  Dr,  Conyers professor,  writer,  and friend passed away yesterday morning.  His death did not come out of the blue,  but rather as has happened more than once in his tenure (
ironically he being a founding faculty member had just completed ten years— tenure’  of teaching young theologians)  at Truett found himself imminently close to death much of this past year.  Not that you would know such from any conversation with him in the past year,  despite his visibly distraught state,
 he was always jovial and curious as to my own well being.  Perhaps it is because we have heard tales of Ruth Ann Foster and other faculty visiting him in past years on his deathbed that brought shook to me yesterday when I heard of his demise.  He came to class in the fall,  with an altered schedule,  and apologized to us for having to take a call from his doctor,  his lung had collapsed earlier in the day,
 but before going into the hospital he insisted on teaching us.  He has been able to recover before and despite the fact that the doctors had given up treatment of the disease,  surely God had not given up on healing our beloved professor.  And if God had not given up,  then I should not give up hope either.  I am even signed up for one of his classes in the fall,
 and while I wasn’ t expecting him to be there every day I was certainly holding on to the hope that he would make a few appearances to impart some of his profound wisdom,  all be it in his convoluted way.  A few weeks ago I preached on death and suffering,  from the first chapter of Philippians,  Paul writing from prison says that he looks forward to death and would even choose that over life to go and be with Christ.
 I concluded that sermon with the closing page from C. S.  Lewis’ s epic,  The Chronicles of Narnia,  the last page of the last book in that series—
The Last Battle reads:  “ Then Aslan turned to them and said:  'You do not look as happy as I mean you to be. ' Lucy said,  'We’
re so afraid of being sent away,  Aslan.  And you have sent us back into our own world so often. ' 'No fear of that,  said Aslan.  “
Have you not guessed? ' Their hearts leapt,  and a wild hope rose within them.  'There was a real railway accident, ' said Aslan softly.  'Your father and mother and all of you are—
as you call it in the Shadowlands— dead.  The term is over:  the holidays have begun.  The dream is ended:  this is the morning.
' And as he spoke,  he no longer liked like a lion to them;  but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them.  And so for us this is the end of all the stories,  and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after.  But for them it was only the beginning of the real story.
 All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page:  now at last we are beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read:  which goes on for ever:  in which every chapter is better than the one before.  One of my favorite memories of Dr.  Conyers came from my semester in his Intro to Theology class,
 one of his patent jokes in that class was,  “ So years from now when you are in the coffee shop reading and chatting and someone asks you what ______(  novationism,  nominalism,  etc)
 is you can tell them .  .  .  Several of my friends had gotten together one night at Common Grounds to prepare for one of his midterms,  and we had some confusion in our notes,  so we decided to call him,
 I called and told him,  “ Dr.  Conyers we are at the coffee shop discussing .  .  .
 and needed your help.  He just rolled into laughter,  and then gave us a good deal of help.  Dr.  Conyers you have departed us,  you have awoken from this dream that we call life at the feet of the Lord,
 fully enlightened and fully restored to worship our Lord in resurrected perfection.  Years from now when I am chatting at coffee shops I will be talking about you and remembering you fondly.
