It\u2019s been a rough weekend. \u00a0On Friday, my friend Daniel Van Note killed himself. \u00a0It has me thinking a lot of thoughts about life and death that I want to share, and eventually I will, but this post is about Dan.<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t know Dan as well as his close friends or family, but I knew him well enough to like him a lot. \u00a0We were at Bryn Athyn College together, and he was still there when I was in theological school. \u00a0Dan was a theatre guy, and I was a theatre guy. \u00a0I don\u2019t remember the first play that we worked on together, but I know he was there for at least the last few. \u00a0He worked backstage, I mostly acted, but we\u2019d hangout backstage or in the greenroom, laughing and joking. \u00a0He wasn\u2019t all jokes, though \u2013 he was committed to making sure the play went the way it was supposed to go. \u00a0He cared about doing his job.<\/p>\n
Because we weren\u2019t actually that close, I don\u2019t quite know how to sum up Dan or how I\u2019ve always felt about him. \u00a0I admired him and loved him, and I still do. \u00a0It\u2019s not like we had a lot of meaningful or deep conversations, and I can\u2019t tell stories about all our times together. \u00a0But there was just something about him that I really looked up to. \u00a0His love for serving others shone through. \u00a0I don\u2019t tend to divide the world into \u201cgood guys\u201d and \u201cbad guys,\u201d but I don\u2019t know how to say it other than to say that he was one of the good guys, one of the best of them. \u00a0I\u2019m going to miss him, and my heart goes out to all of those who love him.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo he who had received five talents came and brought five other talents, saying, \u2018Lord, you delivered to me five talents; look, I have gained five more talents besides them.\u2019 His lord said to him, \u2018Well done, good and faithful servant; you were faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your lord.'\u201d\u00a0(Matthew 25:20-21)<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It\u2019s been a rough weekend. \u00a0On Friday, my friend Daniel Van Note killed himself. \u00a0It has me thinking a lot of thoughts about life and death that I want to share, and eventually I will, but this post is about Dan. I didn\u2019t know Dan as well as his close friends or family, but I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":275,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"yoast_head":"\n