Christina Jackson Enjoyed Her Swedish Wedding Crown - Birthday, August 22

August 22, 2026 - 78th Birthday.
Christina wore the Swedish crown for her wedding.

Engagement photo.

Chris loved to tell the nurses - Erin Joy loved that middle initial. They both did!

Norma Boeckler wondered if I could find her splendid garden. 

Martin enjoyed the calendar photo - and bakeries. 

 

Bethany Joan Marie Jackson, Erin Joy, and Christina Jackson,

 Bethany Joan Marie had the curly reddish hair.

 

Bethany Joan Marie loved her brother so much!

 Erin Joy was always filled with joy.

 

Yes, the Weather Is Too Cold Today

 

First the snow and cold came for sunny Minnesota. Next another wave swept across those areas without stopping to melt the snow - or even rest.

The Stoning of Stephen reminds me of the violence absorbed. Yet he gathered the greatest of all pain and blessing, apart from Jesus Christ.

KJV Acts 7:54  When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him with their teeth.

55 But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,

56 And said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.

57 Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord,

58 And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet, whose name was Saul.

59 And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.

GJ - Many times the worst comes upon us. At any given point someone will say or think - "Why is this so bad?" We stop to ask for help, and God reverses the problem and bad turns into good, even miraculously so. I especially enjoy praying for people when the worst appears and God turns the worst into the best for us, even when we are worried and burdened. Mindful of successes and Bible clear messages, I am happy to offer my prayers for myself and for many others.

    My biggest smiles come from my wife Christina, my daughter Bethany Joan Marie, and the baby Erin Joy. All three beam at me from two walls. Christina especially glows at Erin grinning at the camera. Doesn't every parent and grandparent enjoy that? Bethany was wearing her red Christmas dress on her fourth Christmas. Many loved the joy within them, and that continues.

I told Christina not to leave the bed during the service - because she had dangerous falls. She could not stop smiling and laughing at "disobeying."

I Keep Thinking about This Teen

I often get someone knocking on the door about insects, windows, and other sales items. The teen was in his late teens and talking about screens. I explained how I was a renter (aren't we all?) and not a good source.

On the way out from the porch he looked at three metallic photos of Christina, Erin Joy, and Bethany Joan Marie. He asked how they were made and who were they. I said, "My wife Christina died of cancer and our two daughters had a mysterious ailment."

He looked over each photo and began crying. He said, "You put their photos in the garden? What a wonderful way to honor them." 

Christina Elizabeth Jackson

52 Years of Marriage

"Build a Rose Garden. Grass is boring."

               

Erin Joy is portrayed as "a gift of heavenly joy," holding her teddy bear.

Bethany Joan Marie - "Nurses always called her Angel.

In her mother's arms again.

Four Years Ago Today - August 22, 2021 - Rest in Peace

 

Christina posed with LCA President James Crumley.

 We helped at the Crystal Bridges Museum - Walmart funded - and Alice Walton got a hug from Christina for helping. I was later asked to take a photograph of the Waltons on another day.

 Christina was at the bedside of an ALS patient,
like many pastor's wives in ancient days.

Christina was delivered by a not-so-good midwife, in post WWII Germany.

The Swedish Crown at Augustana was used for weddings.

Engagement.

 Erin Joy loved to laugh, especially when someone was acting up and in trouble.

 Bethany Joan Marie loved and squirmed.

 Bethany's favorite nurse could barely speak,
but she  knew the language of love best of all.

Bethany glowed for the camera on Christmas.

Fifty Years Ago and Year Two.Bells for the Campanologist

Campanology is the scientific and musical study of bells. It encompasses the technology of bells – how they are founded, tuned and rung – as well as the history, methods, and traditions of bellringing as an art. It is common to collect together a set of tuned bells and treat the whole as one musical instrument. Wikipedia

 Campanologist - someone who loves and studies bells.

 

I was pushing a wheelchair today and later watching the use of IV antibiotics for a dangerous circulation problem. Surgery and procedures saved one or both legs.

Everyone talks about medical advances so I thought about 50 years ago, when Christina and I were both working at Yale Medical School. She was a researcher for a well known professor and writer of children's books, on the staff of the Yale Medical Child Study Center. I was a lowly xeroxer for the Yale Medical School Library. Researchers asked for journal articles. I went into the dark basement stacks and found the journal for xeroxing. 

We were great friends with Bruce and Betsy Wenger, not realizing he graduated at the top of his class at Yale Medical. 

Christina and I took the Yale shuttle bus over to the medical campus, sometimes together, sometimes solo. One stop was at Baskin Robbins, when they still made real ice cream. 

People would say, "The time will run so fast, you will not believe it." Those people have passed into eternal life, including my favorite professors and the pastor/bishop who helped ordain me.

Two years ago today, Christina transitioned to eternal life. That makes me think of many Yale episodes, trivial but fun, all adding up to the best of memories. Her professor, Joan Fassler, died young from cancer. Joan's husband, Leonard, lived until 2021. 

