It’s been a long week. On Friday I set out for Horn’s Creek in Ocoee, TN to speak at our middle school/high school fall retreat. Everything kicked off on Friday night. We were talking about how to deal with our stress and worries.

Saturday morning went well, and the students were dismissed to take a walk and spend time thanking God for anything and everything. Zach (7th grade) and Kelly (12th grade) Weimer walked together and thanked God for their family.

One hour later, tragedy struck. Zach was the second student down the zip line on the ropes course. Long story short, a large wooden structure used to remove kids from the zip line was not moved out of the way and Zach slammed into it. After hanging unconscious from his harness for several minutes, staff, students and volunteers were able to carry the structure back up to the platform and get Zach down.

He was lifeflighted to Children’s Hospital in Chattanooga. I don’t have the energy to give more details at this point. But I spent many hours outside the Pediatric ICU with Zach’s family and friends.

After a long battle, Zach was called home on Wednesday morning. Zach is in Heaven with Jesus. I know that because he gave his life to Jesus Christ last year. I was there. It was another day in ministry last fall. Now I know how significant that day was. And now I know how significant is every opportunity to share the gospel of Jesus Christ. He is Lord. Our God is mighty to save. His ways are perfect, even if we don’t understand them.

God is using Zach’s life in mighty ways. Here are two links. One is the story in the Knoxville newspaper. The other is the site used to update everyone on Zach’s status. At the moment, over 23,000 people have logged in to follow his story. All across the world. At a worship/prayer service last night, at least two students gave their life to Christ. They now share the hope that Zach and his family share.

http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2008/oct/09/boy-dies-after-accident/

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/zacharyweimer