If I could have written my friend Jerry Seymour’s obituary, it would not have been the little snippit we got in the local newspaper. That bit of information could easily be gotten from visiting his currently unmarked gravesite and reading the tombstones in his family plot at the entrance of Pine Grove Cemetery.
People (like me) who really knew Jerry Seymour, another being his first cousin, former Chief of Police Kent Lawrence and wife Judy, would agree with me regarding the heart of Jerry. We know that he was immediately translated to heaven in the presence of his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ on January 9, 2026.
Jerry admitted always to me that absolutely no one would ever be able to live with him, because he was so “peculiar.” That is not a bad word for him, because the Bible, the infallible Word of God, calls His people “peculiar.” Jerry loved Jesus, his best friend. He worshiped Him every day by singing and playing his keyboard.
There was a time in our past history together that Jerry and I and one other played music together. I was the vocalist, Jerry played the bass, and the other one played skillfully lead guitar. One of the local pastors who at the time lived in a parsonage just a few doors from Jerry would come and listen to us sing and play. Most pastors love music because it is one of the ways we like to worship.
The honest truth about Jerry and many other people, including myself, is that the devil hates us and at times we have been trespassed with demonic influences, many times through horrible addictions such as alcohol, illegal drugs, or pornography. There are statistics from Barna that elaborate on the percentage of pastors everywhere who are addicted to pornography today and who have divorced their wives of many years, breaking the threecord covenant they had with their Creator and their wives. (Nothing new under the sun — see the book of Ecclesiastes.)
I knew Jerry intimately, because when a person is hired to clean their home or mow their lawn, or do various cleaning jobs outside or inside the home, you get to know that person very well, because they are trusting you to help them and they pay you financially for helping them.
I grieved for a day, but joy has replaced the grief, because I know Jerry is singing, dancing, and praising the Lord with strings and instruments in his special mansion built just for him by Jesus Himself. He is talking with all the saints in heaven that have gone before him, and he could care less about what is going on in the world.
I pray that someone out there who reads this will be very encouraged, especially Jerry’s only son and appropriately written on a federal holiday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
Margaret Gail Segars Eatonton