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Many of you may have no idea who Bob Heerspink was, yet the influence he had in creating Church Juice was enormous.  Bob led Back to God Ministries International, the parent ministry of ReFrame Media and Church Juice.  This past weekend, he went to be with the Lord after a short fight with pancreatic cancer.

I first met Bob nearly four years ago.  At the time, Church Juice didn’t exist other than on paper with the placeholder name, ‘Church Marketing Outreach.’  From early on, I could tell the love Bob had for the local church.  Being a pastor himself, he realized just what a struggle communications can be in a church, especially the smaller ones.  And as the director on an international media ministry he realized it was part of our duty, and ministry, to use what we knew about media to help those churches.

As my relationship grew with Bob, I realized that his passion for ministry made him a good leader, too.  Technically, Bob was my boss’s boss.  In most organizations, that’s a person you may rarely have interaction with.  If anything, past experience told me when people at that level came around your desk, it was never a good thing.  With Bob, the opposite was true.  He wanted to learn everything he could about the ministry that people in our organization were doing.  While he oversaw a big ministry—with offices around the world that produce dozens of programs—he wanted to know about all of them.  Why?  He was always an advocate on our behalf.  If he met someone, he’d be able to share one of our programs that might be useful to that person.  It was just part of his relational personality.

It’s that same love of individual relationships that made him a fan of partnerships.  We can be stronger media missionaries when we work together for God’s Kingdom.  Yet Bob never partnered just for the sake of partnering.  Above anything else as a supervisor, he believed in the mission of our organization and supported the staff in place.  If a partnership didn’t make sense or compromised the vision God placed on his heart for this ministry, he would not do it.  He listened to people and his heart while trusting his faith.

The Bible tells us death is harder on those left behind than the one who gets to rejoice in the presence of God.  While I have joy for Bob that he is home, I can’t help but think about the void left in our ministry.  But I do know the legacy he leaves in transforming a ministry.  Relationships mean everything.  I had moments where I casually shared meals with Bob and other times where we talked deeper about where our ministry was headed.  It’s rare to find such a cool mix of friendship, business and faith.  If there’s anything we can learn from Bob’s work life it’s this: Real leadership means caring for people, trusting your people and believing in your heart that the work you do has eternal meaning.  Thanks Bob for leaving those messages with all of us who had the pleasure of serving alongside you.