The patriarch Job said of God, “In whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind (Job 12:9-10).” Isaiah echoed these words when he declared “Thus saith God the LORD … he that giveth breath unto the people upon it … (Isaiah 42:5)” The Apostle Paul wrote, “…seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things (Acts 17:25).”
These three witnesses agree that our breath, yours and mine, and in fact all living flesh, is held by and sustained by God.
First of all, I want to thank and praise our Lord that during my pilgrimage of now 58 years in this world, until somewhere around 2:30 February 16, God has shielded the William Dean family from the feelings of a deep loss that comes with losing a family member.
This feeling is not one I want to feel again for a long time. However, I recognize that this choice is in God’s hands.
With my dad now living at 89 and mother at 85, and considering the considerable amount of travel my brothers and I have undertaken, God has protected us and continued to keep that breath of God in all of us all my years and for this I give Him praise.
With David’s passing it has been almost impossible for me to keep my mind focused on my most recent memories. Although it is not intended, my thoughts of David go back to childhood. Perhaps this is because we were together much more then.
As a boy I was always amazed and proud of my oldest and then big brother. I’m sure this is normal but David seemed much braver and tougher than most of the other boys his age. He was also very smart.
Although he wasn't especially spiritually minded during those days, he did know a lot about end-time events and most especially the mark of the beast and the anti-christ. He would scare me to death when he would talk about these frightening events while we laid on our blankets in the back yard on those warm summer nights in DeLeon, Texas. His teaching one night (Johnny said at the funeral that David had convinced us that night that the moon had turned to blood) resulted in a prayer meeting at the church. I missed that prayer meeting because I had become so overcome with fright at not being able to buy or sell without the mark of the beast that I had quietly slipped into the house to my own bed. That night Johnny received the Holy Ghost.
David loved all animals with the exception of cats. David would climb high trees every spring in search of baby squirrels in their nest. He would usually find at least one or two squirrels to bring home. He soon discovered that if they had some hair on their bodies their chance of survival was better. David would keep those babies in an old shoe box and feed them with baby doll bottles. More than one of these squirrels grew up to become pets at the Dean house. One squirrel actually traveled with us to live in West Texas for two years and then returned with us to Killeen.
David could easily recognize the sound of a panther at night out near DeLeon Brick Plant where we often spent the night outdoors. He would always let us know when the panther was on the prowl. The panther was usually a black panther the way David talked. I’m not sure how he knew the panther was black but he could tell. According to David, black panthers were the meanest kind of all panther species.
He could tell by the panthers screams how far away it might be and without fail he was careful to let us know if the panther was headed our way and I don't ever remember a black panther that was moving farther away. It was pretty difficult to go to sleep knowing a black panther was prowling the night close to where we had made our camp.
We often followed David on all day journeys down the rail road tracks and across country fields. We were never lost it seems and he always knew the way back home.
David could dive like an Olympic champion from the towering clay cliffs around the Pits. David had found this exceptionally good swimming hole he called the Pits. We would spend countless hours there in the summer. Sometimes we thought to bring bathing suits and sometimes we forgot. I really didn't matter to us. I remember those cliffs as being several stories high and his dives were beautiful. He called them the Swan Dive. My feeble attempts at the Swan Dive turned into belly busters more often than not and so I quit doing them. He also taught us to do the Jackknife. David taught me how to dog paddle at the pits. I must have been only about 7 years old at that time. David never found the bottom of the Pits and this is amazing considering how far down under the water he could go (I really think that was the truth).
One day from the picture window of the parsonage my brother Johnny saw David Creel (for some reason none of us ever liked him or his brother Timothy) choking me on the sandlot baseball field over a disputed call. Johnny truthfully shouted “David Creel is whipping Jerry” and that’s all my big brother needed. David ran across the field, hurdling over a couple of barb wire fences without slowing down on the way. David Creel saw him coming and took off running into his house with my brother in hot pursuit. Almost immediately they came running out the back door with David right behind him. David told us that they ran right past his parents who were sitting at the table eating their lunch. When Creel’s dad came out and said something to David, my brother started climbing over the fence saying something like "I'll whip you too." David did have a temper. Mr. Creel went back into his house. I went home snubbing.
David was my hero without a spotlight! When the older Carlin boy came to the parsonage one day with the bull whip, popping it and threatening us, looking really mean, it was David who stood up to him and dared him to pop one of us. David was a Senior in high school then. I remember him taking his high school ring off of his ring finer and slipping it on the middle finger of his right hand. He was getting ready. I don’t know if David could have whipped the bully but I suppose Carlin thought so because he left and went home without popping anyone.
