Jeannie, Jeannie, Jeannie, my wife, my lover, my darling, my friend. On Monday, May 23, 2016 at 5:43 am, my wife went to be in the presence of our Lord. As I write this article on June 13th, I can say it has been the worst three weeks of my life. On March 2, 2016 we received the diagnosis that she had incurable cancer. We stormed heaven for a miracle of healing according to scripture, yet she went instead to be with the Lord. People can speculate and theologize, but I believe it is one of the mysteries of God when our prayers are not answered the way we think they should be. I know that the doctors and nurses who cared for her cried and testified, even in writing, how much they saw our faith and the love our family had for Jeannie.

Jeannie’s life was based on Jesus Christ and doing His will on earth. Her life was a testimony of faith, sacrifice and surrender to the will of God. She loved Jesus, her husband, children and grandchildren, in that order, as well as other family members and friends, and she lived to please them. I am shocked and amazed at the impact she had on people in our community. Everywhere I go, people are telling me how much my wife meant to them; how sweet, kind and considerate she was. For example, one day she took balloons, flowers and a card to the staff at a Stanwood coffee cafe just to bless them.

Everyone is asking me how I am doing. My heart is breaking, as if being ripped from my chest, for my soul mate is gone. The depth of love I had for Jeannie nobody can appreciate, as the depth of love for which Jeannie and I have lived to serve Jesus sacrificially. I shared everything with Jeannie; my thoughts, feelings, goals and emotions. Jeannie was willing to leave country, family and friends to move to Singapore, Malaysia and Africa because that is where God sent me. In Malaysia, I was the interim pastor to three different churches in Borneo/Sabah, the rain forests of Malaysia.

Jeannie and I would regularly recall how an orangutan tried to pull our daughter Tamara, eight years old at the time, into the trees by her hair or how our three daughters would crawl under the table at restaurants in Sandakan because the people had not seen white girls and wanted to pinch them. I remember how we took our three daughters to Brunei, another Muslim nation, to work in the underground church. We smuggled Christian literature in our suitcases and watched as the first fifteen people ahead of us had their suitcases searched. What faith it took for Jeannie to be willing to go with me and take our daughters to these nations when we could have been arrested.

In Kenya, even when American war ships were ready to evacuate Americans because of the internal fighting, Jeannie would always tell me, “Go, don’t worry about me or the children. Just go and obey God.” At that time I was an Overseer over other churches and missionaries in other countries in Africa, sent there by that great apostolic planting church in Singapore, Calvary Charismatic Centre. When I became the President of World Ministries International, Jeannie would always tell me, “Go and prepare the church and warn the nations.” We are talking about thirty years of traveling the nations! Jeannie understood the apostolic and prophetic mantle and the responsibility of love it carried from God to His bride (the church) and the nations.

I remember going through two national court trials in Kenya where we were threatened with death because we obeyed God. One was when I was a presbyter with the Kenya Assemblies of God and dealt with sin and corruption in church leadership. Corrupt leaders who were in adultery and other types of sin, lied about me. Evil men came to our home with guns wanting to drag me outside. They were pounding on our front door demanding me to come out to them. I wasn’t even there because I was already at a police station being harassed. Jeannie told our young daughters, “If the door breaks, I will push you out the window and you just keep running.” She knew everyone in the house would be killed. What a woman of God! What faith! When they left after being unable to break down the door, she cuddled and comforted the girls. She cried, but never asked me to leave Kenya. She knew we needed to continue to be faithful and build the Kenyan church.

I remember when we adopted Mimi, our fourth daughter, after she was left on the streets of Mogadishu with her throat slit from an attempt to cut off her head. We went through a two month, high profile court battle and the Muslims threatened to burn down the churches in Kenya and kill my family. Jeannie never once asked me to leave, but instead was determined to go the Lord in prayer and supplication in this spiritual battle. She wanted us to be faithful so God could give us the victory and we could adopt the baby that God told us was ours. Jeannie became the baby’s nurse, learning to suction out the fluid from her trachea twelve times daily to keep her alive until God healed Mimi four years later.

I remember Jeannie was willing to sleep on the floor the first six years in Africa because there were always other needs for our money other than a bed. I remember living in a small 950 foot house and Jeannie cooking on a hotplate, at times having 33 other people eating and sleeping at our home, but Jeannie never complained. I remember Jeannie being in church twelve hours a day on Sundays for three services in a row and classes in between. One Sunday, we fed over 950 people after cooking all night. I remember, I remember!

