Dick Eastland’s Celebration of Life
This was posted by River of Angels filmmaker Shawn S Welling on Facebook. Copy-pasted for redditors who are not on Facebook.
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Dick Eastland's Celebration of Life 🙂
Today Michelle and I witnessed something I would call one of the most significant moments of my life.
I’m sharing a few from last week when we spent the day at Camp Mystic Cypress with our children.
Today, we attended the Celebration of Life for Richard “Dick” Eastland.
I never personally met Dick. And yet, in a strange and very special way, Michelle and I came to know him.
Over the past year, while making River of Angels ...our film, we have interviewed dozens of young children on camera and spoken with hundreds Kerr County people. Again and again, we heard his name.
Again and again, we heard what he meant to those girls.
He was very, very special to them. He saved many lives.
Today his children gave some remarkable speeches about their Father and we got to know him even more.
Last week, Michelle and I spent the day at Camp Mystic Cypress for the fifth time over the past year but this time with EmmaRain and LillySky...our children.
We played fetch with their dog, Blacky. And we walked our daughters through the very place that has occupied so much of our hearts for the past year while making this documentary.
Then came today.
Thousands of people connected to Mystic and to Dick Eastland came to honor him at his celebration of life. One auditorium could not hold them. Overflow auditoriums filled as well.
The amount of love was overwhelming.
As Michelle and I walked in, person after person came into our arms, hugged us in tears and thanked us for telling this story.
To be recognized and loved for our project was truly wonderful.
But the thanks belong somewhere else.
They belong to Richard, Britt, James, and Edward and Tweety Eastland, all the Eastland family, the Mystic families, the survivors, the first responders and everyone who trusted us enough to tell us the truth and then trusted us to carry that truth forward.
But perhaps the part that meant the most to me happened before today.
For one day last week, our daughters got to experience a little piece of Mystic. They ran the grounds. Spent the day at Mystic Cypress as campers. They laughed with Britt and his pups. They prayed with Tweety.
They experienced the place not simply as somewhere tragedy happened, but as generations of girls have known it a place of friendship, faith, courage and love.
And that brings me to something my daughters once taught me about love.
I shared this with Tweety that day.
EmmaRain often tells me how much she loves me. One day she said:
“Daddy, I love you so much that if you went to the moon ten times, came back, counted every grain of sand on every beach and in every desert, and then put every single grain back exactly where you found it…that’s how much I love you.”
That’s EmmaRain.
She has flair.
So I turned to my five-year-old, LillySky.
She wasn’t about to be outdone. LillySky has grit.
She looked at me and simply said:
“Dad, I love you to Hell and back.”
That was it.
And today I realized just how profound those little words really were.
To love something enough that you are willing to walk into the valley of the shadow of death for it and somehow find your way back.
That is what the people of Mystic have done.
That is what Kerr County has done.
They have walked through Hell fought the enemy and won.
And they are finding their way back.
My five-year-old somehow defined it perfectly.
To Hell and back.
And still loving.
And maybe that is where faith carries us when words no longer can.
We believe death is not the end. We believe there is a Heaven beyond the pain, beyond the flood, beyond the heartbreak a place where there are no more tears, no more fear and no more goodbyes.
And tonight, I believe Dick Eastland is there.
Not defined by the way he left this world, but by the lives he touched while he was here. Surrounded by the love of God, whole and at peace.
God never promised us a life without valleys. He promised that we would not walk through them alone.
And when our time here is finished, we believe the ones we love are not lost.
They are simply Home before us.
And maybe, just maybe, if we could see Heaven for a moment, we would see Dick Eastland looking down on the thousands of Mystic families, Kerr County families, friends, campers, first responders and people whose lives he touched.
And I imagine him smiling and saying:
“It’s all good. I see you. I love each and every one of you
I am with Jesus, our Lord. Keep your faith. Keep loving one another. Keep moving forward.”
Because evil does not get the final word.
Fear does not get the final word.
Death does not get the final word.
Jesus does.
And for those of us who believe, Dick is not gone.
He is Home.
He is with our Lord, looking down on a community that showed today just how deeply one life can be loved.
The enemy cannot win when faith survives, when love survives, and when God has already promised us eternity.
So tonight I believe Dick would want every Mystic girl, every Kerr County family and every person carrying this loss to know:
“ I’m with Jesus. I love you all. Keep going. We will see each other again.”
To Hell and back. And someday, by the grace of God, all the way Home.