David had a unique way of getting any herd of cattle to chase us. I was even reluctant to cross some fields with him where there were cattle present. He would make the sounds of a calf and run a few feet and here those cattle would come chasing us across the pasture until we could get past a fence (David could make sounds like all animals including the black panther). This was better than any roller coaster ride and would scare the wits out of me. David would die laughing and I would be wondering why he wasn’t afraid that the cattle were going to stamped all over us. As you can see he was much tougher and braver than the rest of us.
David kept me from a big sin one day. Mom sent me to look in her purse to get the fifty cent piece to go to Sloan’s Grocery to purchase a loaf of bread. In those days a loaf of bread only cost about a quarter. When I looked in mom’s purse I noticed that she had two fifty cent pieces so I quickly surmised that she didn’t know this and I quietly pocketed the extra fifty cent piece. Feeling quite proud of my accomplishment I secretly told David about my thievery. He quickly shamed me by scolding me and informing me about how poor we were and what a difficult time dad and mom were having financially trying to raise five boys. He shamed me so much that I slipped back into the house and secretly placed the money back in mom’s purse. I immediately felt a great sense of relief. I realize now that David was truly looking our for my welfare, however, I found out later that David was taking money from the little plastic church house that people put their birthday offerings in at the church. I guess that was different.
We all loved to hear David tell his stories. He had more stories than a Reader’s Digest. These were Real Life Stories. "Shoot, I’ll tell you one thing," he would say. The word shoot was the closest mom and dad let us come to cussing. We all knew David embellished his real life stories but we didn’t care because those stories made us laugh. Over the years, the more he told them, the better they got. “Shoot fire man,” he would say, “I ain’t lying.”
David taught me some things he shouldn’t have, (Some are not repeatable here).” “One night my childhood friend Randy Barnes and I were roaming the woods with David and a bunch of older boys. I was just a kid and David gave me and Randy two cigarettes apiece. I would be a good while before I figured out why. Johnny and David would later tell that I was a tattle tale. I don’t accept this accusation but looking back it may have been true because most likely the two cigarettes were hush money.
David burned a hole in the vinyl seat cover of the old Chevrolet with the ashes from a cigarette he was smoking. Right there by the drivers seat in the old 1960 Biscayne. He told Dad that one of his friends was riding in the middle and did it. I was really scared for him because I knew all liars went to hell. Dad believed him I suppose.
The first time I every preached a message with my brothers in the congregation was a very frightening experience. Just about the toughest crowd I’ve ever spoken in front of. David was sitting on the end of the pew about half way back next to the middle aisle. While I was preaching he leaned out into the aisle and waved at me. This was not a wave of encouragement. He was trying to make me laugh. That was David.
David changed my life one day. When he graduated from DeLeon High School we didn’t know if he was going to graduate until the day of graduation. He had to make a certain grade on his Algebra test to get his diploma. He passed. Behind closed doors, he would tell us he couldn’t wait to get out of the house. He didn’t like the house rules.
After graduation, just like he promised, he promptly left and moved to Uncle Lonnie’s in Plano, Texas. Going to sow some wild oats I guess. He went to work for Uncle Lonnie who ran a crew building highways I think. David’s girlfriend went up to spend the summer with her sister who also lived in that area. Someone talked them into going to church in Richardson. I don’t know if David sowed any wild oats but the next time I saw him he had just stepped off the Greyhound Bus up from the house. I saw him walking toward our home carrying his suitcase. And of all things, the crazy nut was wearing a suit with a tie!
Upon arrival he announced to us that he prayed back through and that the Lord had called him to preach. He was planning to go to Texas Bible College. David would never know what an impact that day had on my life.
Later that year, he brought some young preachers home with him from Bible School and one of them preached on hell. As you can see I can still vividly remember that night.
Later on David was responsible for giving me an opportunity that helped shape my life. David had been the pastor of a church in Moro, Arkansas. When he resigned to accept another pastorate, he called me. Gina and I were living in San Antonio where I was an assistant pastor. He asked me if I wanted to come and "try out" at the church in Moro. Gina and I had preached a revival there and they had asked David if I was interested. Guess the Dean had made a good impression and they wanted his younger brother for a pastor. I told him no but about the next week my pastor told me they couldn’t afford me any longer so I called David and told him that we had been praying about Moro (LOL) and had changed our mind. The rest is history. Every ministry door that opened unto us after our move to Arkansas can be traced back to being pastor of the church in Moro, Arkansas. Thanks David.
David, more than anything else, lived for ministry. When young, he used to get really nervous before he preached. He would always have to go to the bathroom right before church started. One particular night he actually crawled out a window and went to the bathroom. The pastors office door opened into the sanctuary and he was embarrassed to walk past the congregation.
