Doug Schaible Funeral
October 16, 2020 (death on October 11)
Note: Doug Schaible and his wife Cheryl, missionaries with New Tribes Mission, became active members of First Evangelical Free Church in Wichita when Doug left tribal work to recruit new missionaries from Bible colleges and seminaries in the states.
Welcome: I want to welcome you this morning to a celebration of the life of Doug Schaible. First, let me express the gratitude of the Schaible family for the outpouring of love they have experienced, and especially for your attendance today.
It is our desire to honor a really fine man but more importantly, as desired by Doug himself, to focus on his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Doug was a family man, a church man, a missionary, and a friend to many, but he saw himself preeminently as a fully devoted follower of Jesus.
Just two months ago Doug wrote a prayer letter to his supporters:
“To our friends who love the Lord,
‘Shall we accept only good things from the hand of God and never anything hard?’ These famous words from Job came in response to his wife’s challenge about the loss of nearly everything he owned to calamity. (In fact, she suggested he curse God and die). Job saw the sovereignty of God as something absolute, not situational. These words were a great comfort to me and Cheryl as the Lord decided to bring a form of cancer into our lives so that we could say the same, but I will return to this subject later in the letter. I want to share some other thoughts first.”
Doug then went on to talk about an outreach of the Gospel into a new language group by some missionary friends of his. That is so Doug! Here he’s facing the biggest crisis of his life, but the uppermost thing on his mind is the spread of the Gospel.
Doug was one of the principal teachers in the Moriah Class here at First Free in recent years. The class members loved Doug. He had a thousand stories, principally from his years as a missionary among primitive tribal groups, and he would weave them through his teaching of Scripture, making the biblical account come alive. Doug was also a man of great conviction, the polar opposite of a mealy-mouthed compromiser. But at the same time, he was a humble servant and a faithful friend. I personally will miss him greatly.
Song: The congregational song Doug wanted is one I have never heard sung at a funeral service. In fact, I haven’t heard it for decades in any setting. But the song is revealing of how Doug viewed his task as a fully devoted follower of Jesus: “Onward Christian Soldiers.” A lot of Christians today don’t like the military metaphor in the hymn. They prefer to view themselves as non-combatants. Some have simply gone AWOL. Not Doug. He viewed himself as a soldier, called to serve the Supreme Commander until the last day of his life, or until Jesus came first. Think about the words as you sing.
Onward, Christian soldiers! Marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
Christ, the royal Master, leads against the foe;
Forward into battle, see his banners go!
[Chorus]
Onward, Christian soldiers! Marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
At the sign of triumph Satan’s host doth flee;
On, then, Christian soldiers, on to victory.
Hell’s foundations quiver at the shout of praise;
Brothers, lift your voices, loud your anthems raise.
Like a mighty army moves the Church of God;
Brothers, we are treading where the Saints have trod.
We are not divided; all one body we:
One in hope and doctrine, one in charity.
Onward, then, ye people; join our happy throng.
Blend with ours your voices in the triumph song:
Glory, laud, and honor unto Christ, the King.
This through countless ages men and angels sing.
Message: When I contemplated an appropriate biblical passage for Doug Schaible’s service, my mind went instinctively to the book of Daniel and the character of the prophet whose name it bears. Our pastors have been preaching through Daniel for the past several months and I have been studying it on my own. I never cease to be amazed at this man. He is one of only two or three heroes in the whole Bible of whom no sin is recorded. Oh, I know there was only One Person who was actually sinless, but Daniel clearly stood head and shoulders above his compatriots in respect to his lifestyle, his integrity, and his faith in God.
Toward the very end of his life in chapter 10, an archangel came to Daniel when he was overcome with grief over a traumatic vision of the future that was given to him, and said, “O man, greatly loved” and later said to him, “Do not be afraid, O man, highly esteemed.” I suggest to you that those affirmations could well be attributed to Doug Schaible: he was greatly loved and highly esteemed, certainly by those of us who knew him, but also by his Lord and Savior. And I think the reason these things can legitimately be said of Doug is because he shared three qualities that Daniel had in abundance: character, consistency in his walk with God, and devotion to duty.
Let’s talk about character first. Think about the exceptional character qualities Daniel exhibited, like purity in his personal life. When he was first taken as a hostage to Babylon as a teenager, Daniel “purposed not to defile himself.” At the end of the book, nearly 70 years later, we find that he is still living with the same resolve in his personal life. He was the quintessential “in the culture but not of the culture” person.
Daniel also showed integrity in his work life. When the Babylonian king decided to elevate him to the position of prime minister due to his outstanding administrative competence, this stirred up intense jealousy among the other bureaucrats. Daniel’s enemies searched for grounds for charges against him, but they were unable to find anything incriminating. They bribed his secretary, went through his mail, tapped his phone, checked his internet search history, examined his expense accounts with a fine-tooth comb, searched every document he had ever written, but all to no avail. Believe me, his enemies would have burned him if they could have found even a $10 discrepancy in his expense account report, but they couldn’t.
