Jessica Evans

Sometimes things happen in life that absolutely blindside you. Today I attended the funeral of a 27-year-old, beautiful girl in the prime of her life, big dreams in her heart, a contagious smile of joy always on her face. I’d recently met Jessica, prayed with her, and gave her words of encouragement at a local church where I was visiting one Sunday morning. I didn’t know her before then, but that day when I met her, she made a big impact on me.

This week she was driving one night down the highway, lost control of her car, crossed the median, and a semi-truck hit her car. Critically injured, she died at the hospital after being life-flighted there. Two friends texted me the news just after the accident to pray. When I was praying for her from the text, I didn’t realize it was the young woman who I’d prayed with and talked to only a couple of months ago. Later when a friend told me who it definitely was, I was devastated.

I have really debated writing a blog about this. Will it dishonor, hurt, or anger the family by writing about the funeral? Some of her family live here in town.  I don’t want to do anything that causes them more pain, because God only knows the severity of their pain today. I can’t imagine the horror of what they’re going through right now, and don’t want to even think about it. Since I first heard about this, I have been praying for all of them continually.

But this girl made such an incredible difference in many lives, and through just meeting her one time, in mine!  It was evident today. People say the date of your death says more about you than any other day of your life. What would people say about you or me at our funeral? Something to think about…

Today when I came to the funeral home for the visitation an hour before her funeral, I saw that she was dressed in a gorgeous, white, lace, wedding dress. Why a wedding gown?  All her life, Jessica had wanted to be a wife and a mother, and she never had been. After being homeschooled, she became a phlebotomist and was currently employed by a family medicine clinic.

But more than anything else, Jessica had one passion: winning souls to Christ. A student at The Masters’ Commission, she became a missionary and went on missions trips funded by family, community, and church, privileged to go to Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Panama, Nicaragua, and into the mountains of Old Mexico. She was a preaching woman and a soul winner. She was a licensed minister, soon to be ordained, and had an Associate Degree in Biblical Theology and a Bachelor of Arts in Missions from Central Bible College in Springfield, MO.

And Jessica was waiting for the right man to come along to add to her joy. That was one of the things I had talked about with her when I met her, that I sensed she felt alone and lonely. Tears filled her eyes, and she said, “Yes, I am. I really want to find a good husband and get married.” I encouraged her to hang on, to focus on Christ, and that God would give her the desires of her heart. 

I told her that I sensed it wouldn’t be too much longer, that soon she would no longer feel alone and lonely. Little did I know when I gave her this word, that what God meant was being by HIS side as the Bride of Christ.  (I thought it meant she’d be married soon – here!)  Yet the wedding dress she was buried in was very appropriate. She’s no longer alone, lonely, empty. She is complete and whole in Christ, in His glorious presence, His radiant Bride without spot, blemish, or wrinkle. (Ephesians 5: 27)

From her obituary, Jessica lived a full and happy life in her very short time here. She loved spending time with her family and friends, fishing, swimming, horseback riding, eating corn on the cob, reading romance novels, watching Hallmark movies, and spending time with her faithful white poodle, “Taffy.” She had a great sense of humor and loved pulling pranks on people.

Jessica was described as “the favorite” in her family.  Her sister Stephanie at the funeral said that Jessica was her very best friend. She and their other sister, Tiffany, did a creative drama-song with hand signing glorifying Jesus and as a final, touching tribute to their sister, with tears in their eyes. It was anointed and beautiful.

I was amazed at all the people there who had come to see Jessica. The funeral home chapel was filled to overflowing with people who had been touched somehow by her life. She was well-loved. Jessica made an eternal impact on those around her.

Her pastor at The Master’s Commission, Lloyd Zeigler, wept at times as he gave the sermon, and said the way this happened so suddenly, the way she died while just in her 20′s in the prime of life, was all wrong, it was backwards. “She should be preaching at MY funeral!” he said.

But he didn’t want to disappoint Jessica when he got to heaven. He joked that he didn’t want her rebuking him when he got there. Her passion was to tell others about Jesus, so he boldly gave the invitation for salvation by her casket. At her funeral, people quietly came to the pastor or family members after the service to give their lives to Christ. This would have made her really smile. Even in death, Jessica was winning souls for Jesus!

This is the second death of someone I know in the last several months. (The first was Ray’s and my friend Mike Fools, who lost his battle to stage 4 cancer.) When you encounter death through those you love, it shakes you up.  Grief is such a painful emotion. It just aches in your heart.  It also makes you face your own mortality, which is a very uncomfortable thought.

