Nick Scott Memorial

Today my wife and I along with my parents drove to Oklahoma City to attend Nick Scott's memorial service.  I was asked to read the obituary. I was honored to be able to do so.

Nicolas Neal Scott (born Nicolas Aweyo), aged 23, of Oklahoma City died October 1, 2014 in Oklahoma City of homicide.

He was born June 23, 1991 near Homa Bay, Kenya. His mother died in childbirth and he was adopted by Neal and Tillie Scott two weeks later. His early childhood was spent in Morogoro, Tanzania where his parents were missionaries. Then the family returned to the United States, residing in Texas, Tennessee, and New Mexico before settling near Hodgen, Oklahoma'

Nick was home schooled for his first 6 years and then completed seventh and eighth grades in Hodgen, Oklahoma. He attended high school in Heavener, Oklahoma and was active in football and basketball. After high school he worked at a series of odd jobs but ran into difficulties when his citizenship papers were misplaced. Repeated attempts at replacing them were lost in red tape and his frequent moves.

He spent most of his adult life in Oklahoma but was homeless for the last several years. Basketball remained a passion throughout his life. Nick was a quiet young man until you got to know him well. Then a sense of humor and deep compassion came through that endeared him to his friends.

I first met Nick as an eight year old boy named Nicky. He was a quiet boy who couldn't sit still. Over the next few years I got to know him in my Sabbath School Class and in Pathfinders. By the time he was twelve he was almost as tall as I was.

Nick loved Pathfinder camping trips. We always knew to take extra food when Nick was along, especially an extra container of sour cream.

Nick was scheduled to go to the Faith on Fire Camporee in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Over 33,000 Pathfinders from over 100 countries attended. Shortly before the Camporee he injured his foot and was afraid that he would miss out, but he was able to go with a special boot. He had a great time at the Camporee and never complained even though we had to do lots of walking, (our campsite was almost a mile from the main events hangars), on his sore foot. I'm very glad that he was able to be a part of the Faith on Fire Camporee.

Nick is survived by his father, Neal Scott and wife, Lucy of Harrah, Oklahoma, two brothers, Steve and wife Vivian of Illinois and Tom and wife Jo Ann of Wisconsin, a sister, Marci, of California, and nieces and nephews. His mother, Tillie, preceded him in death in 2011.

Remembering Nick

Last week I received news that was a shock to me.  One of the boys that I had in my youth class at church a number of years ago had been shot to death in Oklahoma City.  He was just 23 years old.

Around 9 p.m. on Wednesday, police were called out to the apartment complex on NW 25th and Penn on a shots fired call with a man down.  On arrival Nick Scott was discovered in the courtyard of an apartment complex.

A neighbor told police that they heard 5 or 6 shots. "I ran outside, everyone says Nick, it's Nick! He's dead, he's dead!" the neighbor said.

Oklahoma City Police report that an arrest has been made in the shooting death of Nicolas Scott.  Sam Neal, 45, was taken into custody Thursday afternoon.

As the realization of what had happened sank in I was very upset.  I had been very close to Nick and his family.

Nick's family moved to our area and started attending the Mena Seventh-Day Adventist Church in 1999.  As the youth leader and the Pathfinder Club leader I got to know Nick and his sister Marci.  His parents had been missionaries in Africa and had adopted him there. When they retired, they moved back to the U.S. You can read more of the story of Nick's parents on my blog post written when Nick's mom, Tillie Scott, passed away in February 2011.

Nick enjoyed being a member of the Mena Wildcats Pathfinder Club. Pathfinders is a church based, co-ed, scouting type organization. Twice a year we would go on campouts, and Nick loved to go. He was a friendly boy and always made lots of friends. Every five years Pathfinders hold an International Camporee.  Nick was scheduled to go to the Faith on Fire Camporee in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Over 33,000 Pathfinders from over 100 countries attended.  Shortly before the Camporee he injured his foot and was afraid that he would miss out, but he was able to go with a special boot.

He had a great time at the Camporee and never complained even though we had to do lots of walking, (our campsite was almost a mile from the main events hangars), on his sore foot.  I'm very glad that he was able to be a part of  the Faith on Fire Camporee.

In 2004 Nick was a part of a mission trip that our church made to San Pedro Belize.  While we were in Belize we helped start the construction of the New Horizon SDA Chapel.  We spent a lot of time at the New Horizon School that was next to the construction site.  Nick was happy to be a part of the project, and carried lots of cement blocks to those who were laying block.  He loved the ocean.  This is one of my favorite photos of him taken while were were in Belize.

I am so saddened by this senseless loss of life.  I know that I will never forget Nick.  My thoughts and prayers are with his family.

Your GPS

This is my article as published in the March 13, 2014 issue of The Mena Star.