I remember Jeannie and I traveling with our three daughters on a small boat from Brunei to Lebuan and when using the toilet you could see the ocean beneath the commode. Once Jeannie took our three daughters into a hut in Africa to use some water, only to see a cobra coiled over their heads and another one behind the door. I remember Jeannie being willing to sleep in a tent in Africa with elephants, hippos and lions literally roaming within several hundred yards outside our tent and Jeannie standing in the tent with a hatchet as a hippo was munching outside the tent.

In 1987, the long distance telephone rates in Kenya were ten dollars per minute. There were no cell phones, fax machines or computers. When I would travel in other countries, whether communist or Muslim countries, I could be gone weeks or months and never make a telephone call. Jeannie and I had developed such a strong relationship with the Holy Spirit, the God in us, that our faith did not demand we communicate with each other like most people do today. We lived with the peace of God and unless He urged us to awake and pray, we knew each other had to be safe. What faith of this woman of God!

Before I married Jeannie, she was a cosmetologist and had an AA in Biblical Literature from the Berean Assemblies of God. In Singapore, she home schooled our twins and constantly had guests in our home as a pastor’s wife. She continued to serve her family and the church members in Malaysia and in Africa. She served for a season in the church in Kenya as the Women’s Fellowship President, Choir and Worship Leader and Sunday School Teacher. She also ministered with me in Uganda and was a Church Camp Speaker once in Zambia. Jeannie continued taking Bible courses her entire life, equipping herself to better serve the Lord. She earned a Bachelor of Theology Degree; a Master of Theology Degree; a Master of Divinity Degree and in 2009 earned her Doctor of Theology Degree from Christian Life School of Theology (CLST).

 Dr Randal Langley, Pres./CEO CLST

 
Jeannie Hansen and daughters

 
Dr & Mrs Ron Cottle, Emeritus/CLEN

Besides pastoring five churches with me, Jeannie has traveled to over twenty nations in ministry and served with me as members of the Regents Advisory Council for Christian Life Educators Network. Jeannie was deeply loved and respected throughout the United States and around the world, as I was on the Board of Beacon University, Christian Life School of Theology, Christian Life Educators Network (CLEN), Apostolic Council for Transformational Servant Leadership and International Coalition for Apostolic Leaders. The members of this broad network of leaders from every denomination and non-denominational churches loved and appreciated Jeannie for her constant humility and fruits of the Holy Spirit always exhibited in her life.

I look back and marvel at the tremendous gift that God gave me, my wife Jeannie. Even this time facing death the last two months, spending over thirty days in the hospital enduring incredible pain, she would constantly tell me, “don’t cancel any of your meetings, go and be faithful.” This time I told her that God told me to stay with her. Still to the end, she kept telling me to go home, be with my Mom and take care of the ministry. Two weeks before she died, she asked me, “Jon, am I a wimp?” I was shocked as Jeannie was one of the strongest, most self-sacrificing people on earth. She was so humble, serving God and others first. She told me, “I want to end well; I want to go through this with the character of God.” People, my wife suffered so very much at the end, with a mask on her face forcing oxygen into her body. Through it all she never complained, but exhibited the total character and nature of Jesus Christ.

I could never have married a better spouse to help me fulfill the call of God on my life, to prepare the church and the nations for the return of Jesus Christ. Jeannie never complained about the constant traveling the nations, but encouraged me to go and be faithful to what God wanted me to say in that particular nation. Most women would have complained and been jealous of their husbands being gone so much, but Jeannie would pack my suitcase and always encouraged me to be faithful. Even when other people misunderstood my motives for leaving, Jeannie knew it was because of the love for our Lord and being bond servants to Him that we had to go to the nations. She would always say to me, “Don’t worry what other people think. Someday they will understand that it’s your sacrifice to the Lord that you have to go and someday they will be proud of you.”

To me, Jeannie rates right up there with the heroes of faith in the Bible. Men and women of God that gave up their lives to serve and please God! There is no pain like that of a spouse who buries their mate. The depth of love they have for God is the depth of love they have for one another. God gave you a spouse to make you complete and when that spouse is separated by death, the pain is nearly unbearable. These few weeks and months have been the worst and most painful of my entire life. When one buries other family members, they come home to their spouse for comfort, but when you bury your spouse, your home and life is empty and incomplete until the Lord can fill that terrible void. I know it will continue to get better with time, but right now life is so painful. I want my wife back so badly. Jesus told me that is how He feels about His wife, the church. He wants His bride serving Him totally, not separated. I love my family and the church, but right now I am bathing in a sea of tears, for the best gift I had is gone!

Jeannie will be honored and remembered in eight Faith/ Memorial Services in the United States and three in Africa, as we ministered to the bride of Christ for 31 years together and I gave Apostolic Council to many different churches.

     
Jonathan & Jeannie Hansen with their 13 Grandchildren

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