I first met Dr. Wayne E. Oates the week after Christmas, 1956, in Alpine, Texas. He had come to speak to the Baptist Campus Student Ministers of Texas and I was the BSU Director at The University in Austin. I was 23 years old.

As I heard Wayne speak of caring for people spiritually, I was riveted by his every word. In a world dominated by hot-gospel evangelism and an activity level that would have made St. Vitus proud, here was a man of grace and tenderness talking about something deeper than successful programming. He was equipping us to be “harbingers of hope,” as he put it. He was encouraging us to minister to students in a way that bonds them with God and each other.

I fell on him as a starving man would have fallen on a buffet bar! I spent every moment I could spend with him, soaking up his wisdom and picking his brain! And the amazing thing was--and still is!--he treated me like a colleague! He jump started my fledgling attempt to be a minister and framed what the real challenge is for us as ministers, interpreters of the Scriptures and the Faith--and as theologs.

Sixteen years later, I spent a rich month with him at the former Southern Seminary--as what he called a Pastor-in-Residence. The day I arrived, Wayne’s mother died here in Greenville--where, coincidentally, I now live. We had settled on a covenant that he would help me learn about how to help grieving people, among other things. I walked into his office, we shook hands and sat down for our first session. After an appropriate but brief amount of pleasantries, Wayne said: “So you have come to learn how to help people with grief? As you know, my mother died a few days ago, and I’ve just returned today from her funeral in South Carolina. Will you help me deal with my grief in the loss of my mother?”

Voila! All of a sudden one of the great counselors and teachers on the planet had turned the tables on me. He had invited me to be his pastor in a time of need! He wanted me to learn what I’d come to learn by doing what I wanted to learn to do. What genius! What grace! What pedagogy!

I continued discovering deeper crevices of the genius of this man. Learning for him was not from the top down. He did not teach from some Mount Olympus! For Wayne, learning was a mutual quest in which two or more seeking human beings offered themselves to each other--and to God!--in the high and holy search to know the truth in Jesus the Christ that makes us free. He equipped people to be redemptive and to work for what Paul called "the common good."

Because of my time with Wayne in that rich month in my life, I have been more free--and more faithful ever since. I am eternally indebted to him for what I’ve learned about life and ministry! about Counseling and Pastoral Care!

Through letters, lengthy phone calls and periodic visits, I have stayed in touch with Wayne through all these years since 1956. 43 years! When we met, I was 23; he was 39. My God! At the time, I thought he was 60! How could anyone have the wisdom he had at 39?!

Ardelle and I attended the annual meeting of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors in Las Vegas (of all places) a few years later. We accompanied Wayne and David Switzer to the Jack Benny Show--one of Benny's last, when the great comedian was aware that his time here was limited. The highlight of the show for Wayne was when the great Jack Benny brought on stage a pre-teen Asian girl to share the spotlight in playing the violin. And, true to Benny, he applauded her excellence--and became a straight man for her!

Wayne’s comment as we left was a window to his greatness: “A valid characteristic of greatness is, in Erikson’s words, ‘generativity.’ What we saw here tonight was one of the great entertainers of our time who is not selfish with the stage. He knows that what he has isn’t all earned and he wants to pass the grace he has received on to a younger generation.”

A few years later, Ardelle and I spent three days at the borrowed home of friends in Santa Fe with Wayne. He had led a week-end retreat for our church, and agreed to remain for some R & R with us. It had been a painful and difficult time for us--and for the church we served. He stepped into the role of pro-active minister-in residence with us, and made a lasting contribution to our well-being.

Dr. Oates’ picture has hung amid the cloud of witnesses on my office wall for 27 years now. It is there alongside my father, Ardelle's father, Harry Emerson Fosdick, Carlyle Marney, The Honorable George Mahon, Grady Nutt and others. It is and will remain one of my most prized treasures.

Wayne has “been there for me” during all the years of my total ministry. It is staggering to me that in the providence of God he entered my life three months deep in my attempt to be a minister and exited three months before my retirement. What an incalculable gift! He has been hero, teacher, model, counselor, supervisor, mentor and friend. Ardelle and I are bereft and bereaved here today. Losing Wayne is a staggering blow!

Saying that his beloved Pauline, and his larger family, his students, protegees and fellow pilgrims--our world at large will miss Wayne is like saying that the Grand Canyon is pretty, or that Michael Jordan is a good athlete. A colossal understatement!

We will miss Wayne mightily; but O how we will miss him gratefully!

What contributions he has made with his immense giftedness and commitment to excellence! What a legacy of redemption he has left in his mighty wake! Wayne helped me want to be a better minister and a better human being--in reverse order. In memoriam --Thanks be to God!