I’ve been serving with brother Nat at Sac State since 2015. A cherished memory I have is once we were rooming together for a weeklong conference, and a few days in, I caught on that Nat was going on morning runs and I started joining him. As a brother about 30 years younger, I was able to run faster and farther, and he would compliment me and say how he couldn’t keep up. But the problem is, I only managed to run three times that week. He, on the other hand, was up at dawn and running every morning. I was the one who couldn’t keep up.
In the Sac State campus work, often we younger serving ones would be “running” out in front, and he would be behind the scenes, praying and cheering us on, and waiting earnestly to hear how things went. He liked to take notes when we shared, and sometimes he’d miss a name or detail and ask us to repeat because he typed a little slower and wanted to catch everything. He just loved hearing about the young people and praying for them. He also had such a broad heart, and never wanted to give up on anyone or take anyone’s name off our prayer list.
In serving together, we had roughly 3 hour morning meetings every weekday, and through 6.5 years, I just can’t remember him taking a day off, unless he was on a trip with his dear family. Sometimes, certain team members including myself would be down or not doing so well, but he didn’t criticize. Instead he just worried about us and cared for us.
Philippians 2:16 - Holding forth the word of life, so that I may have a boast in the day of Christ that I did not run in vain nor labor in vain. I just pray for myself and so many others our brother labored on and shepherded to keep holding forth the word of life and running the Christian race. Our finishing our Christian race victoriously would be our brother Nat’s greatest boast in the day of Christ. I’m just so thankful the Lord gave me such a gracious, generous, and forgiving older brother to be my mentor, spiritual father and running mate.