Ride For Life: Minister's loss is also his gain

The Rev. J. Langston Boyd's shoulders are still broad and his gray-green eyes still snap with fire. The passion to communicate is still there, too - just like when he was in the thick of it as a Denver activist, a manager of Jesse Jackson's presidential campaigns, a delegate to a Democratic National Convention . . .

But now a wheelchair contains the once-larger-than-life, 6-foot-1-inch Boyd. On Sunday, as usual, it held a place of honor in the first row of Shorter Community African Methodist Episcopal Church, which Boyd has pastored since 1978.

His head is bowed and speech labored, but Boyd's presence still fills the contemporary-looking sanctuary he built in 1990. Under its swooping rafters he thundered through many a sermon, punctuated by what members affectionately call "The Spin" - a 360-degree turn he used to delight audiences at just the right moment.

But Lou Gehrig's disease has ruined the timing of this 65-year-old whirlwind.

In technical terms, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is a "fatal neuromuscular disease characterized by progressive muscle weakness resulting in paralysis." Its human face is Yankee Lou Gehrig and physicist Stephen Hawking. And now - since his diagnosis last spring - the Rev. Jesse Langston Boyd.

"He was such a big man," sighs church member Jackye Holmes. "This is hard."

As the choir sets the rafters afire with song, and members walk to the altar for prayer, each lays a loving hand briefly on the pastor's back. At Boyd's side is his son-in-law, Glen Whitney, who periodically offers him a sip of water with the tenderness of a mother.

This, I hope you'll see, is a love story.

"Hi, Daddy Bear," whispers Boyd's 37-year-old daughter Juli Whitney. It's after the service, and the Whitneys and their four youngsters have gathered around the widowed patriarch. (Boyd's four other children live out of state.)

Glen first noticed the strange symptoms last spring. On a family fishing trip, he says, "I noticed he didn't move like usual; he usually treads very lightly on his feet."

After dropping off his father-in-law in Denver, Glen, 41, was driving back to his home in Missouri where he worked as a video consultant. As he was praying, he says he heard God speak to him with piercing clarity: "The Lord told me, 'Go back and take care of him.' "

As Glen said that, Boyd began to weep. But not for long. He had things to say, and he said them in a language that Juli and Glen are now adept at translating.

"I've lost a lot, but I have gained more," Boyd said. "I now have a closer relationship with the Lord. I have learned how to deal with loss by finding myself more dependent on God. I depend on him and also depend on other people."

After a pause, I started to ask a question and Boyd broke in vigorously - "I'm not done!" - and everybody laughed. That was the Boyd everybody knew.

"I have the greatest support system in the world - my daughter, my son-in-law." he said. (The Whitneys did move back to Denver, and now are caring for Boyd in the home he shared with his wife, Faye, until her 1999 death from cancer.)

Added Boyd, "I also have a faithful church."

Sunday is the pastor's 66th birthday and plans are percolating to make it memorable.

As for Boyd, gifts keep coming in the form of insights like this one: "In these times the church is emphasizing how people become prosperous. But it should also teach them how to receive from God, and how to deal with relinquishment."