My brother, Rev. Gerald Sims, passed away on February 11, 2014, after a long struggle with cancer. This is some stuff I want to say about him.
First of all, Jerry was smart. I was not particularly aware of this until we were teenagers. Jerry was a year-and-a-half younger than me, and I remember when it first dawned on me that he was unusually intelligent. We were riding in the back seat of the family station wagon along the freeways of Detroit’s downriver area where Dad was a pastor, probably on the way to a Bible quiz meet where Jerry was a star quizzer, and on the way, Jerry was figuring out the square roots of the license numbers of the cars we were passing. Pocket calculators weren’t the thing yet then, and he didn’t need paper and pencil; Jerry was doing all the calculations in his head. I knew what a square root was, but I certainly didn’t consider it fun or entertaining to figure them out as a pastime while riding in the car. I was still playing the ABC game.
Maybe this is why it struck me as especially diabolical that the cancer that eventually attacked his brain was first discovered in the mathematical center and then in the areas that controlled language and vocabulary. That just wasn’t fair.
Early in his brain cancer journey, I recall asking Jerry if the tumor gave him a headache. He paused a minute, searching for the right word, and then smiled. “Why couldn’t I think of the word aspirin,” he said, “all that would come to me was ‘analgesic’”. It occurred to me then, that he had probably been condescending to the rest of us all his life verbally, not wanting to sound like a geek by using the sophisticated vocabulary of which he was capable. His condition had compromised his ability to dumb down his speech for the rest of the world.
Secondly, if respect is one possible manifestation of love, Jerry was a loving man. He was not an emotional person or a sentimental softie like me, but many of you know that he was infallibly courteous and respectful. I think that any time emotional love is inappropriate in the Body of Christ and in the world, respect is the most appropriate substitute, and Jerry was good at it. I rarely ever heard him speak a critical word about anybody.
Pastors usually have one or two nemeses in their constituency whose spiritual calling is to get in the way of progress and do it as nastily as possible. Even when Jerry was being assailed by an attacker who was viciously attempting to destroy his reputation and his career, he refused to utter a critical word about that person, even in his own defense. I was amazed.
That was a demonstration of godly respect, of sacrificial love.
Thirdly, if the word “liberal” means generous, Jerry was a liberal man. He was neither a legalist nor a judge of anybody. And he was an advocate for the underdog. That’s a family trait, by the way.
Those of you who attended my Dad’s funeral six years ago may remember Jerry telling the story of the superintendent who told Dad early in his ministry that he was a pastor who was 20 years ahead of his time. Jerry then pointed out that all Dad’s kids were cursed with the same trait. Later I offered an alternate perspective: Dad was not a man ahead of his time, just a minister who had enlisted in an evangelical denomination that was running 20 years or more behind the times. As evidence for my theory I pointed out that, after Bible College, before he showed up at his first church, a circuit at Bliss and Pellston, Dad had been told that his wife would have to remove her wedding ring - jewelry was considered worldly, you know. Well, she did, but eight years later, when they moved down to the city, Mom put her wedding ring back on... and nobody confronted her about it, and it ceased to be an issue in the Missionary Church after that.
Dad and Mom set the pace for the Sims family in being liberal. Non-judgmental folks who respected everybody, regardless of status, gender, or orientation. And Jerry took it even further.
I recall a few years ago when Jerry and I sat in lawn chairs at my campsite at Brown City Camp talking about what it would take to get the last restrictions on women in ministry removed from the constitution of the Missionary Church. He said it could start with a resolution from a local church board. I knew that there was no way that the conservative rural church board and pastor I was serving with at the time would support such a motion, but Jerry said the folks at New Hope would. And he was right. The resolution passed unanimously there and worked it’s way through the denominational system... and failed, of course, but that didn’t matter; at least he had tried, and church leaders had had to discuss and question their traditions again. Yes, Jerry was a second generation liberal in a conservative denomination.
The liberal folks at New Hope will verify my observation here that Jerry was respectful, generous, and loving, a pastor who would affirm the gifts at work within men and women equally and without restriction.
Next, Jerry was a writer and author. He wrote mostly novels, of which his first and foremost was a fantasy fiction mystery called Dreamwalker which was just released to the public a few days ago on February 8th. You can find it on Amazon in a paperback for $16.99 or Kindle $7.99 if you like stories of adventure and intrigue.
His latest and unfinished work is a book called The Cannibal Church, which is centered around that common phenomena in our post-Christian culture: the one new church in every town that is growing - at the expense of the other older churches in town. Though Jerry will never complete it, probably any small town pastor living and working in the shadow of a mega church will be familiar enough with the topic to contribute to the content of that work. Of course, that one will be non-fiction.
Finally - and this is on the lighter side - Jerry was a prankster. I remember his practical jokes starting during the college years when he became the scourge of the pop can pyramid. Pop can pyramids went through a popular phase while Jerry was at Bethel College, and the guys in the next room had one that he attacked several times, usually when the weather was mild and the windows were open. One time he climbed out his window to the fire ledge when they were at class, inched his way along the outside of the building and threaded a string through the pop cans which were neatly stacked on the window sill almost to the ceiling. He looped the string around the bottom can and then returned to his room holding the string. Listening as the guys next door returned to their room and settled in at their desks for some studying, he pulled on the string... and heard the delightful crash of 100 pop cans to the floor. I think an earth tremor - in Indiana - was blamed for the incident.
For his grand finale, only last year, Jerry planned and executed an elaborate plan to fake a car wreck with sound effects while talking on the cell phone with an unsuspecting friend. He called from the church parking lot which he had outfitted with props for breaking glass and smashing metal, and he had enlisted several of the youth who were on hand to assist with the effects.
And then he left before anybody could even the score.
So these are a few of the essential traits that my brother possessed that bear witness to a life well lived. As I mentioned earlier, it is a good thing for those who knew him to come together as we are today to give tribute to a wonderful man.
But there is an even greater tribute that we can offer, and that is to assimilate into our lives the characteristics that we admired in him. It is an appropriate tribute to point out that he was a generous liberal. A better tribute would be to become more generous ourselves. If it was good for Jerry, it will be good for us - and will make the world a better place.
It would be fine to remember him as a courteous and respectful person, but even finer to become more loving ourselves.
It would be right to notice that he was an advocate for the underdog and the underprivileged. It would be even more right to carry on that advocacy ourselves.
As far as being intelligent. Uh, I’m not sure we can help ourselves on that one. If you don’t want to factor the square roots of license plate numbers, in your head, well... maybe at least learn to play chess or work a crossword puzzle if it seems good to you.
And, uh, I’m not suggesting anyone should aspire to become a practical joker - unless your friendships are very durable.
If you are a pastor, like Jerry you will do well to aspire to lead a small humble congregation and give personal attention and build life-long relationships, rather than to cast a vision for the super church - which is all too often just a vision of grandeur.
Jerry spent his entire adult life after college in ministry. He invested every day of his life living out the Great Commandment: to love God and love people. He demonstrated his love for the Lord, by serving people. I say it again: that was a life well-lived.
My brother, Gerald Sims, was a great man in a humble skin, a kind and gentle man. And I love him and miss him already.
