A Life Not Wasted

March 6, 2011 marks one year since I lost my friend, Jon Downing. Jon is perhaps the most well-rounded, spontaneous, flexible and committed man I’ve ever met and these qualities extended to everything he did, whether work or pleasure. If it caught Jon’s attention, it was going to be done well and completely. My friend set his personal expectations high, to the extent I never fully realized prior to his memorial service. Here Jon’s wife, Shirley, set out his personal daily journal in which he regularly reminded himself of eight goals for his life.

Jon's goals included:

    * Become more spiritually fit
    * Become physically fit
    * Eliminate work-related travel
    * Get organized at work
    * Get organized at home
    * Invest more in relationships
    * Help others/volunteer
    * Become financially independent

Jon wrote out his life’s mission and summed it up in a passage from the Bible when he wrote:

“Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your ways to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass.” -Psalm 37:4-5

I can testify Jon Downing did as well as anyone I know at achieving this mission and reaching his goals before leaving this world at age 42. The fact he wrote these out still baffles me. Clearly, Jon was a deep thinker and took advantage of the times when many others would have typically “checked-out”.

I am thankful for the example Jon continues to provide for my life. For about a year, Jon and I ran together and we often talked about technique improvements or new gear we wanted. We were in a small group at a church near Louisville, Kentucky and this provided an opportunity to draw our families closer. Jon and I went on a white water rafting weekend in West Virginia two years in a row. On weekends, we played video games with a group of buddies for hours and hours, just like teenagers. Our families had cookouts and we helped each other with projects when the other needed an extra hand. But the countless hours Jon volunteered helping his son’s robotics team, the world-wide respect he earned from his professional contacts within the aviation maintenance industry and the love he showed his wife in the poems and letters he wrote were a revelation saved for his memorial service. Learning these elevated my respect for Jon, yet again.

I think more than anything, Jon’s passing has taught me to challenge my everyday decisions in light of eternity. This life is too brief to be caught doing things which simply don’t matter. Losing one of my closest friends has been a sobering event, one of the most painful experiences of my lifetime. The hidden blessing is getting the splash of cold water in the face, waking me up to see the full meaning of life and the impact I can have while I still have time. Invest in relationships, volunteer to help others in need, be more patient, show more love.

I miss you, brother, but am so very thankful for what you have taught me through your life. I find peace only in the knowledge we will see each other again one day in Heaven, thanks to the sacrifice of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and the way only He provides.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. -John 3:16