Oscar Torres took two gasps of air, rocked to his knees, and with his last breath praised Jesus and went to sleep.  He was thirty-two and newly married when he died.

It is uncommon for a man to use his dying days to be a light to others, yet last Thanksgiving in the grip of terminal illness, Oscar told his brother Cesar, “I would rather be sick and with Jesus than heathy and without him.”

These words haunted Cesar, a man living in his flesh, just as he pleased.  What kind of God would allow a young, faithful man to be inflicted with full-blown lung cancer?  But Jesus showed his mighty power to Cesar through Oscar’s weakness; it would be Oscar’s faithful words in suffering that Jesus would use to call Cesar from death to life.

Cesar had grown up Catholic and never given much thought to Jesus.  Jesus was the figure on the cross that accompanied ritual and ceremony. Jesus was “not personalized,” as Cesar says, and he had never really considered Him.  With Oscar’s death imminent, however, Cesar’s heart was stirred.  He came to Mars Hill, compelled to find a church where he could lean about the gospel and about the Jesus that Oscar knew.  At the Mars Hill Men’s Training Day last winter, Cesar responded to the altar call and gave his life to Jesus.

The weekend before Oscar went home to be with Jesus, he instructed Cesar in how to address their family with regard to the cancer. “I don’t have room for doubt, ” Oscar said.  “I need you to speak life.”

Cesar did just that when he eulogized his brother in Spanish to three hundred non-Christian relatives.  He told the story of how as children, he had saved Oscar’s life–but in His brother’s death and testimony, Jesus used Oscar to save Cesar’s soul. Cesar didn’t want to waste his brother’s death. When you love Christ, Cesar said, “you want that for everyone else.”

Oscar was a drink offering poured out to save Cesar from himself– from partying and immorality, from death to life.  In memory of his brother, Cesar cites Romans 5:3 we rejoice in our sufferings. “I witnessed my brothers live this verse,” he says.  “Now I have that hope.”

When I interviewed Cesar for this story, he praised Jesus for giving him just one day to become a Christian.  This past Easter, it was our pleasure to baptize Cesar at Mars Hill Lake City.  His account of who he was apart from Christ was simple and straightforward, “I was a wretch,” he said, followed by “it’s all about Jesus.”