{"id":6961,"date":"2018-10-30T07:26:29","date_gmt":"2018-10-30T12:26:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/?p=6961"},"modified":"2018-10-23T09:39:49","modified_gmt":"2018-10-23T14:39:49","slug":"november-4-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/november-4-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"November 4, 2018–Beyond Death’s Stench"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bryan Jaster,\u00a0 Winchester, VA<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Warm-up Question<\/strong><\/p>\n

What is something traumatic that happened in your life?\u00a0 What did you do in response?<\/p>\n

Beyond Death’s Stench<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mikah Meyer is on a 3 year journey to visit all 417 national parks and discover the power of healing and love.<\/p>\n

Imagine being 19 years old and having one of your parents die.\u00a0 When Mikah Meyer was 19 his father died suddenly of esophageal cancer at the age of 58 years.\u00a0 He was devastated.\u00a0 His father would never see him grow up and be able to celebrate life with Mikah.\u00a0 The assumption that his father would live to be 80+ years old was shattered.\u00a0 The realization that life isn\u2019t infinite and that tomorrow isn\u2019t guaranteed hit hard.<\/p>\n

His father loved to travel and Mikah set a goal that when he was 30 years old he would hit the road and set the world record for being the youngest person to visit all the national parks while sharing along the way that life is worth living and to appreciate time and people while we have it. So, at 30 he did.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Once he started his national park tour something happened that had begun in his life as a 19 year old. That year was the first year when he met an adult who was openly gay.\u00a0 Gay before that was a topic that wasn\u2019t even spoken of.\u00a0 So after meeting more people in his 20s and making public that he was a gay Christian, he began to encounter many who felt they weren\u2019t loved by their church or by God.\u00a0\u00a0 He thought that sharing that part of his life during his tour of national parks would decrease financial support from congregations.\u00a0 Living out of his van, he visited congregations on Sunday mornings and relied on the hospitality of friends and strangers to continue his journey.<\/p>\n

However, he decided to share that part of his identity after being contacted via social media by a young teen who was in the closet about being gay. The teen reached out after finding out about his past work setting up \u201cQueers for Christ\u201d in Washington, D.C. The teen thanked Myer for letting him know he wasn\u2019t alone and that he could accomplish his dreams, just as Meyer was accomplishing his.<\/p>\n

So now honoring his father\u2019s life, he travels living out of a converted van as an openly Gay Christian, \u00a0performing as a contra tenor singer who sings for his supper.\u00a0 He preaches at congregations about living God\u2019s limitless, boundary-less love and proclaims that we are all children of God, worthy of love. He has been able to stay on the roads because America\u2019s Christians have funded a gay man to set a world record. \u00a0\u00a0He has currently visited 368 of the 417 national parks and will finish April 29, 2019 at the Lincoln Memorial.<\/p>\n

Check out more of Mikah\u2019s journey at https:\/\/www.mikahmeyer.com\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Discussion Questions<\/strong><\/p>\n