“Mom, is there a God?” His question came out of the blue, and Mike’s mother knew she needed to get her 13-year-old son to church to meet his Creator. Saturday morning, she packed her seven children into the car and headed for the nearest Seventh-day Adventist church. She had visited there before and knew they adhered to Scripture, but she had never attended services regularly. On Mike’s first visit to that church, my dear friend Pastor Danny met him. He and the teenager became good friends before the family moved away to another state.
After the move, Mike soon responded to the siren call of the world that beckoned him to join in the pleasures of sin, eclipsing his desire to attend church. He often snuck out the window after his family had gone to bed and stayed out all night partying, but he didn’t realize that the reason he couldn’t find satisfaction was because God placed eternity in every human heart, and nothing but the love of the Creator can fill that void. His mother’s relationship with God continued to grow, and she prayed daily for her son’s deliverance from the snares of the world.
Mike eventually married his girlfriend, and then his entire family moved back to North Carolina. Marriage didn’t keep Mike from chasing the excitement the world had to offer, and he spent several years on the treadmill of a secular life, longing for peace in his heart. Suddenly, his family noticed an unexpected change in his personality. Mike had uncharacteristic outbursts of anger, and his emotions erupted over daily routine tasks. Something was wrong. A couple of challenging years passed, and the young man began to suffer pain. After several examinations and medical procedures, Mike was diagnosed with stage four colon cancer that had metastasized to his brain.
The Savior wooed Mike back to His loving arms, and he returned to church. He rekindled His relationship with the Lord, and with my friend Danny who also welcomed him back with open arms.
Mike shared the news of his dreadful diagnosis, choking back tears as he confessed his remorse for the life he had lived in the world. But God is in the business of new beginnings, and soon Mike brought his family to church with him.
Rededicating his life to the Lord, Mike shared with the church members the great joy and peace he had finally found in returning to his Heavenly Father. He raised his hands in a gesture of praise and thanks to God for being so merciful, patient, and kind to him. From that day onward, during the time of prayer and praise in church services, Mike would stand and turn to face the congregation to speak words of encouragement for every listening ear. He never mentioned his own ongoing battle with cancer, but told his church family how much God loved them and how proud it made him feel to be accepted by them. Mike had finally found the peace and joy he had been searching for during his earlier life.
The pastors and elders anointed Mike with the hope that our Heavenly Father would do something miraculous in his life. The truth is, God had already done the greatest miracle in restoring Mike to Him. Sadly, his cancer began to take its toll on his bodily strength and he suffered intense headaches. Mike would get into his car and drive to a parking lot where he could have an intimate talk with His Savior Jesus Christ. He said that it was in those moments alone with Jesus that the Holy Spirit strengthened him.
Danny called me last month to ask that we put Mike on our worldwide prayer warriors list. The oncologist had informed the 48-year-old man that he only had six to eight weeks to live, and his wife and children were overwhelmed by the news. He was in the hospital, undergoing radiation treatments to try to slow the malignant spread and stretch out a little more time to be with his family. Arrangements were made for Hospice care to take him home, where he could go to sleep in Jesus. But that wasn’t to be. Mike experienced a very sudden downward turn.
Pastor Danny visited Mike on Wednesday, with plans to return Saturday evening. As he departed the two simultaneously said, “I’ll see you later,” not realizing death was silently creeping into the room, and the final curtain call for Mike would happen before.
One by one, his friends and family members came to say their goodbyes and to share how Mike had influenced their lives with his love. Mike courageously beamed his gigantic smile at them, his eyes radiating with the warmth of God’s love.
In Mike’s final moments, his family was with him. With tears flowing down their cheeks and hearts that were pounding, his daughters expressed their love for him and shared their great sadness that he was leaving them. Mike’s life force was rapidly draining, but with a wide smile on his face he shared his favorite memories of their lives. In a voice that was barely above a whisper, he repeatedly said, “Just be there when Jesus comes to wake me up.”
Around sunset on that Sabbath day, Mike slipped away safely in the arms of His Savior into his deep rest, until the voice of Jesus awakens him to the resurrection of the righteous (John 5:28–29). A peaceful stillness filled the room. His months of suffering were over. Mike’s favorite Scripture passage was 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17, “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.”
He trusted in the promise of the Creator who had brought him into the world, watched over him, forgiven him of his sin, and renewed his heart with the hope of eternal life. In the silent stillness of the moment, each family member heard the echo of his voice in their minds, “Please be there when Jesus comes to wake me up.”