Leonard was the surprise person on the sidewalk in Chicago when Christina and I found ourselves walking behind him and two other businessmen. She was sure it had to be Lenny. I whispered, "He is a New York lawyer!" I conceded it was possible, so I yelled, "LENNY!" He turned around and mutual recognition lit up. Christina hugged him, and his friends said, "Lenny. Strange beautiful young women run up and hug you! What a gift!"

He helped in the legal battle to break up AT&T. He also kept us up to date about his dear wife.

Math-Science Breakthrough at the University of Water, Ontario - Where Christina Jackson Earned Her MA in German Literature

 

When we went to Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, in 1970, I enrolled at Martin Luther University Seminary, whose legal name is still Waterloo Lutheran Seminary.

Christina soon got a job at the University of Waterloo, a short walk or bus-ride away. It was the spin-off of Waterloo Lutheran University, where John Warwick Montgomery and our brother-in-law Kermit Way (physical chemist) taught. UW called WLU "the little red schoolhouse down the street." 

UnitWat, as they call it, was a collection of beautiful new buildings with underground tunnels to reduce frostbite. We loved to stop by the computer center and watch the new priesthood, mainframe computer minders, silently managing the giant IBM 360 as we watched reverently through a glass wall.

If you want to look down on UniWat, they were known for computer advances decades ago. Not knowing about a school does not remove it from advances, eh?

Christina quickly went from research librarian to graduate student in German literature. All her professors were German born, except one gentleman. Her only lady professor was Gisela Brude-Fernau, PhD Yale, who was impressed with Christina's original paper about the Wandering Jew in literature.

Canadian-American Border

My Funny Valentine

 

The only way to get Erin to hug her bear for the photo was to tell her not to. That was a major effort, and she grinned about it.

My friend from many years back lost his wife recently. The loss of Christina is very much with me, so I thought I would mention a few things I have learned.

Red-haired "Lucy" with her sister Maria

Christina was a genius researcher and a constant source of encouragement.

We went to an LCA national communication conference in Seattle. Christina posed with James Crumley, Lutheran Church in America president.

My Funny Valentine

As a widow from our Moline class said, "The first year is the hardest." Acute grief is a time of extraordinary pain, because marriage is the only relationship where two become one. The loss is much greater than anyone can imagine.

I expected to be in a fog for a year, because my mother's death was like that. The fog lifted because my Moline classmates kept reminding me of how much she meant to them as a teacher. More than one said, "She saved my life."

My congregation and Christina's family helped me in my grief, in countless ways. Kermit Way and Maria Ellenberger Way drove straight through to get to the parsonage. The last two-way conversation Christina had was with Maria on the phone, when she said "I love you Maria." The last voice Christina heard was "I love you Grammie Chris" from California. She grinned from ear to ear, though not able to speak, and grinned the same way as she slipped into sleep.

I am going to list a few things that lifted me slowly from the Slough of Despond. I could list dozens, because dozens were needed, but these are the individual ones that a husband would know best.

• I realized the encouragement Christina gave me was not lost in death but kept alive and intensified by the fact of us being one flesh. Our oneness was not lost but shifted heavenward by 50%. She said, "You still have work to do."
• I improved when I began recalling the wonderful memories we had, from meeting at Augustana at the age of 18 - when I was still 17 - to 55 years later.  
• Chris was dubbed Lucy by her father for her red hair, her crazy ideas, and her laughter. She was shocked at first by my polemics on the blog, but she offered comments that left me breathless with laughter. She never realized how hilarious her observations were - especially when she described synodical staffs. "Am I that funny?" I said wheezing, "Yes."
• We went to a lot of movies at first, then to as many live performances as possible. We saw Vincent Price, Peggy Lee, Katherine Hepburn, and others, live in Chicago.
• Her favorite actress was Hepburn, and we both loved "Bringing Up Baby." Chris was even zanier in real life than Hepburn playing a role in the "madcap comedy." 
  
• Medical appointments often led to eating lunch at restaurants where we engaged the staff in various ways - favoring our favorites. One regular Red Lobster waiter asked me to perform his upcoming marriage. It was in a beautiful setting in Fayetteville, overlooking the valley.
• We did most things together, so she got to know churchly villains and valiant ones as well as I did. We realized that dastardly behavior was a benefit in getting us into an independent congregation with the rapidly growing computer and Internet media.
• After the funeral, I gave away tons of things others might use or pass along. My favorite creation now is the Happy Corner, where I have pinned the best photos of Christina with Bethany Joan Marie and Erin Joy. I look at the Happy Corner every day and smile, remembering those times, not lost welded in my memory.
  
• All three girls are now with Jesus Christ, the Son of God, born of the Virgin Mary, Miracle Worker then and now, atoning for our sins, rising from death and ascending to heaven - Our Good Shepherd. 
• I pointed out to Chris, just before she died, "We will not be separated, but with the Savior on one side of the gates or the other."

Try Not To Smile