None of us like the thought of dying, of our lives suddenly ending. The Bible says to dust we shall return. (Genesis 3:19) It’s discomfiting, thinking that one day we’ll be nothing but dust again. Driving through the gates at the cemetery today for the graveside service, I thought about how we all end up there…and how brief our years really are.

But it’s necessary to think about these uncomfortable things.  What are we living for today? Are we making any difference while we are here? Does our life really matter? Have we impacted anyone’s life with ours, and more importantly with Christ’s life in us?

Not to indulge in a pity party, but I really wondered looking across the room at Jessica in the white wedding gown in the casket, would ANYONE come to my funeral? Or would they have to hire mourners for my funeral? :O  Of course, I am kidding…sorta’!

I don’t think that I would have as many people there. Maybe very few people would actually come to my funeral – just my immediate family. Maybe fewer would even feel a sorrowful loss over my death. :O  I am just being real with my thoughts here – all of us want to know the answer to this question: “Does my life really matter and have any significance? What is my purpose? Why am I here?”

I looked deeper inside because sometimes I can be so selfish, so uncaring.  What am I doing TODAY to help others? To make a difference in this world for God and to further His kingdom? Am I living in such a way that my death would cause many others great grief because I loved others so well with the love of Christ – like beautiful Jessica did?

Am I leading others to Jesus, the Living Waters, the Messiah? Am I sharing the good news with others? Is His light boldly blazing from my heart – or am I just along for the ride in a dark, sin-filled world, not making much impact here? Am I so busy living my life, ignoring the most important things – like people’s relationship with God?

“Preach the gospel. And if necessary, use words.” ~ St. Assissi

When I talked with Jessica at the church in town recently, I told her that I sensed from the Lord that she had a strong preaching and teaching gift and that she needed to use her spiritual gifts for God. She confirmed that she did have a preaching gift, and that she wanted to preach – she loved preaching.  Ahhh, this is one reason we hit it off so well immediately!  (besides her being such a great person!)

She said she had thought about preaching at pastor Charles Mathis’ church (Full Gospel Church, the church I was visiting). I urged her to go to him and share this with him, to not wait. God wanted to use her gifts now.

Jessica did go to pastor Mathis to talk to him about this, and he let her preach one Sunday. (She was supposed to preach there again, 3 weeks from now.)  Unfortunately, I wasn’t there that morning when she spoke, but my friend Diane who attends there said she did great. A clip of her preaching was played at the service today.  It was amazing.  Who knew that when she preached this sermon, it would be the one to be played at her own funeral?

Its message was on always being ready for Christ!  And Jessica sure was!

From her Facebook wall entry in September this year, she wrote about her sermon:

“I preached from Mathew 12:30- love. Getting back to the basics of Christianity and practicing what we preach. Because I truly believe when we are faithful with the basics, God will then entrust us with more of His promises. Then, and only then, will we see God move in our midst, see people give their lives to the Lord, and witness great and mighty miracles. That’s it in a nut shell.  :)”

What about you? Are you ready to meet Christ? Don’t wait any longer. The time is now. Time is so short. Today choose to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. All of us have sinned and are separated from God. Only Jesus can save you. Repent of your sins and ask His forgiveness so that you can be restored in your relationship with God and spend eternity in heaven with Him.

Live for an audience of one!

Here is a poem that Jessica’s sister Stephanie wrote in tribute to her:

Jessica lived for an audience of one
A life of worship, a princess to become
In the arms of her Prince Charming
she is now embraced
The heartbeat of God and worthy
of seeing His face
So now precious Father above
Grant us peace and make us worthy of Your love.
Give us strength to live each day
Til our name You choose to say.
Thank you God
for the time we had…
Treasured memories
we will always have.

Copyright 2010 Stephanie Evans

*****

Jessica, I’m so glad that I got a chance to meet you here on earth. You made such a big impact on me in just that one day.  I’ll see you when I get to heaven and we can chat some more – so glad you have now met THE one!   

lion

Have you ever been really excited about something and then when it happened, you were just disappointed? Well for weeks now, I’ve been waiting with much anticipation for The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader movie in 3D. I went tonight with Ray and Leah, and yes, I was disappointed – the first one was so much better!