Doug Schaible was also a man of character in that he, too, demonstrated purity in his personal life, and integrity at his work. One of his most often quoted Scripture passages was 2 Cor. 4:1-2: “Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. 2 Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God.” Though Doug didn’t have normal office hours, he was faithful and accountable to his supporters, and when not on the road working, he was at home working, doing administrative tasks related to his ministry.
Consider also Daniel’s consistency in his walk with God. Daniel’s enemies bemoaned the fact that “we will never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel unless it has something to do with the law of his God.” The only place Daniel was vulnerable was in his commitment to God, and it was actually his consistency that made him vulnerable. His enemies knew he would never compromise on the basics; therefore, if they could just devise a scheme to exploit this consistency, they had him!
As the story unfolds, his enemies devise a plot to have Daniel thrown into a den of hungry lions. They used his consistent practice of praying 3 times a day before an open window against him by getting the king to make a law that no one could pray to anyone but the King for 30 days. This was a law of the Medes and Persians that could not be rescinded. Daniel knew he would die a most excruciating death if he violated it. There was no point in hiring a lawyer. There was no value in staging a protest. The die was cast and there was nothing he could do about it, except what Daniel always did. He prayed to God. The text says,
“Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before.” Consistency!
Doug Schaible reminds me of Daniel in regard to consistency in his walk with God. He always had a Bible with him wherever he went. He was often seen reading it, studying it, meditating on it. He would regularly listen to or read spiritually edifying things. He would read theological or spiritual books to engage his mind. He prayed faithfully for a lot of people.
Thirdly, I want us to focus upon Daniel’s exceptional devotion to duty even in the face of discouragement and great trial. Why should Daniel be discouraged? Well, try this on for starters. He was kidnapped as a teenager and taken to a foreign country, never to see his homeland again. He was emasculated so that he would never be able to marry or have children. He served the kings of Babylon faithfully for 70 years, but despite his efforts. the nation remained pagan to its core. Even among his own people—the Jewish exiles—there is little evidence of any spiritual revival. There was plenty of reason to be discouraged, yet he was faithful to duty anyway.
Daniel also demonstrated duty in the face of trial. Think about the fact that as powerful as Daniel was, when faced with the lion’s den he undoubtedly could have fled the country to avoid execution. His enemies would probably have helped him—all they wanted is to be rid of him. But though undoubtedly tempted to choose the easy way out, he stayed because of duty. What would the other exiles think if their leader were to run and hide?
That was Doug, too. There was a time when Doug traveled to a new island in New Guinea to hopefully share the Gospel with another unreached people, but he was flat out rejected. Imagine you were in his shoes. You’ve taken your family of five halfway across the world, abandoned the American Dream, endured all kinds of hardships to help people who have nothing become heirs of the King, and they say, “we don’t want you here.” But Doug had received his commission from the Commander in Chief and he would do his duty! When rejected at one island he just went to the next one. In recent years as a representative for New Tribes Mission (now Ethnos 360), Doug didn’t enjoy being away from Cheryl as much as he was, but he saw ministry as his duty. He didn’t like driving tens of thousands of miles each year, but he saw it as his duty in order to motivate college students to surrender their lives to Christ.
There’s one more verse I want to mention from Daniel. It comes in the last chapter. The angel says to Daniel, “Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever.” That describes the gist of Doug’s life—leading many to righteousness. I’m not talking about just helping people improve their lives, or getting them out of poverty, or teaching them to become literate. I’m talking about helping people get right with God, which is far more important!
And Doug always made it clear that getting right with God is not a matter of human effort but rather accepting something God accomplished for us by sending His Son to die on the Cross. “God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16). Why are people in danger of perishing? Because “all have sinned, and the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ His Son.” (Romans 6:23)
Friends, what the church needs today, and needs desperately, is a new army of Christian soldiers, ordinary believers—not supersaints—who are willing to exercise godly character, consistency in their walk with God, and devotion to duty, like Daniel, like Doug.
Prayer: Father, I want to thank you personally for the privilege of knowing Doug Schaible. We will miss him terribly. But he has left a marvelous legacy for his wife, his children, his grandchildren, and a host of friends. Let us not forget the passion he had for the Gospel, and not just the truth of the Gospel but the need for everyone, from tribal peoples to his neighbor, to believe the Gospel and experience its liberating power.
We ask for a special measure of your strength and comfort for Cheryl, Leah, Daniel, Joel, and the rest of this dear family. Cause them to feel your presence surrounding them and sustaining them. Thank you for the sweet promises in your Word that the separation of death is not final for believers, because our Savior rose from the dead and will in like manner raise us up that we might spend all of eternity together in your presence. We ask it in the precious name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Benediction: “Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” (1 Corinthians 15:58)