Touched by An Angel

Jeanette Pryor

Seated at the Center for Judaic-Christian Studies book and tape table in Sherwood Bible Church’s sanctuary in Little Rock, Arkansas, she was a portrait of Christian dedication and faithfulness. Her loving husband and partner at her side, she joined in fervent worship. Jeanette Pryor was in her element, epitomizing devotion to God and to her husband and the important ministry they shared.

From our table at the side of the sanctuary, we were sharing the same experience when Pat and I noticed a striking and revealing event: the bright glow of the setting sun that was streaming through the glass doors of the sanctuary had enveloped Jeanette’s golden hair in an almost surreal halo of light, in much the same fashion as the heads of the "angels" on the popular television series, "Touched By An Angel," were illuminated. As we viewed this spectacle, I mused in my spirit, "Indeed, we have all been touched by an angel."

Jeanette Pryor always had an angelic quality–a warm personality, a ready smile, a pleasant voice, an unassuming charm, a thoughtful, encouraging word, and a subtle, often penetrating wit. In angelic fashion, she was always seeking ways in which she could worship and serve her Lord, Jesus the Messiah, and she challenged others to a similar passionate intimacy with God both by her words and by her actions.

Jeanette was the quintessence of the woman of valour epitomized by Sarah of old, about whom tradition says Abraham spoke the words recorded in Proverbs 31:10-31. Like Sarah, her tent was open on all four sides, making her home a haven of hospitality for those who needed ministry and succor. Though her husband Dwight has been (and remains) one of the most insightful teachers in the body of Messiah, Jeanette, like Sarah, may have possessed greater intuition into human responses to divine initiative.

Jeanette Pryor’s life touched untold numbers of people. When in the last three months of her life she waged a valiant, faith-filled fight against cancer, she was joined in prayerful support by thousands of intercessors around the globe. Every outpouring of prayer and love was both an expression of gratitude to God for having allowed such a precious vessel to touch so many lives and a petition that she receive the healing touch that would have permitted her to continue as such a channel of blessing.

Jeanette’s faith in God and her submission to his will never wavered. She had at her side the constant, loving attention and prayers of her devoted husband Dwight and of her son Ben. She also had the undergirding love of Church of the Messiah in Dayton, Ohio, whose members more than anyone else understood what it was to be touched by an angel, to pray, to laugh, and dance before the Lord with her and to share her boundless love.

But, in a greater sense, Jeanette was the possessor of a relationship with God that transcends angelic opportunities. She knew Yeshua the Messiah intimately as Savior and Lord, something which even the angels of heaven desire to observe and experience. A believer whose life of faith and good works could be read as a manual for the love described in I Corinthians 13, she touched lives in ways of which angels are incapable.

Jeanette Pryor stepped through the portal of eternal life on Friday, June 25, leaving family, relatives, and friends stunned by her sudden, untimely passing. The grief of separation from a devoted wife, a loving mother, a considerate relative, an honest friend is tempered only by the understanding that for Jeanette this experience was a graduation from the probation of human existence into the glories of the age to come when all the righteous of the earth will be reunited in the Messianic Kingdom around the throne of the One who died that all might live.

All of us who were touched by this angel of shalom and hesed will deeply miss Jeanette Pryor.

–Dr. John D. Garr

Memorial Gifts may be made to the Center for Judaic-Christian Studies and designated for the Jeanette Pryor Memorial Fund. Write: The Center, P. O. Box 293040, Dayton, OH 45429

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