A man came by Scott and White Hospital last week to tell David goodbye. On his way out he leaned over to me and said, “Your brother was the only person to ever get through to me.” David could truly minister to people.
If there were ten adults, a dog, and two kids in the room, David first attention was given to the kids and the dog and then the adults. Sometimes it might have been the dog first, then the kids and then the adults. He loved children and animals. He could make kids laugh by talking his Donald Duck talk to them. He truly loved people and he truly loved The Tabernacle of Praise in Killeen, Texas where he was pastor for 22 years.
Like most of us, there were some conundrums in David’s life. Today these are greatly overshadowed by his deep love for God, people (especially children), animals and his deep love for his family.
My oldest brother was unusually competitive. To David, every sandlot baseball game was equivalent to the World Series and simple neighborhood football games were like the Super Bowl. He hated to lose, I mean, he hated to lose. If he said let’s play 2 out of 3 and lost 2 he would quickly change it to 3 out of 5. Many, if not most of the games we played as kids, David made them up. If he started losing he would often change the rules. Of course, he was smarter than the rest of us so we let him. Even in a ‘thumpum’ football game, or a ping pong match, with David, you would think we were competing in the Master’s Golf Tournament.
He never lost that competitive spirit. David did not want to die. He wanted to whip this disease. My own research on the Internet frightened me. I immediately saw that Mesothelioma (Asbestos Cancer) is deadly. There is no medical cure. I also saw that this disease causes a great deal of pain. we believe in a God that heals, always have, and might I say, always will. So we believed as did David he would not lose this battle. I think David had more faith than any of us.
For many months David would always respond to my text of encouragement to him. When he didn’t have the energy to respond, Shannon, his son, told me he would still read my text. So every few days I would send him a text that would go unanswered and this was fine. One day I sent him a text that ended with a scripture from Acts 5:16, “And they were healed, every one.” I was shocked when he immediately text me back and said, “You’re so right Jerry.” He believed he would be healed.
I arrived at the hospital just a few hours before David slipped into a coma. He was still talking and he told me, I've got to get back to eating. I've got to start eating again. David didn't want to lose. However, with his sickness, someone else was calling the shots. David couldn’t change the rules in this game. There was someone higher up, someone who outranked him. Jehovah wasn't going to let him change the rules this time.
And yet, still David held on. The hospice worker said when she left on Friday evening, “He won’t be here when I get back Monday morning.” She didn’t know about my brother’s competitive spirit. Monday morning when she arrived she just threw her hands up in the air. Not only was David still breathing, nothing it seemed had really changed and would not change for several more days.
The great news is that David's losing this time was not a real loss. He was actually going to win. His horrible suffering would end and peace would come.
Over the years, like many other people, I have developed a ringing in my ears. The past few years it has become worse. A trip to the doctor confirmed what I already knew. Nothing can be done about it. Most of the time, so long as there is some noise around I really don’t notice the ringing. But, when it gets quite the ringing is there, always there.
Like the ringing in my ears I have already noticed that so long as I am busy, I'm not thinking of David so much. But when it gets quite, and I get still, I miss my bother and wish we could chat a while. And when I think that I can't call him and talk, there is this deep feeling of sadness in my heart that will bring tears to my eyes. Although we didn’t talk every day, and sometimes not even every week, I always knew that if I wanted to talk to my hero without a spotlight, I could. Jesus once told his disciples that it was hard for a rich man to go to heaven. The disciples were stunned and Peter said, “Luke 18:28-30 Lo, we have left all, and followed thee. And he said unto them, Verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom of God's sake, Who shall not receive manifold more in this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting."
I get the impression that many if not most people are more excited today about the manifold blessings promised on this earth than they are in the promise of life everlasting. However, on this day, it is the "life everlasting" that is most important to us. You see, it was our call to ministry that geographically separated me and my brothers. Today, it is our prayer and hope, that in time it will be our calling to ministry that will ultimately bring us together again. And for this I praise God.
I asked a friend who recently lost a younger brother last week, “Will we ever get over this?” He said, “You’ll get past it, but you’ll never get over it.” I believed him and decided that this is best. Why would I want to get over losing my big brother? I don’t.
My last text from David came almost one week before he slipped into a coma. Referring to our church's live web cast which he often watched with his son Shannon during his sickness, he said, "I WILL BE WATCHING YOU THIS MORNING OK I love you" Until the end he wanted to be at church. He never said good-bye without saying, "I love you Jerry" or "I love you too." So i sign off today by saying, "Hope you're watching David, I LOVE YOU."
