Pastor Bob

I first heard of Bob Gibson many years ago when Mom and Dad were working with a halfway house called BARC. BARC, or Bay Area Recovery Center, is a place where guys are transitioning from prison back into civilian life. Dad was always a teacher at heart and had developed a series to teach classes about the good news of Jesus Christ. Dad had approached BARC about teaching classes to the young men. The class was voluntary for the men, but it was always a packed room. At one point, Dad had invited Bob Gibson to come and say a few words to close the class. Bob ended up leading many of those men to the Lord.

Bob invited Mom and Dad to teach their class at San Leon Community Church. They all became good friends. One time, as they were setting up a class session, they were having trouble getting video from Dad’s laptop to the screen, so Mom called and asked if I would come out there to see what I could do to help. That is when I met Bob. Bob was about 10 years older than me and always wore a Vietnam Vet shirt or hat. He did not look like a typical preacher. Every time I saw him, he was wearing a t-shirt and jeans, but he would be ministering to everyone he came across.

One time, I asked Bob about his experience in Vietnam. He said the second trip and all the ones after were much better than his first trip there in 1965. He said going back to visit the areas where he was first was a healing time for him. He never talked about his time there as a soldier, and I respected him for that.

One day, as I was talking with Mom, she said that she and Dad were going to Nicaragua with Bob. I was not sure I had heard her correctly, so she went on to explain that Bob had invited them to join him and some other people on a mission trip to Bluefields, Nicaragua. They were there for at least a week; I really don’t recall many details about that trip other than Mom and Dad enjoyed going.

Pastor Bob’s ministry was called Lost Sheep Ministry. He was like a shepherd who would go looking for the lost sheep. That meant he would go anywhere in the world that God led him. I kept up with Bob’s world trips; he took them all the time, and I kept him and those who traveled with him lifted in prayer. One time, I would hear that he was in Brazil, then Vietnam, and later Nigeria. He literally traveled all over the world when the opportunity arose to tell others about Christ. Many times, he would travel alone. He would call it ‘Fishing with Jesus’.

Since we were friends on Facebook, and he always posted what he was doing, I was able to continue praying for him as he journeyed throughout the world. It would be common to open Facebook in the morning, and one of the first things I would see was a picture of Bob with an airport ticket agent, a hospital worker, or a man on the street, and Bob would say, “Caught another fish for Jesus!” Bob would give them a paper printed as a birth certificate, with their name and date filled in, along with his signature.

Bob would say something to this effect: “I do not fear death; in fact, death is the goal. But as long as I have the breath of life on this earth, send me!” Yesterday Bob took that last breath and was welcomed home in Heaven. He fought the good fight and finished the race. We will all miss Bob, but know without a doubt we will all be together again one day.

As I look back on what I know of Bob, he was like what I imagine the Apostle Paul was like—continuing to serve the Lord to his last breath.