Roosevelt Hunter–His Life, My Reflections
Roosevelt Hunter—His Life, My Reflections
My friend and brother in Christ died this week. Roosevelt Hunter went home to be with Jesus. So many emotions. It is like a roller coaster. “this shouldn’t be” “why did God allow this to happen?” I have been sad, mad and rejoicing all at the same time.
My heart is broken. Roosevelt was a brother to me. An uncle to my girls. A best friend. We have known each other since 1993. My family and I are facing incredible pain right now. I went to his funeral Saturday, August 15, 2009.
Really it wasn’t a funeral at all. It was a celebration of a life. Jana and I flew to Florida and did a quick 36 hour trip. I was asked to be one of the pallbearers. Perhaps one of the top 5 honors of my life. It was sacred for me. How do you carry the body of Roosevelt Hunter and not feel like you are walking on Holy ground? Being one of Roosevelt’s pallbearers was a sacred and holy moment for me.
On the plane home I typed out five reflections and thoughts I had in the past few days since hearing about Roosevelt Hunter dying. I am going to take the next few days to share these reflections.
So often Christians don’t take time to embrace their pain and reflect on life. We are so quickly to say, “praise God Roosevelt is in heaven”. I have good theology. I understand heaven is real. I understand Roosevelt is in a better place rejoicing in the presence of God. I understand our final hope is in Jesus and Jesus alone.
With this said, “we need to learn to embrace our pain”. Pain is part of the journey of life. To say “Roosevelt is in heaven—let’s rejoice” is only part of the process to health. I think we have to go deeper than this. What is the message of Roosevelt’s life? What are the implications for our lives? How can the pain make us better? I don’t have all the answers. But we need to get real. We need to be honest. I don’t know why Roosevelt died at such a young age. I don’t get it. It hurts. It makes me anger. As we work through these emotions then we can begin to make reflections and observation that truly can shape us to being more like Jesus.
Roosevelt Hunter’s life had way to much to offer than just saying “praise God he is in heaven”. I will reflect on five of these over the next few days.
You are so right! And more so when it happens to people who’ve begun their journey in life, whose work is just begun and so the pain and the questions mount up to points too painful to process all at once. My mom’s advise when I became a widow was: “one day at a time…” and “in time..” but you see widowhood has phazes which will pan out in time. And God does put it all in perspective…I am 13 yrs into my journey (one which put me in Christ’s path in a mighty way) It still hurts but it is “bearable” and the questions I had, have been cleared up along the way…holidays continue to hold a bittersweet joy and one upside to the process is that I’ve come to discover strengths in myself that I didn’t know I had…all in time will unravel…so that “this too shall pass”…In light of my faith that I will see my husband again, all other pains and questions are put into proper perspective.
Troy, I want to say thank you for expressing the very same thoughts I have. I’ve known Roosevelt for 16 years having worked with him at Revival Tabernacle and then at Times Square Church in New York. As everyone who knew Roosevelt could attest to, he embraced life and lived it well. I was so saddened to hear he had passed away. Last year in October, I found out he had cancer and had been praying for him ever since. I emailed some friends and asked them to pray for his family, and one response I received really irked me. It went something like this, “he’s healed on the other side.” I am very aware of that, however, I still feel pain and anger.