this morning during church, my phone buzzed, and showed that i had an incoming call from chris seay (of ecclessia in houston, and an emergentYS author). i didn’t take it at the time, but called him back as soon as church got out.
chris gave me absolutely tragic news. kyle lake is the pastor of university baptist church in waco. this is the church that chris started years ago, before moving to houston to start ecclessia. it remains a very important church in the emerging church movement. it’s also the home church for david crowder and his entire band, and they regularly lead worship when they are home. this morning, kyle was in the baptismal tank during the church service, and was somehow electrocuted (it’s a bit unclear how this happened, at this point). he shouted out for help and went under. doctors in the congregation immediately came up to try to help, and kyle was transported to a local hospital. but he didn’t make it — he passed away.
as you can imagine, this is an incredible loss for chris and lisa seay, for david and toni crowder (and all the crowder band-mates: jeremy, mike h, mike d, jack and jason), and an enormous loss for the church (as well as truly horrible thing for those who were present).
kyle has written a couple fantastic books, including a brand-new one on prayer that he just sent me this week. i emailed him on friday (two days ago) and thanked him, saying that i have a sense that the two of us would become good friends if we could ever spend some time together. he responded that he feels the same way, and would love to do so. we tentatively agreed to hang out, at the latest, at our convention in austin next fall.
today is the 2nd anniversary of mike yaconelli’s death. i have a sense that i’m going to really start to dread this weekend in future years. as readers of this blog know, i have a fondness for questions over answers (that gets me in trouble with some people). but this is a day when i would sure appreciate some answers.
please pray for all who will be so dramatically affected by this tragedy.
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Wow, Marko…will be praying!
oh, man.
serious prayer here.
I guess the answer is that God has already used Kyle to touch your life. His writing prompted you to want that deeper relationship with him. And also Kyle’s work and ministry has already been such a formative part of so many people’s lives.
I greive with you and with the people at university baptist as hopefully they can see this as one more called home to sit in glory.
Praying for you marko
I sat in on Kyle’s seminar at the Catalyst Conference in early October. He was very encouraging and I was able to ask him some questions afterwards. His response was so gracious and he presented him self a a co-laborer not an expert on all things “emergent”. Sorry to hear about this tragic loss- He will be missed!
Kris and I extend our deepest condolences and our prayers to Kyle’s family and to all those who know them.
kyle was my pastor and friend for a number of years. here is an excerpt from kyle’s latest book, entitled {re}Understanding Prayer: A fresh approach to conversation with God.
“My experience of life outgrew my understanding of God. Pure and simple. At some point, I was overcome by the realization that the God I was raised worshiping could not handle the complexities of real life. He was perfectly fit to deal with lollipops, candy canes, and sugerplums, but avalanches, wildfires, and tsunamis He was not. Literally and metaphorically. What’s odd about this realization is not it’s ridiculous nature but my response to this realization. The next few years I shifted into a defensive posture. I became protective of God, like an older brother watching out for his diminutive little sister who couldn’t hold her weight on the school playground. And this posture eventually seemed odd to me. Why did God need defending? Who was I really protecting?”
What a tragic day and what a timely quote. I pray that these words will give you some comfort as they do me.
hmmm. This is sad.
It is sad for the man and the family.
But what keeps coming to my mind is how hard this would be for a church. To have your pastor electrocuted right in front of you. Wow.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/10/31/pastor.electrocuted.ap/index.html
Terrible terrible thing….all I can say is man that truly stinks, and all we can do is pray for comfort and peace to those affected….