Roy C. Deaver

After a lengthy battle with dementia, Roy C. Deaver passed from this life on March 2, 2007. Roy was born in 1922 in Stephens County, Texas, in the suburbs of Caddo, to my grandparents, Harvey and Alta Deaver. My grandmother was 18 when Roy, her oldest child, was born. She had experienced difficulties with a couple of prior pregnancies, and according to family lore, she had prayed the prayer of Hannah, and asked God for a healthy son, whom she would encourage to become a preacher of the gospel. Roy preached the gospel for more than 60 years.

Dementia was not the only thing Roy battled during his life on earth. He defended and proclaimed the truth of God’s Word. He was well known among Christians as an educator, administrator, minister, elder, teacher, writer, and debater. The impact on those who heard him speak, and those who read his writings, may never be known this side of eternity. He was also a son, a brother, a husband, a father, grandfather and uncle.

He was tireless in his devotion to the church. At one time he served as the President of Ft. Worth Christian College, the director of Brown Trail School of Preaching, the pulpit minister at Brown Trail Church of Christ, and as an elder at Brown Trail. The operative phrase here is “at one time”. Roy Deaver served in these capacities at the same time.

I was teaching a class one Sunday, in Lewisville, on the book of Romans, and a visitor to the class raised his hand to make a comment. Because of the difference in our last names, he had no way of knowing that Roy Deaver was my uncle. As he spoke, he stated, “Roy Deaver is the smartest man in the brotherhood. He knows more Bible than anyone I know, and he has memorized the entire New Testament.” I wouldn’t doubt that Roy was an incredible Bible scholar and one of the best Greek scholars of his time. I never heard him claim to have memorized the entire New Testament, but obviously Roy had impressed many that were seated at his feet while he taught.

The relationship I had with Roy was less frequent, in occasion, as those who were in his immediate family, or those in the congregation or school where he was working. When we got together, there were lots of jokes, lots of laughs, and lots of fun. I watched him grieve, not as one without hope, the death of one of his sisters in 1965, the death of his dad in 1977, the death of his brother in 1999, and his mother in 2000. He helped us grieve the loss of other family members, including my dad in 2001. Thankfully, he was too sick and unable to come to the funeral of my mother, his youngest sister, in 2006. But, I have found numerous notes of encouragement and love from Roy to my mom, sent over the years. Roy was the last survivor of that Deaver family of six. My faith tells me that they are all together now, enjoying one another and perhaps a “mess of catfish” and some clear conversation. My grandfather, Roy’s dad, suffered from dementia, and so did my mother. It’s been a long time since that Deaver family had a clear and meaningful conversation together.

I was always able to call on Roy for advice, counsel, or insight into situations that I was facing. When the Lewisville church was first established, and continued to show amazing growth, he, tongue-in-cheek, asked me, “Didn’t you say that you had already appointed elders there?” Then, we laughed, knowing full well that he had the utmost respect for elders. When I was asked to serve as an elder in 2000, at a very young age, he gave me encouragement, and expressed his confidence in me to accomplish the task with God’s help.

In the later years of his life, it saddened me to see friends and colleagues turn on him, withdraw fellowship from him and members of his family, and dismiss and minimize his contributions completely, based on their disagreement with a few of his teachings. The Lord will settle those things in His time, but I can’t help but be saddened by the actions of these men. It also saddened me to see him struggle with his memory, one of his greatest God-given tools. His close friend, Tom Warren, experienced many of the same things during his bout with dementia. A family member told me, that in his last days, Roy would cry and say, “I need to be preaching the gospel”. It appears that, after the Lord, his mom’s prayer shaped him as much as the influence of Brother Pullias, Brother Hardeman, and Brother Warren.

As we have honored some, in this blogspace, who were giants among us, we honor Roy Deaver in that same regard. Even if it takes nine, or ninety, of us to fill his shoes, we are obligated to try and fill them.

Is there a future giant among us today?