I had a good Christian friend that helped me do that. She had the faith and confidence in me to do something I had never done. I don’t know exactly why, but she did. I’m glad she did because that was just another way that I feel God answered my prayers to help people and to grow as a Christian. I was able to help a friend when she was going through a really tough time in her life. This gave me the confidence to continue to pray for boldness and to be able to do things that I may not be comfortable with. That is how we grow as a Christian. That is how we grow our faith. I learned first hand that if we trust what God leads us to do that he will take care of us. I truly believe that God places people in our lives for a reason. Paula and I remain close to this day and we will always have a special bond.
In I Corinthians 2 Paul talks about being guided by the Holy Spirit. Verse 3 says, “I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling”. Verse 4 goes on to say, “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power”. I went to these verses several times as I prepared for Cody’s service. God will guide us if we trust him. I have learned this as I mature as a Christian. I still have a lot of growing to do. But, I have learned that some of the times I have grown the most and learned to trust God the most are when I stepped out of my comfort zone and just put all my trust in him! I hope I never shy away from those things again that require me to have faith that God will take care of everything. I hope that I can have faith and be bold enough to go and do whatever God leads me to do!!! That is my prayer for everyone I know as well. Just think of the difference we could all make together to those around us!!!