Michael Clay Whitten

Mike was a friend of mine. He was the 1st person I met in 1992 at Crossroads Community Church. Between dragging chairs and fake plants into the Jazzercise we would smoke cigarettes and tell jokes. Mike had an infectious laugh, whenever I saw him I knew 2 things were going to happen (1), I was going to get a great big bear-hug and (2), Mike and I were going to one-up each other until one of us conceded that the other was truly inappropriate. He could be a serious dude, he loved Donna like there never was another woman on Earth, and it always touched me that she called him “Michael”…nobody else did that and I could tell he loved that too. He loved mentoring the young Musicians over at the Collins Hill campus, I am certain many are remembering the little things he said right at this moment. I loved him and I miss Mike, he was my friend.

“your drum mix sucks” he would say early on in our friendship. Our friendship began talking over audio mixes, what to change to make the drums pop back in the Cornerstone days. He was a man who had knowledge in many areas and often we would talk on some subject whether or not I knew it well, and so I would learn from him. I would try to steer to spiritual things now and then, and he soon recognized I didn’t like certain topics or words, and respected that. He gotta kick that I didn’t know who Lewis Grizzard was, and gave me a book to read concerning his life. It was a common occurrence in our conversations that he would try to bring him up without me catching that he was telling a “story”, to which I would reply “zing” once the cat was out of the bag.

We would talk on the phone every 3-4 weeks or so since various health issues or surgeries; well he did most of the talking, ha! Eventually I’d pipe up to say I need to get back to work, and realize we’d been on the phone for 30min or more. Time just seemed to fly by.

We celebrated folks coming to Christ whom he would speak with at his Kroger job. He would just strike up a conversation with anyone whether fellow employee or a customer, and witness through friendship, asking pointed questions. Even intellectuals can know that Christ loves them and died for them that they could go to heaven too, if but they accept it.

Gonna miss him, I’m sure you will too.

I’ve kown Mike for a solid five years or so, we met causally while he was working the night shift at Kroger. I happened to be wearing my uniform (paramedic), and he decided to test out his more-than-common-knowledge about medical stuff that no lay person would usually know. Over the years I would find myself conning more often to Kroger to shop and have a nice chat with him about just about everything. Often I would end up just chatting with him for hours on end before realizing the time (longest was a good 4 hours once!)

He had a great sense of humor and it clicked with me because as a paramedic, I have a dark sense of humor so even an off-color joke makes me snicker. I also enjoyed the random tidbits of knowledge about life in general that he’d pass on to me, and I especially enjoyed hearing about his more amusing medical issues that most would be abashed to mention in public, as well as the stories from his youth as a rock musician. Gonna miss the big guy.

Such a tragic loss. So many memories. Riding around in that Brown Plymouth (I think it was). Playing Little League baseball at Perkerson Park. Talking and arguing about music and rewriting the lyrics of then popular songs to humorous effect. Mike was one of those perpetually positive people who genuinely wanted to help others and was willing to give others a chance. Few people are like that. I regret not talking to him in recent years but I definitely remember many things about him and it’s all good.

I lost touch with Big Mike by losing his # over the years and just called today and saw this, so it’s historically upsetting to me that I never had a chance to say goodbye to an irreplaceable hard worker, friend, mentor, and father figure.

I worked at Kroger with him 15 years ago when I was 20 -24 and I tried my best to follow his advice and mentoring but still made stupid young mistakes of course, but I never forgot my friend and mentor, I always remind people about his influence on my life and his jovial nature.

May he rest in eternal peace with his savior.