DYING TESTIMONY OF A PRESENT DAY BAPTIST PREACHER
I recently received the following email from an Independent Baptist pastor that I met several years ago while vacationing with my elderly parents in South Carolina. Since then, I have received frequent emails from him sharing dying testimonies of saints and sinners, and also devotional readings by C.H. Spurgeon. I thought you might find blessing in his faith as he confronts a very imminent death and makes preparations. Please pray for him and his family as God puts them on your heart.
Dear Friends,
There are times in our lives that we experience new things that bring us great pleasure and satisfaction. Sometimes it is something we have learned or accomplished that fills us with exceeding great joy and or happiness. I wish to share some wonderful news with you. I hope you will rejoice with me.
For 36 years now I have been deeply interested in the next life. I am speaking about the life of the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ; the Christian. I have read hundreds of stories that tell of the experiences of people as they are dying. It is clear that there is a spiritual world around us that we do not see until the very last.
I have been fascinated with the thought of Heaven ever since Christ saved me in 1971. My Daddy asked me to promise him that I would meet him in heaven just a few days before he died in 1964. I was a 14 year old boy and I made the promise, but I didn't know how to go to heaven until Pastor Glenn Hill explained it to me in 1971. It was on a Wednesday night, February 3 that the Lord Jesus Christ saved me and changed my life. For the first time in my life I experienced real abiding joy and peace. God gave me a reason to live and called me to preach His Gospel. For several years now I have had an intense desire to go to heaven. I cannot explain it, but my wife will back up my words that I have been telling her I had a gut knowledge that my departure time was drawing near.
I got back home from the VA Hospital in Charleston, SC on Friday. I have several malignant tumors in my brain. They say I have from three months to a year to live, but they are not in charge; God owns every ounce of me and when He says time is up I will leave this world and not until then. Please pray that the pain will go away and stay away. Also, please ask the Dear Lord Jesus to give me grace to face this trial like a good soldier. I want Him to receive glory and honor out of this, because He deserves it. I am the blessed one. I get to go to heaven and live with God in a place that is as perfect as God could make it. It is going to be so good and Christ has paid for everything. I love you, my dear friends. It will not be long before our Heavenly Father will gather all of us together and we will never have to say good-bye again.
I am not afraid; Jesus has given me great peace. This is going to be the greatest experience of my life. I will be with Jesus and it doesn't get any better than that. Please pray for my wife and family because this is going to hurt them immensely. If you really want to do something to help me, then please help my wife to get by emotionally and financially. Some of you have already helped and I do thank you from the bottom of my heart. Those of you who have helped in the church services will be rewarded at the judgment seat of Christ.
~Pastor George W. Ray~
Friendship Baptist Church
October 29, 2007
UPDATE:
On Tuesday, February 20, 2008, I received my monthly mail package from my home church in which was included a "Thank You" card postmarked January 25, 2008, from the wife of Pastor George Ray. The following is the entire handwritten contents of the "Thank You" card:
"Mr. and Mrs. Craft,
I am writing to say thanks for the book and check. I have to tell you that Pastor Ray went to heaven on January 13th. I miss him very much but I know he is happy and wouldn't come back if he could...like the book says "All Things For Good." I know God has a reason for everything. Please keep me in your prayers. I will read the book. Thanks a lot.
Mrs. Ray"
Dear Friends,
There are times in our lives that we experience new things that bring us great pleasure and satisfaction. Sometimes it is something we have learned or accomplished that fills us with exceeding great joy and or happiness. I wish to share some wonderful news with you. I hope you will rejoice with me.
For 36 years now I have been deeply interested in the next life. I am speaking about the life of the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ; the Christian. I have read hundreds of stories that tell of the experiences of people as they are dying. It is clear that there is a spiritual world around us that we do not see until the very last.
