Skip Poindexter
June 15, 2011
I was asked to write a eulogy for my dear friend Skip. As I write this, I think I can say I speak for all of us who knew him. As I pondered how I would do it I remembered things about Skip; talking with him on the phone as our LZRussell organization was being birthed. I remember the impressions from those conversations; Skip was easy to talk to, like few people I've ever met. He was personable. He was friendly. He cared deeply about what was going on in peoples lives and he didn't have an agenda. He was a great listener and he had a profound sense of God and His presence. He genuinely cared about people. Skip was one of the people the Lord used to change me. There is a parable in the Bible that Jesus told, it's the story of the Good Samaritan. A man was beaten and robbed and left on the side of the road. A religious man came by, he walked by him on the other side of the road to avoid the beaten man. Couldn't be bothered, he was in a hurry. He was probably on his way to a church service. That was me. But then the Samaritan came by. A Samaritan is offensive to a Jew, an outsider, not one of God's chosen people. In the parable Jesus was making the point that God is interested in the heart, not the exterior superficial trappings of religion. The Samaritan stopped and ministered to the beaten man, put him on his donkey and took him to the Holiday Inn, paid for his stay and even said if it costs more I will stop in on my return visit and settle the tab. Skip was that man, he truly was The Good Samaritan. Remember the first reunion in Vegas? On his way he saw a couple people on the side of the road with a broken down car. He not only stopped and helped them but brought them to the reunion because they had no place to stay while their vehicle was being repaired. I was a religious zealot when I first met Skip. I had had a profound experience with God but got caught up in the trap of religion, churchianity, form without substance, clouds without rain. God used Skip to point me back to Him. He taught me that it is so easy for religion to misrepresent Father God's heart. He taught me that the only reason people reject God is they have been shown He is something that He is not. That incident at the reunion was by no means isolated, it was the way he lived. When he was in Orlando he was ripped off by close friends but the way he handled it was remarkable, they had stolen what little money he had at the time and his reaction was, "it was the only way they could see"(there were other ways but because of the way they were, they could only steal). It was certainly no reason to write them off. It was even more of a reason to stick with them and help them so that maybe their eyes would be opened and they would see there are other options. I told him and others that he was the best Christian I knew who didn't call himself one (naturally he blew that off with a smirk). And of course the best example is the LZRussell web site itself, Skip's baby, he spent more than 10 years of his life creating a memorial to us. Like none of the rest of us he had a dream that this web site and our organization would immortalize what we did and through that bring self worth, healing and wholeness not only to our guys but to Vietnam veterans and even veterans everywhere. He had a big dream. It was an effort motivated by love that consumed him and through it he became the heart of LZRussell.
Of course he wasn't perfect. He was paranoid; the VA was sent right from Hell to make sure he was constantly screwed over. I'm not sure how all that worked but it certainly was fun to listen to his stories. There is lots more but the most important thing I can say about Skip was that knowing him changed me for the better and I loved him and will miss him greatly.