When my son was a young boy he belonged to the DeQueen Pioneers Pathfinder Club, and I was a Pathfinder leader.  One weekend I took the Pathfinders on a backpacking trip.  We left in the evening and headed to Alexandria, Louisiana. We made it to Alexandria at about midnight.  There I took the eastbound exit off of the interstate instead of the westbound exit.  I wandered around Alexandria for an hour trying to find the right road.  By the time we found the campground it was 1:30 and we still had to pitch our tents.

I would have loved to have some way of knowing the right way to go to reach the campground.  I'm not the only one who has wished for such a device.  For centuries, navigators and explorers have longed for a system that would enable them to locate their position on the globe with the accuracy necessary to avoid tragedy and to reach their intended destinations.

The answer came about because of the Cold War.  U.S. scientists began working on the GPS system because of an Air Force requirement for a guidance system to be used with a proposed ICBM that would travel on a railroad system. On June 26, 1993, the U.S. Air Force launched a satellite into orbit, completing a network of 24 satellites known as the Global Positioning System, or GPS.

This satellite navigation system was intended for military use and therefore the signals were scrambled, limiting accuracy for civilian use.  On May 1, 2000, President Clinton announced that this scrambling would be turned off. Civilians were then able to use the GPS signals.  Soon there were accurate automotive navigation systems available.  Now smart phones come with GPS capability.

I like using my GPS; we have named her Tink. She tells me when to turn. She tells me what lane to be in. On our last trip to Houston to see our son she took us a new way and saved us half an hour.

So now that I have Tink to guide me, I never get lost.  I always know where to go.  Except---

When we first got Tink we were going to Shady Lake. Now I have been to Shady Lake a number of times, and I know how to get there. When Tink wanted me to turn off of my normal route I decided to see where she would take us. She took us on an adventure. She guided us to Shady Lake over forest service roads that hadn't been traveled on in a long time. There was grass growing in the road. We arrived safely at Shady Lake about an hour later than if we had traveled our normal route.

A couple of weeks ago we went to Dierks Lake to see our granddaughters compete in the Pathfinder Adventurer Cardboard Boat Race. Tink wanted us to leave the highway and travel across dirt roads. We declined. On our way home I was curious as to where she wanted to take us so we followed her advice. After travelling on forest service roads we were within just a few miles of the highway when we came to the Cossatot River bridge that was impassable because there was three feet of water flowing over it.

We had to turn around and go all the way back to Dierks Lake so we could take the paved roads. On our way back to the lake we followed Tink and were stymied three different times by locked gates across the roads.  After an hour we finally made our way back.

Sometimes exploring a new road can be quite an adventure. When you are traveling a rural Arkansas road you just don’t know where you will end up.  Sometimes even a GPS doesn't help.

Have you taken any wrong turns in your life?  Have you been on any wrong roads?  How do you know which road to take?

In Psalms 25:4, the Bible says, "Show me the path where I should walk, O LORD; point out the right road for me to follow".

That sounds like a GPS doesn't it.  God will point out the right road for us to follow.  You can trust him.  You might not always be able to trust your GPS, but you can always trust God.  No matter how knowledgeable you are, you aren't the best choice as navigator. Proverbs 14:12 tells us that, "there is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death".

The whole point of being a Christian is to have a knowledgeable navigator to guide us through this life to our eternal destination. Why would we decide not to listen to the best guide there is and use our own judgment instead?

Solomon explained it very well in Proverbs 20:24   “how can we understand the road we travel? It is the LORD who directs our steps.

The only reliable GPS for our spiritual life is God’s word.  The Bible gives us direction.  So many Christians I meet seem to want more than the Bible.  The old reliable Bible isn't enough for them and they want something new. Psalms 119:105 states, "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path".  If David and Solomon understood that it was God’s Word that directs our steps why should we feel that there is not enough information in the Bible and feel the need to supplement it?

I hope that you know where you are going. Have you studied the map? Do you have your spiritual GPS? Do you use it?

I hope that you and I will be able to say what David said in Psalms 73:23-26. “Yet I still belong to you; you are holding my right hand. You will keep on guiding me with your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny. I have no one in heaven but you; I desire you more than anything on earth. My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak, but God remains the strength of my heart; he is mine forever”.

Your GPS

When my son was a young boy he belonged to the DeQueen Pioneers Pathfinder Club, and I was a Pathfinder leader.  One weekend I took the Pathfinders on a backpacking trip.  We left in the evening and headed to Alexandria, Louisiana. We made it to Alexandria at about midnight.  There I took the eastbound exit off of the interstate instead of the westbound exit.  I wandered around Alexandria for an hour trying to find the right road.  By the time we found the campground it was 1:30 and we still had to pitch our tents.

