Dover AFB Chaplain Klavens Noel

U.S. Air Force photo released in 2004

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DOVER, Del. (FBW)—Readying herself to collect the remains of her husband from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, a woman looks closely at Chaplain Klavens Noel and says the first thing that comes to mind.

"Chaplain, there are no words. No words to say in these circumstances," Noel remembers her telling him. For Noel, however, the brief encounter with a family member who has lost a loved one during a time of war is an opportunity for him to deliver a glimpse of hope.

"God does all things well," Noel recalls gently telling the woman. "Look to God for the silver lining in the cloud, so that we can move on and find out the purpose of all of this. ... Focus on your faith."

Noel said rarely do the families of those killed in war show up at Dover's gates, but when they do, he shares with them pretty much the same message he lives 24-hours a day with the nearly 100 others who are present in the mortuary building where the war dead are brought to be identified, prepared, cosmetized, dressed for burial, and delivered to their final resting places.

Instead of becoming hardened or desensitized, Noel said the environment "on the contrary, brings us closer to who we are."

U.S. Air Force photo by Master Sgt. Joseph Springfield

"It takes off the veil, it takes off the front that we carry in our life," Noel said. "Now we become real, sensitive."

Noel, a major in the Air Force Reserves, announced on Memorial Day weekend he was stepping down as pastor of the Haitian ministry at First Baptist Church of Central Florida in Orlando to serve a four month assignment at Dover.

A native of Haiti, where his family practiced Voodooism until converted by Southern Baptist missionaries, Noel, 41, said he and his clan left the island nation to move to Miami in 1980 when he was 14.

By the time he was 19, Noel said he had accepted a call to ministry and began preaching. In 1998 he graduated from Miami Christian College and in 1993 earned a master of divinity degree from Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary in Memphis, Tenn., and was endorsed as a Southern Baptist chaplain by the North American Mission Board.

After serving in the Army chaplaincy for a time, and then serving on active duty as an Air Force chaplain, Noel, and his wife, Lucy, headed to First Baptist Church of Central Florida in Orlando after receiving a call from pastor Clayton Cloer, a longtime friend and classmate from Mid-America.

"He's an incredible man," Cloer said of Noel. "He brought exceptional leadership to our Haitian community as well as flexibility and strength to our staff."

Cloer said the church gave Noel a standing ovation when he announced his decision to serve those who care for the fallen at Dover.

"Every one of our soldiers that dies over there comes to him and they are there with all of the opening of the [body] bags. It's unbelievable emotionally what they have to do," Cloer said of Noel and the other personnel at Dover. "It's an incredible, high honor."

Noel told Florida Baptist Witness he was a "little slow" in making the decision to serve at Dover, but eventually had peace about the commitment.

"One of the things I thought about was, life goes on," Noel said matter-of-factly in speaking about those he ministers to on a daily basis. "Even as people move up here to this location and this difficult situation, life goes on for them.

U.S. Air Force photo by Master Sgt. Joseph Springfield

Chaplains Klavens Noel (l) and David J. Sparks stand in front of The Wall of Significant Events at the Charles C. Carson Center for Mortuary Affairs at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where they serve.

"They marry, they have children at home, the dogs need to go to the vet and different circumstances come up," Noel said. "It's just a matter of being alongside of them and encouraging, reminding them of the holy in the midst of this."

Noel and Chaplain Lt. Col. David J. Sparks are two in a team of three chaplains assigned to Dover's Charles C. Carson Center for Mortuary Affairs where over 4,000 deceased soldiers, marines, sailors and airmen have been received from the war in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2003.

Sparks, a reserve chaplain since 1980, has been assigned to Dover for four years and plans to be in ministry there until September of 2008. An ordained minister of the Church of the Nazarene, Sparks said he finally separated from his congregation in Hollywood, Md., after staying at Dover much longer than he initially anticipated.

In a letter to Noel's home church, Sparks credited the younger man with having "unique pastoral skills" and thanked the church for his willingness to serve.

"Just know that your sacrifice is offered to God and to the families of our fallen heroes," Sparks wrote. "Though they will never know about your sacrifice, we know, God knows and you know."

Sparks also asked the congregation to pray for Noel:

"Would you pray that his spirit not be damaged by the constant exposure to the worst that war can do to God's creation? ... Would you pray for peace; a time when young men and women do not die in war; a time when nations do not rise up against nations?

"Would you pray too for the promised peace 'in the midst of the storm,' a 'peace that passes understanding?'"

CHAPLAINS PRACTICE 'EARLY' EVANGELISM

In a Witness interview, coordinated with Noel and Sparks through the Dover Air Force Base Public Affairs Office, Sparks said the environment in which the men work provide them a unique opportunity to be on the same team. The third member of the team is Chaplain Derrick Harris.

"We are co-pastors to a group of 100 folks, most of whom do not claim some denomination as their own," Sparks said. "Most of the time we present a united front for the cause of Jesus Christ which in this environment is what I refer to as a very early stage of evangelism."

Joking that denominational issues only come up during lunch when the men "argue for the fun of it," Sparks turned serious when he said Noel "connects" in a personal way with nearly everyone he meets.

"There are some who we work with every day who are profane as far as you can imagine, and a chaplain must find a way to connect," Sparks emphasized. "Chaplain Noel is able to do that. It's really cool to watch."

Speaking on a level with which Christians might not even identify, Noel is able to have a spiritual conversation with almost anyone, Sparks said.

"It has to do with loving people, connecting with their story, to do with building such a relationship that they will talk to you on a non-religious level because some of them don't have any of that," Sparks said.

And affirming Noel's belief that "life goes on" even in the harshest of environments, Sparks said, it's relationship, family, financial and religious issues that are on people's minds.

"The mortuary is a difficult environment, certainly, and the work they have to do can be sad or horrific... but those are not the real issues," Sparks said. "Those are temporary issues. ...Noel is able to connect with them ... in such a way that they will talk about those issues which then provide an open door in the relationship for moving small steps forward in the field of very early evangelism."

In one instance that connection led to Noel's conducting a wedding ceremony for a Jewish man and Catholic woman.

Recalling his involvement, Noel said the couple was under conviction about living together without being married and so they asked him to marry them. Outside of the circumstance of his being a military chaplain, Noel said they wouldn't have likely had the opportunity to speak with a Southern Baptist pastor.

"Neither of them knew too much about their religious background, so I sent them on a journey to go find out about who they were. So they did," Noel said. "They found a rabbi and the other one found a Catholic priest and they learned more about who they were ... and they decided that they would continue to the wedding ceremony."

Ultimately, Noel said, after the wedding the couple found a non-denominational church "more suitable" for them both to attend.

"That made a huge difference in their lives in finding out who they were and where they were going on a journey," Noel said. "I felt like I made a big difference."

For Noel, connecting with those in the mortuary unit also means the opportunity to do something few have rarely done, according to Sparks.

Apparently, Noel linked up with a group of 7-10 individuals recently to go on morale trip in a military vehicle to Salisbury, Md., nearly an hour away.

The purpose of the trip? To encourage those who had "religious and spiritual yearnings" to attend Wednesday night services at a church.

"I'm ecstatic," Sparks said of Noel's initiative. "He's just an encouraging guy."

Noel said when the opportunities come-whether a trip to church or to the mall or beach, there's an "open door" to better equip and encourage people and share Christ with them.

"Death causes us to think about the immediacy of life; how short life is and what we can do in this life that will make a difference," Noel said, reflecting on his presence in a place where death is so prevalent. "But death itself, we don't talk a lot about it."