I have been fascinated with the thought of Heaven ever since Christ saved me in 1971. My Daddy asked me to promise him that I would meet him in heaven just a few days before he died in 1964. I was a 14 year old boy and I made the promise, but I didn't know how to go to heaven until Pastor Glenn Hill explained it to me in 1971. It was on a Wednesday night, February 3 that the Lord Jesus Christ saved me and changed my life. For the first time in my life I experienced real abiding joy and peace. God gave me a reason to live and called me to preach His Gospel. For several years now I have had an intense desire to go to heaven. I cannot explain it, but my wife will back up my words that I have been telling her I had a gut knowledge that my departure time was drawing near.
I got back home from the VA Hospital in Charleston, SC on Friday. I have several malignant tumors in my brain. They say I have from three months to a year to live, but they are not in charge; God owns every ounce of me and when He says time is up I will leave this world and not until then. Please pray that the pain will go away and stay away. Also, please ask the Dear Lord Jesus to give me grace to face this trial like a good soldier. I want Him to receive glory and honor out of this, because He deserves it. I am the blessed one. I get to go to heaven and live with God in a place that is as perfect as God could make it. It is going to be so good and Christ has paid for everything. I love you, my dear friends. It will not be long before our Heavenly Father will gather all of us together and we will never have to say good-bye again.
I am not afraid; Jesus has given me great peace. This is going to be the greatest experience of my life. I will be with Jesus and it doesn't get any better than that. Please pray for my wife and family because this is going to hurt them immensely. If you really want to do something to help me, then please help my wife to get by emotionally and financially. Some of you have already helped and I do thank you from the bottom of my heart. Those of you who have helped in the church services will be rewarded at the judgment seat of Christ.
~Pastor George W. Ray~
Friendship Baptist Church
October 29, 2007
UPDATE:
On Tuesday, February 20, 2008, I received my monthly mail package from my home church in which was included a "Thank You" card postmarked January 25, 2008, from the wife of Pastor George Ray. The following is the entire handwritten contents of the "Thank You" card:
"Mr. and Mrs. Craft,
I am writing to say thanks for the book and check. I have to tell you that Pastor Ray went to heaven on January 13th. I miss him very much but I know he is happy and wouldn't come back if he could...like the book says "All Things For Good." I know God has a reason for everything. Please keep me in your prayers. I will read the book. Thanks a lot.
Mrs. Ray"
FINDING THIS HAS TRULY BEEN CHRIST LET. I HAD JUST GOT OFF THE PHONE TALKING TO MY FRIEND IN OHIO WHO WAS A MEMBER OF OUR CHURCH....MY FRIEND AND I WERE TALKING ABOUT OUR UP COMING SURGERIES. I HAD A BRAIN TUMOR BUT THEY GOT ALL OF IT OUT. I HAVE HAD 9 BACK SURGERIES, 3 NECK(4 COMING UP),BOTH KNEES REPLACED, APART FROMTHAT I AM IN PRETTY GOOD SHAPE. I AM 65 I ATTENDED (Church...editor) REGULARLY WITH MY WIFE UNTIL RECENTLY. MY (wife....editor) MARY TEACHES SUNDAY SCHOOL AND HAS THE CHILDREN'S CHOIR FOR THE PAST 13 YEARS. I AM SORRY BUT MY BACK IS GETTING TO ME AND I'LL HAVE TO LAY DOWN FOR A WHILE. GOD BLESS YOU AND YOUR MINISTRY MR BERT. I LOOK FORWARD TO COMMUNICATING WITH YOU.
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I am so sorry to hear of Bro. George's death. I met him years ago, preached for him a few times, as he for me. I love hearing him preach, he was humorus, biblical, and sound in doctrine. He preached two Revivals for me here in West Virginia. I''l never forget the sermon he preached on "Death". He described it in such gory details that some of the members were getting sick. But he spoke the truth. I wish I would have kept up with Bro. George before he took his trip to Heaven. I'll keep his family in my prayers. Another of God's choice servants has laid his burden down.
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