I would have loved to have some way of knowing the right way to go to reach the campground.  I'm not the only one who has wished for such a device.  For centuries, navigators and explorers have longed for a system that would enable them to locate their position on the globe with the accuracy necessary to avoid tragedy and to reach their intended destinations.

The answer came about because of the Cold War.  U.S. scientists began working on the GPS system because of an Air Force requirement for a guidance system to be used with a proposed ICBM that would travel on a railroad system. On June 26, 1993, the U.S. Air Force launched a satellite into orbit, completing a network of 24 satellites known as the Global Positioning System, or GPS.

This satellite navigation system was intended for military use and therefore the signals were scrambled, limiting accuracy for civilian use.  On May 1, 2000, President Clinton announced that this scrambling would be turned off. Civilians were then able to use the GPS signals.  Soon there were accurate automotive navigation systems available.  Now smart phones come with GPS capability.

I like using my GPS; we have named her Tink. She tells me when to turn. She tells me what lane to be in. On our last trip to Houston to see our son she took us a new way and saved us half an hour.

So now that I have Tink to guide me, I never get lost.  I always know where to go.  Except---

When we first got Tink we were going to Shady Lake. Now I have been to Shady Lake a number of times, and I know how to get there. When Tink wanted me to turn off of my normal route I decided to see where she would take us. She took us on an adventure. She guided us to Shady Lake over forest service roads that hadn't been traveled on in a long time. There was grass growing in the road. We arrived safely at Shady Lake about an hour later than if we had traveled our normal route.

A couple of weeks ago we went to Dierks Lake to see our granddaughters compete in the Pathfinder Adventurer Cardboard Boat Race. Tink wanted us to leave the highway and travel across dirt roads. We declined. On our way home I was curious as to where she wanted to take us so we followed her advice. After travelling on forest service roads we were within just a few miles of the highway when we came to the Cossatot River bridge that was impassable because there was three feet of water flowing over it.

We had to turn around and go all the way back to Dierks Lake so we could take the paved roads. On our way back to the lake we followed Tink and were stymied three different times by locked gates across the roads.  After an hour we finally made our way back.

Sometimes exploring a new road can be quite an adventure. When you are traveling a rural Arkansas road you just don’t know where you will end up.  Sometimes even a GPS doesn't help.

Have you taken any wrong turns in your life?  Have you been on any wrong roads?  How do you know which road to take?

In Psalms 25:4, the Bible says, "Show me the path where I should walk, O LORD; point out the right road for me to follow".

That sounds like a GPS doesn't it.  God will point out the right road for us to follow.  You can trust him.  You might not always be able to trust your GPS, but you can always trust God.  No matter how knowledgeable you are, you aren't the best choice as navigator. Proverbs 14:12 tells us that, "there is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death".

The whole point of being a Christian is to have a knowledgeable navigator to guide us through this life to our eternal destination. Why would we decide not to listen to the best guide there is and use our own judgment instead?

Solomon explained it very well in Proverbs 20:24   “how can we understand the road we travel? It is the LORD who directs our steps.

The only reliable GPS for our spiritual life is God’s word.  The Bible gives us direction.  So many Christians I meet seem to want more than the Bible.  The old reliable Bible isn't enough for them and they want something new. Psalms 119:105 states, "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path".  If David and Solomon understood that it was God’s Word that directs our steps why should we feel that there is not enough information in the Bible and feel the need to supplement it?

I hope that you know where you are going. Have you studied the map? Do you have your spiritual GPS? Do you use it?

I hope that you and I will be able to say what David said in Psalms 73:23-26. “Yet I still belong to you; you are holding my right hand. You will keep on guiding me with your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny. I have no one in heaven but you; I desire you more than anything on earth. My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak, but God remains the strength of my heart; he is mine forever”.

Cardboard Boat Race

Today we had a great time at the annual Arkansas-Louisiana Pathfinder and Adventurer Cardboard Boat Race held at Dierks Lake. My grand daughters and their cousins were participating.  They spent the night before the race at our house and had an cookout and ice cream party followed by a slumber party.

To enter the boat race the kids had to build a boat with only cardboard, duct tape and paint.  It was amazing how durable the girls boats were.   After the race they spent quite some time just paddling around in the boats.  They all had a really good time.

The girls were excited to win trophies and medals for their efforts.

Grandma and Papa had a lot of fun spending the day in such a beautiful place and seeing the girls have such a good time.  After the race we had a picnic and then the kids spent the afternoon swimming.

On our way back home we took a "shortcut" over gravel mountain roads.  Within just a few miles of the highway we came across a bridge that was impassable because there was three feet of water flowing over the bridge.  We had to turn around and go all the way back to Dierks Lake so we could take the paved roads.  On our way back to the lake we followed our GPS and were stymied three different times by locked gates across the roads.  After an hour we finally made our way back.

What an awesome day!