Grandpa Kaemingk

Matt's Grandpa Kaemingk passed away last week. We attended his funeral last week, and Matt was asked to speak. We're posting his text here, since many in his family have asked for it.

My Grandpa was a builder, a carpenter par excellence.

He was a sander, a nailer, a fixer, a stainer, a fashioner, a gluer, a driller, a sawer, and smoother. My grandpa made clocks and cars, bowls and boxes, and games of sorts. Grandpa spent hours in his dark workroom filled with the smells of sawdust, smoke, and wood stain and the sounds of the Mariners echoing from his old beat up radio. Grandpa spent decades in there crafting things for friends, for family, for neighbors, for the local Christian school, and for children around the world he had never even met.

Pine, oak, walnut, and cedar.

Grandpa made stuff that smelled good. He made stuff that felt good. He made stuff that lasted. Grandpa didn’t make crap. Grandpa cared about the look, the feel, the quality of the things he made. And while his joy was always subtle and understated it was clear Grandpa took great delight in a job well done.

Most kids these days receive gifts made out of plastic. We got stuff made out of wood.

Grandpa didn’t talk much. A child of the depression whose parents learned English as a second language, a young man who came of age in the midst of a horrible war, my Grandpa would never gush with effusive words of affection for his family and friends.

Instead my Grandpa would quietly walk down the stairs to his workroom and make his friends and family a clock, a table, a game, a car, or an absolutely exquisite bowl. He would cut for them, sand for them, stain for them, and fashion for them his declaration of love, his promise of fidelity. And finally, ever so quietly, my Grandpa would present to his beloved a gift carefully crafted and made just for them.

I know that I personally would have loved to have heard more ACTUAL words of love from my Grandfather. I, after all, am a child of a wholly other generation. My generation gives LOTS of words and, for that matter, we give lots of plastic gifts.

That said, when I consider the time, the quality, and the care my grandpa put into these creations I would have to be an absolute dolt to believe that my grandpa did not love me.

Now, for my day job, I work as a theologian down in Seattle and we theologians spend a lot of time talking about who God is and what God is doing… so… please forgive a little theological aside for my grandpa. It is what I have to offer him.

In Genesis 1 and 2 the VERY FIRST thing we learn about God is that he is a builder. He creates the light and darkness, he cuts the land out the sea, he decorates the sky with lights, he fashions flowers and trees, colors the birds and the fish, and he crafts the animals and finally he forms human beings.

God doesn’t make crap. God cares about the look, the feel, the smell, the quality of the things he makes. And he takes great delight, great joy in the good stuff he builds.

It is not uncommon for human beings to walk through the world surveying the gifts of God wondering to themselves if God loves them. They climb Kilimanjaro, watch a sunset from Kauai, walk the streets of Paris, listen to Bach, hug their children, and drink a perfectly brewed cup of coffee and quietly wonder to themselves… does God love me?

Grandpa’s gifts of pine and cedar, oak and walnut were gifts of love. Gifts of honor. And Grandpa not only honored each of us with the care and time he invested in these gifts. No.

Grandpa honored his maker. He honored the one who made the pine and the cedar, the oak and the walnut. Grandpa knew that God did not make crap and so neither could he.

So, what is my Grandpa up to now?

I think whenever someone we love dies, we all become theologians. Whether we like it or not we all ask questions about who God is and what God is doing? We all wonder what God has done with the person we love.

Ever since my grandpa died I have been thinking about a little verse from Isaiah. You probably know the one, It says that in the last days “They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.”

Now this little verse is often quoted when we talk the end of violence and war at the end of days. In heaven, we are told, there will be no more swords or spears. No more fighting.

As a veteran of World War II I am sure my Grandfather will be relieved to hear this. He was always quite brief and even visibly shaken when recalling his experiences in the war.

Along with no more fighting, we are also often told that heaven will be a place with a lot of singing, a lot of praying, and a lot of standing around talking with loved ones long separated. Lots of talking and lots of singing.

Now, as a Grandson of Henry and a theologian I have two things to say about this rather popular vision of what heaven is like.

First, I am not sure my grandpa would really like this sort of heaven very much—all that talking and singing would not really be his thing. Remember, my Grandpa was made to be a builder—not much of a talker.

Second, I am not sure that all this talking and singing is really what Isaiah had in mind when he was writing about swords and plowshares. What is often missed in this verse is that our swords and our spears will NOT be destroyed instead these weapons of war are transformed into TOOLS. Tools for working. Tools for making. Soldiers, soldiers like grandpa are not turned into singers and talkers. They are turned into workers.

Entering into the holy city soldiers are each given a task. A task that God made them for. They are made into kings given a specific job and responsibility in the new city.

My heart was broken for my Grandpa this past year when I learned that he could no longer make it down the stairs to his workshop. Grandpa was simply not grandpa without his workshop. Grandpa was not made for a bed. He was not made for a wheelchair. Grandpa was made for a hammer. He was made for a saw.

We Christians say we believe in the resurrection of the body. That God will restore our lives. That God will make us whole and renew us so that we can again give him glory.

But what does resurrection look like for my grandpa?

And how might my grandfather best give glory to God?

The moment my grandfather passed and was welcomed into heaven I have a hard time believing that God handed him a songbook that would last him 10,000 years.

Singing is not what restoration looks like for my Grandpa. I can’t really picture him with a harp.

Instead, I think God welcomed him with open arms and said well done my good and faithful servant. Good work. I love what you made down there. I gave me delight. Henry, here is your old hammer back I have some work for you here.

And so my Grandpa continues to make stuff. Sanding and sawing, staining and nailing, extending and articulating his song to God through cedar and oak, pine and walnut. Grandpa’s quiet, careful, and beautiful building and giving continues in the eternal city.

And for those of us who are left behind Grandpa’s gifts and the memory of his giving, his crafts and the memory of his craftsmanship remain embedded in each of us. The evidence of Grandpa’s love and the evidence of God’s love are all around us.

Grandpa Kaemingk quietly and careful touched every person in this room. Grandpa gifted each of us.

So, how do we know God loves us? Is it through incredible gifts falling from the sky?  Is it from miraculous, extraordinary, and inexplicable moments of beauty and revelation?  

No, God shows us his love through the mundane, the ordinary gifts like Henry Kaemingk. God demonstrates his care, craftsmanship, beauty, and faithfulness through ordinary faithfulness of workers like my Grandpa.

That is why today is a day of thanks not only for Grandpa Kaemingk but for the God who gave us Grandpa. For the God who blessed us through Grandpa.

Grandpa would never want this day to be about him but about the God who gave Grandpa cedar and oak. Grandpa’s very life poses a question to each of us, how will we respond to the gifts God has given us?

We have all been given a workshop. We have all been given our own pieces of walnut and pine. How will we, Grandpa asks us, How will we in ordinary, quiet, and mundane ways, give glory to God through the gifts he has given us?