Now don’t get me wrong. I was still glad to see dear Lucy and Edmund again (and Susan and Peter briefly). Yes, I was happy this time around that  Edmund made the smart decision to leave the Turkish Delight candies alone and to not join the white witch (although Edmund and I share a mutual love for the sweet, sugary Turkish Delights! Ray surprised me with some at home a couple years ago, and I ate nearly the entire box!).  But I digress now! 

Georgie Henley, who plays Lucy, was – as always – a delight with her freckles, accent, and sweet nature.

I was so glad that the movie addressed Lucy’s struggles with her identity, in particular her physical appearance and her attractiveness.  She stared into the mirror, envying her older, pretty sister Susan, who Lucy imagines looking like (who wouldn’t want Susan’s flawless skin and those thick red lips–they are Angeline Jolie lips!!!)   Aren’t we girls all this way, wanting what some other woman has, and NOT wanting something we already DO have that God so graciously gave us?  

Lucy asks the age-old question that all of us girls ask ourselves and other women —- but mostly we ask it of our man:  “Do you think I am beautiful?” Only one answer from him will do for her and will make her completely happy, maybe for months or years – or even a lifetime!  A different answer will destroy her heart, her very life.  And satan never wants us to discover how beautiful we are to God!   (You can read more about this interesting discussion in Staci Eldredge’s great book Captivating.)

So, no romance in this new Narnia movie…what are the writers and producers thinking? We can rest in the knowledge as women that God says our voice is always lovely to Him and our face is so beautiful to Him. That can make a girl’s whole day, ladies! (Song of Solomon 2:14)

It had been awhile since I had seen a 3D movie and our youngest daughter Leah told me that it was totally different now than the last time I’d gone to a 3D movie, acting as if I am centuries old!  I did about SCREAM when  a ball was thrown toward me from the screen during one of the commercials and I wasn’t expecting it. Ye-uh, this is definitely much more real! 

The 3D glasses are different now, too. I am telling my age now by admitting the last 3D pair of movie glasses I wore were quite flimsy, almost like paper or cardboard.  And you left the movie not quite sure what really just happened – it was kind of blurry. 

 But these are plastic frames  today, MUCH harder than the paper 3D glasses  - these are big, ugly, square, plastic glasses. Can’t the 3D glasses creators at least try to make 3D glasses in a Third-Dayish fashionable style?

Toward the end of the movie Edmund has made his righteous decisions, Lucy has come to her senses about accepting her own identity and helping another younger girl accept hers, the Narnians disappearing to the evil green mist are recovered, and the 7 lords’ swords are intact and returned as they should be.

I didn’t think I was going to get through the first part of the movie, though.  Initially I couldn’t stomach that whiny, complaining cousin Eustace and nearly wanted him to drown when the ocean water came pouring into the room from the Narnia ship picture. I didn’t feel sorry for him either, when he turned into a dragon and cried on the beach  - he almost deserved turning into a scaly, ugly dragon, being such a brat and then being so greedy for all that gold! He was very lucky to be turned back into a boy by Aslan at the end, after all!

Also, loving chic flics as I do, I was hoping for a little romance in the movie somewhere. Maybe dark-eyed Edmund finding a good woman to really love him and to help him overcome this little obsession with the witch, or Prince Caspian noticing that little Lucy is now growing up into a pretty young woman!  Lucy was begging for romance anyway, staring into the mirror all the time, wishing she was beautiful.  But no romance at all – a man must have written this one, sigh!

Then there was the bald sea captain in the movie, who I never quite trusted. He seemed to be a composite of the old Captain Kirk on Star Trek who had hair and a lot of arrogance, the new bald Captain Kirk on Star Trek with just as much arrogance, and the bald male captain who smoked cigars and yelled a lot on Top Gun.  This sea captain acted like he was almost going to EAT the poor, little innocent girl who snuck on board to desperately find her mommy, who’d been taken by the green evil fog . Or I thought he might throw the little girl overboard. But then suddenly he let her stay and gave her an orange. 

But he gave occasional hints of his emotional instability by dropping comments like, “The sea can play nasty tricks on a crew’s mind!”  (Obviously! ) and “If we don’t hurry up and find land soon, my men ARE going to eat the dragon.”  Of course since I didn’t like the whiny-complaining-bratty-cousin-boy-turned-into-dragon, I probably wouldn’t have cared much at all about that part, except that the crew might have winded up with severe indigestion after eating someone like him with his awful personality!  :O

But I just never really did like or trust the ship captain. I kept expecting him to to turn on the royal family and use them as kidnap bait to pirates who might sail by.

