After receiving the call that Jerry had passed, I just began interceding for his family and all of his loved ones. All I could hear Jerry saying was how he is loved and how he is now new again. The blood of Jesus had transformed him and he is now in the presence of the almighty Lord, where disease, sickness, and pain have no place.

Spending the final days with someone is a profound experience, one filled with mixed emotions ranging from sadness and anger to joy and hope. Jerry was one tough man and there is no doubt he fought the good fight until the very end. On my morning runs, I pass by their house everyday and this morning the sky was crystal clear and the moon was as bright as the sun and today there was also a bright star next to the moon. It was one I had never noticed before and it appeared directly above the Coon residence. It made me ponder Jerry in heaven looking down on us and wanting us to know how he was in such peace and to not mourn his passing.

In some of our final conversations, we talked about what questions we would ask God when we went to heaven and as I told him the first person he would see when his sight would be restored was Jesus, the tears rolled down his face. He was so thankful for the redemptive work Christ had done in his life and for the blood He shed at Calvary to make our salvation possible. The blood of Jesus has the power to compel, convict, transform, and raise the dead, which is exactly what happened to Jerry late last night.

To be absent in the body is to be present with the Father and Jerry’s last prayers in this temporal world were for his wife Glenda to have strength and faith to walk the road ahead and also that God would provide for and protect her. His second prayer was over his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. We specifically prayed that the seeds, which were planted in their lives, would begin to take root, growing into mighty God-fearing trees that would bear much fruit and bring glory to God.

I am truly honored to have spent so much time with Jerry during his final days on this side of eternity and I still cannot fathom the literal and figurative blind faith he walked his final days with. He completely trusted in God’s plan and His perfect timing. This is an area so many of us get wrong. We want God’s best, but we aren’t patient enough to wait according to His timing. Jerry understood as long as he still drew breath, God was not done with him and it was only on the exact day of his passing that he ever said he was ready to go home and be with the Lord.

Jerry leaves quite a legacy behind and my prayer now is that his family and loved ones will continue where Jerry found himself in his final days, which was in the palm of God’s hand, living life in the fear and admiration of the Lord. My final word of faith to Jerry was that the Lord’s word does not return void and that it always accomplishes the task for which it was sent. Jerry truly understood how the Lord’s presence enables us to face each day with confidence and peace. Our trust in God is a testament that anxiety and restlessness is only a reality when we envision our future without Jesus in it.

Rest in peace my brother in Christ; you will always be loved and missed!

Until we meet again… JD

Something most people don’t always realize is that we all have eternal life.  The real question is where and how we will spend it.  Our time here on earth is our most precious gift from God because we only have a set amount of it.  What we chose to do with it while we are here is our gift to Him.  Our sacrifice and the way we chose to live our life are the essential acts of our external worship.   With the recent passing of a young man that personified godly living we are all left asking questions of why?  Blake Andrew Martin was someone who not only loved the Lord, but also loved and respected his family.  Wherever he went, the light of Jesus would shine through this great young man.   I have never met someone who always would show the love of Jesus by the way he treated others.  This world was a better place with him in it.

Since, we believe that Jesus died and was raised from the dead; we also believe that when Jesus returns, God will bring back with Him all the believers who have died.  I can only picture Blake smiling and riding some pimped out chariot with 22” rims down to meet all his family and friends in the air!  I often thought of Blake when I would read Isaiah 43:2 – “When you go through deep waters, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you.”  Blake at this very moment is with the King of kings and Lord of lords because God has given us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Blake knew that there were two kinds of enlightenment.  The good kind that comes from seeking God and the terrible kind that comes from sinning against God and feeling the full consequences of our actions.   He chose to honor, love and obey not only God, but also his family.  He knew that each of our lives is but a breath and that our time here on earth is but a vapor.  He understood that we must make every moment we have here count and that we must never leave things unsaid.  He lived life with a conviction to do what God had called him to do with the excitement of spending eternity with the Father when his time here was done.  I implore you; don’t wait to live until it is time to die.  Engage life with a sense of urgency and fulfill your destiny as a child of God.  Say what you have been afraid to say, mend whatever relationship you thought could not be fixed before the chance fades away.

God promises to send us fresh new mercy each day, so even though we can’t see past the pain of today, trust in God because His love will never fail.  His grace is sufficient for you, and His power is made perfect in our weakness.  Though He brings grief, he also shows compassion according to the greatness of his unfailing love.  While we are mourning the loss of our loved ones, those already with the Father are rejoicing to meet them behind the veil.  God views the death of his adopted children in Christ as a joyous occasion and He wants us to view it the same way.  We can be certain that we will see them again in Heaven, if we too have accepted Jesus as our Lord.  The last enemy Christ will defeat is death itself.  “He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain.  All these things will be gone forever.”  The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and He rescues those whose spirits are crushed.  So don’t be afraid, because He is with you. Don’t be discouraged, because He is your God.  He will strengthen you and help you and He will hold you up victoriously in His right hand.

Blake, your memory lives on in all of us.  God Bless.