A champion now rests

Earth has lost one of its finest ministers, Christian examples, and pulpiteers. Gary Glenn Colley Sr. died earlier this week, after living almost ninety years in this world. Gary lived through the great depression, a world war, and saw man walk on the moon. If you asked him, however, what was the greatest thing his eyes ever beheld, he would say the waters of his baptism as he broke through the surface and rose a new man in Christ.

Brother Colley was a passionate, powerful preacher with one of the silkiest, smoothest, voices you could ever hear. He could almost hypnotize you with his slow and steady antebellum accent, but he could never bore you, not if you loved the truth. His sermons were precisely outlined, overflowing with Bible, and reflective of his love of the pure and simple church of Jesus Christ. He could recall a scripture suitable to any occasion and recite it from memory with nothing but a modest wave of his hand. He could command a room with his voice, but he won souls with the Gospel he loved so dearly to preach.

His legacy lives on, not only with his immediate family (he was the second generation of four to become Gospel preachers) but among those he taught as an instructor: Brother Gary was a faculty member of Memphis School of Preaching and, before that, taught students at the Southwest School of Biblical Studies. Though he did not start teaching in Memphis until after I graduated MSOP, I knew him well during my time as a student and the few years after that I spent as the Associate Preacher next to the school. In those days, he preached for the Getwell congregation in Memphis, home to the Spiritual Sword quarterly paper. I was fortunate to be in his home multiple times to hear stories of yesteryear, to peruse his great library (he authored numerous books, including an excellent handbook for training young men to lead in worship), and to study quietly his tremendous demeanor: The man exemplified the conduct of a Christian gentleman, husband, father, and grandfather.

Prayers go up for his family remaining here on earth, who at present are missing out on a splendid reunion in the paradise beyond this life: There are countless—countless—souls who obeyed the Gospel as a result of Gary’s tireless and powerful evangelizing. God bless his life and his memory.

We will meet again.

~ Matthew