A Word of Thanks

Hello Heritage Family!

I cannot thank you enough for your kind calls, notes, and messages about my dad starting hospice last week after his terminal cancer diagnosis. Your amazing church lay and staff leaders assured me that they had everything covered at the church, and let me jump in the car and head up to Virginia to get to see him while I could. I had the chance to sit with him and thank him for being my dad. He thanked me for what I’ve meant to him, patted me on the back and telling me “you did good” by finding him and my mom a terrific daughter-in-law when I married Susan, and he told me how it had enriched his life to be able to hold Jenna and Ashley when they arrived, and to cheer for them along the way in all of their various games, concerts, performances, competitions, and academic accomplishments. What a gift it was to me to be able to say goodbye like that—I know that most don’t get such a chance, and I am indebted to our great lay and staff leaders for their excellence, and for the peace they give me knowing that their able hands are on the wheel.

I got word from my brother just as staff meeting was ending yesterday (Tuesday) that our dad died around 11am. As I’ve said to a few people already, cancer may have won in the end, but I know it’s exhausted after fighting with my dad for the last three years! He did all that he could to stay with us as long as he could despite the pain he was in all along.

Me and my dad in his USMC gear after he was the bugler at a funeral in Orlando.

My family and I have been carried by your prayers during this season, and especially the last week. On behalf of my mom, my brothers and their wives, my sister and her husband, my niece Olivia and nephew Owen, Jenna and Ashley, and Susan and myself; thank you so much from the bottom of our hearts. My dad has lived pretty far away from Heritage during my time as your pastor, but he and my mom have tuned in online every Sunday (before it became so fashionable once the pandemic started!), often chatting with Charlie and others in the tech booth, so he’s felt like a part of Heritage for the duration of his battle. For this and all of the reasons above, I will be thankful for you forever!

Sincerely,

Pastor Matt