Dreamer, Dancer, Wild Man: the life of Rev. Dr. Rob Sanders
By Dr. Sara Sanders
I’ve been asking myself a seemingly obvious but quite complicated question: Who was my dad? How do I define his life, his person, his character? How do I understand the life and legacy of the most formative person in my life, to date?
I made a list and I’d like to share this starting point, my first attempt to capture my father.
Rob Sanders, my dad:
When I finished, I thought: All right, it's a start, but it doesn't capture him. If the paper belonged to one of my college students, I’d write in the margin: “Not representative, it's only one voice!”
So I decided it was time to put my dubious research skills to use and excavate, uncover dad’s life, keep going, collect the data. “Fight on,” as dad would say.
First thought: What if I asked the man himself? Then I realized we’d still be talking, having one of our Amazing Conversations. Dad had a desire to communicate, to connect through words and ideas, that went bone deep. Then I realized that he had told me – of course he had!-- in October, when I last visited him in Florida. He said if he had to say who he was, he would say first and foremost a Christian and, after that, a Sanders from the hills of Tennessee.
Then turned to my very dear stepmother, Jerree, with whom dad shared a deep love over the last nine years. I asked her who she thought dad was and she said he was a seeker of truth, a powerful and ruthless intellect, ruthless in his ability to look truth in the face but kind to the depths of his being.
This brought to mind my Mom and the oft repeated explanation of why she married my dad: he was the wildest boy she could find in in 1967. Then I remembered how thirty five years later, in 2002, several months before she died, she wept with emotion and told me that she couldn't have chosen a better person.
I asked my sister, Lilly, who in many ways is the inheritor of my dad’s spiritual gifts, his mercurial temperament, and drive to write. I was very interested in what this most cherished sister would say. She told me that she said it best when at the moment of his death she washed and kissed his feet, saying “I'm washing your feet, dad, because every day of your life you washed mine.”
I thought of Jack, my dad’s boyhood ally, two little boys together, they were. I remembered how during the last week of dad’s life, I called him every day and he kept telling me, “Jack was here, we had an amazing conversation.” He said, “Jack thinks my life is a triumph.” And each time, I replied, “You can trust that because Jack is utterly logical,” a phrase dad had used time and time again to describe his brother.
I asked my husband, Matt, who said: he lived a remarkable and moving life and was my role model for how to be a good person. He was a real intellectual and always looked for love and beauty in the world.
I asked my brother-in-law, Bo, who told me: he was my greatest spiritual counselor and father. If I were Timothy, he was my apostle Paul.
I asked my son, Evan, who said: granddaddy is the very best player of flying screwdrivers
At this point in my information gathering, I thought: “Now I’m getting somewhere but still, it’s his family -- not representative!”
I remembered how Lilly told me that the Dean of Trinity School for Ministry, on meeting her said, “You’re Rob’s daughter? He's the most brilliant theologian I've ever met.”
And Alvis described dad with these words: he was the most tender, raw, loving man.
I thought of the countless people the world over, people from very privileged and many from very, very humble backgrounds, in Kansas, Florida, Honduras, Guatemala, Peru, Venezuela, Uganda, Kenya, Nepal, Romania, whose lives were impacted by him. They brought their hopes, fear, limitations, and sins. Dad shared love, forgiveness, acceptance, and dignified the lives of each with his compassion and care. He could speak with anyone. People from all walks of life would seek dad out, want to speak with him, and this was such a daily part of my life, I didn't realize how remarkable it was until I was an adult.
Lastly, I thought of Inga, my beautiful one year old daughter, who dad prayed into this world and who won't grow up knowing him, and how in the first few weeks of her life, he was the only person beside me with whom she would sleep. I saw him holding her, asleep in his arms, absolutely motionless except for the gentle rocking of the chair as he watched her sleeping face.
He was an original, one of a kind, they broke the mold -- all the cliches. But, to me, he was utterly unique, absolutely precious, and completely irreplaceable.
Like many grieving people, I keep asking myself how to go forward in light of this loss. To begin, I will find ways to carry him forward into my future.
The day before I left Kuala Lumpur, my son, Evan had a math assessment. He loves numbers, just like his grandfather -- actually Evan reminds me so much of dad and has done since he was born, those of you who knew dad as a young man, please spare a thought for me in ten years. I asked him how the test was and with the typical hubris of a 6 year old he told me he was flying through the levels like crazy and going “full blast.” In his love of numbers and his choice of words, I heard my dad.
When I arrived in Jax, I asked Lill about dad’s death. She said that she prayed while he died, she prayed as hard as she could, she prayed “full blast,” and I heard my dad who spent his life going full blast. She told me that Ron came to pray for him and that he prayed that dad would have “all the love in the world,” poignant and poetic phrase dad used throughout his life. I’ll hear my father when my sister tells me she loves me “heart and soul.” I will have him when Lill and I tell stories and remember “old man river” as we liked to teasingly call him. He'll be with me through this shared language and vocabulary. But over time that will erode. I’ll only occasionally hear an old phrase, stumble across a remnant, and my heart will fill with love and loss and gratitude
But I'll take dad forward in other, more subtle, and probably more powerful ways. He will be with me in moments like these: When Evan tells me to stop and appreciate the sunlight shining on the leaves of the trees, something dad did every day. When I choose forgiveness and reconciliation over anger, estrangement, and isolation. When I love my family. When I fail and try again, when I keep trying and refuse defeat. When I seek truth, justice, and knowledge over indifference, ignorance, or complacence, even when that search comes at a personal cost. When I find the courage to choose my own path even if it's the unconventional one. Especially when I hear the words of his favorite blessing, which I have heard countless times and in so many contexts: “the Lord bless you and keep you, the lord make his face to shine upon you …” In moments like these, dad will be wth me and love prevail over death, love will abide.
As I've reflected, I keep returning to one image with which I'd like to leave you: When we first learned that dad was sick, I suggested we meet in Tennessee for Thanksgiving if he was well enough. We weren’t sure if he was but, as date approached, he said he would be there. And suddenly, everyone was coming, the four brothers, their children, and their children. There were at least thirty five of us and there was no fighting, no conflict, just eating and drinking, playing games and relaxing. Dad was so happy. Every time I saw him he was talking, having amazing conversations, going full blast. He kept saying that he didn’t understand how Jesus blessed not only him but also his family, had healed him and extended the joy beyond him.
It was a hard leave taking for me. I didn’t want to say goodbye for fear that I wouldn’t see him again, face to face, in this life and, indeed, I didn’t. But the moment came, Matt and I loaded the kids into the car, and it was time to say goodbye. I looked at my dad, I looked at him so hard, to fix his image in my mind: he was still tall, weakened but fierce and strong, kind and gentle of heart. It was dusk, night was falling quickly as it does in November. I heard Evan yell “Bye, Grandaddy!” I smelt the smoke from a fire, heard my cousins’ laughter as they cooked dinner, the sound of their children running and shrieking with joy. I lifted my hand in goodbye and called out, “I love you, dad.” He lifted his and said, “I love you, Sara, I love you heart and soul.” It was a moment of such deep, profound, connection, shared history, love, and joy, that for a fleeting moment, I glimpsed heaven.
I looked at dad, he had his arm around Jerree, he was silhouetted against the night sky, and the hills of Tennessee unfolded behind him. And that was my dad: a Christian by the grace of God, a Sanders from the hills of Tennessee.