There were a few good lines in the movie that I enjoyed. One was “You’re all about to be tested…be strong.”

Another was, “You doubt your value – don’t run from the noble one you are.  A noble warrior doesn’t run from fear – let’s meet our destiny head on.”

These lines were about the only positive review I could think of the entire movie, other than seeing Aslan the lion (who represents God). What was worse about the disappointing movie was the family sitting behind Ray, me and Leah. Later Ray said that he was going to drive over them in the parking lot, lol.

Please understand that Ray and I are usually very nice people. But this family was SO annoying. They had one decibel – LOUD. I finally began getting out  a pen and a piece of paper from my purse to record some of the things they were doing and saying to blog about this. It was just too unreal and funny. Things they were shouting in the theatre right behind us:

“That was AWESOME!!” (a kid yelling this during a commercial that played just before our Narnia movie. His parents shushed him because he was so loud.)

“You drank it ALL!” (siblings fighting over large coke, now gone)

“Stop hitting me!” (hopefully the kids talking to each other, and not the dad and mom)

“Mom, can I go to the bathroom now?”  (this whispered loudly just as the movie starts playing!)

They also slurped their drinks and loudly chewed their popcorn and food.

Now the people who had come to the matinee before us had apparently never heard of trash cans and they simply threw their used popcorn bag, candy wrappers, soda cups, and everything else on the FLOOR beneath us. It was quite STICKY. The family in back of us must have gotten up at least four or five times to go out the door, and of course each time they were having to step over, step on, and get unstuck from popcorn bags with sticky movie theatre butter. This went on at LEAST four or five times and they TALKED while they got up, causing the rest of us to not be able to hear what was said on the screen!

Granted, I had to get up once too, but it was because our oldest daughter Heather, her husband Kyle, their two little girls, and Kyle’s family left this morning at 8 am to travel from Missouri to Mississippi all day today (12 hours of driving almost, with MANY bathroom stops, gas stops, and at least one main meal stop).  Heather was calling to let me know she was there in Missisissippi SAFELY arrived - something I asked her to do as I am praying for them. They drive the rest of the distance to Destin, FL today. 

I had a good reason for getting up in the theatre!   The people in back of us did not have good excuses and were getting up for another giant box of POPCORN. They should be directed to the Walmart to the dvd section or to Redbox rental, where they can play dvds at HOME and be as loud as they want THERE.

Another time one of the kids loudly coughed coke into Ray’s hair/neck. I thought I was going to lose it laughing right then. Ray was gracious though. What a guy! (I hope he washed his hair today.)

At any rate, I loved seeing Aslan the lion again and love when he roars. It fills my eyes with tears to see him each time.

This longer than the movie blog post does have a point. You are wondering when I’m going to get to it. Here it is.

Maybe there is something that you’ve been waiting on and had such high hopes for.  Maybe something is going on in your life that you feel really disappointed about – even just crushed. It’s not what you wanted or you thought it would be like at all.  How can this be happening ? Doesn’t God care about you?

Maybe your disappointment is from:

• your marriage
• your kids not behaving
• your finances
• your relationship that is broken and strained
• your health
• your serious emotional issues that you thought you’d worked through already
• your debt
• your friends who really aren’t there for you
• your business
• your home foreclosing
• you losing your job
• your hair – you have bad hair years!
• your sheer boredom with life – is this it?
• your hurt and feeling of aloneness inside
• your frustration with other people
• your faith/church/church leadership
• a product sale
• a work of art you’ve been working on and it isn’t turning out the way you want
• you not being able to visit someone you love
• you not getting a promotion you’ve worked hard for
• you not being able to get a pet that you want or a pet dying
• your weight yo-yoing
• you making a lower grade than hoped for on a college test

No matter what disappointments you have been through in your life, you can count on one thing. God will never disappoint you. He will never let you down.

 In fact, God has a great, exciting plan for you in 2011. (Jeremiah 29:11) He wants to bless your Christmas socks off!  (Deuteronomy 8:18, Ephesians 4:28, Malachi 3:11).  He wants to pour out His goodness on you! (2 Corinthians 9:8 and 11- The Amplified Bible).

Today bring all of your disappointments to God in prayer.  He will take them from you. He will give you beauty for ashes (Isaiah 61:3).  He will give you new hope. He will give you fresh dreams and purpose.