A Great(er) Cloud of Witnesses

Last Monday evening, my son called us, his voice cracking with emotion.  He had to pass the phone to his wife who informed us that one of the elders of our church had been shot and killed in an attempted robbery in Honduras.

I was just beginning to get to know Steve Holtrust, a gentle giant of a man whose heart exceeded his broad, six foot five frame. Steve had just been appointed an elder of our church, which pastor Jim Mann described as a long overdue appointment. Steve had joined the Ontario, CA fire department in 1975 when he was just 18 years old, becoming one of the youngest recruits in the department’s history, retiring as chief in 2007. He continued to serve as a chaplain with the Fire Department and soon became involved in missions work. Among other things, Steve Holtrust was our church’s liaison with Signs of Love, an outreach to the deaf in rural villages of Honduras, and yearly led teams of missionaries to serve the poor in these mountainous areas. In 2006, he visited Central America five times. This year, he had already been there three times. (You can read more about Steve in THIS ARTICLE in a local newspaper.)

Two of my kids were privileged to serve with he and his wife Debbie there. Last summer, Christopher spent a week with Steve and a couple other guys, helping build a church for one of the villages. This summer, Alayna went with Steve and Debbie to serve (you can see some of Alayna’s photos from the trip as well as a cool video montage HERE). She nicknamed Steve and Debbie her “Honduras Mom and Dad,” an apt description considering Steve and Debbie’s generosity and wisdom (and my daughter’s continued need for parental guidance).

Learning about Steve’s death has, understandably, sent shock waves through our church and community. His memorial service is today and planners are expecting upwards of one thousand attendees, evidence of Steve’s expansive influence. He was the type of guy you couldn’t help but like.

Perhaps even more lasting, will be the memory of Steve Holtrust’s heart for giving. Steve was a dedicated member of our church, serving cheerfully wherever needed. But Honduras and its people was one of his great passions. Alayna shared about the time she spent with Steve on their last missions trip. He drove her from the airport and, according to Alayna, spent the entire 90 minute trip describing the area, pointing out landmarks, and naming villages along the way. Such was the devotion of the man.

So perhaps it was fitting that Steve Holtrust died in the land he loved, doing what he did best.

At the hands of those he served.

Hebrews 11 is often described as the Hall of Faith. It’s a roll call, if you would; a rather rag-tag bunch of saints and sinners, old and young, nobility and miscreants, who line the halls of history. Their common denominator:

All these people were still living by faith when they died (vs. 13 NIV).

Though united by a single element, their deaths are, how shall we say it, florid.

Some faced jeers and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were put to death by stoning; they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground (vss. 36-38).

Jeered and flogged, imprisoned and stoned, sawed in two and killed by the sword. And in Steve Holtrust’s case, shot. But how a person dies is never as important as how they live. And Steve Holtrust lived by faith. He looked past the Third World squalor and the injustice, to a better country, a city made without hands. He put his life on the line, for his life was not his own.

Of such a man, “the world is not worthy.”

Alas, now our brother joins the great company, a “great cloud of witnesses” (12:1). He was added to the roll call! He joins the saints and martyrs in the Hall of Faith. Well done, man of God! But with Steve Holtrust there, that great cloud of witnesses is even greater.

And it’s this cloud of witnesses that is cheering us on.