s/o; James David Brown & Ryann Lea Forester.

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"Jesus Loves Me"
Hymn Lyrics
(written by Anna Bartlett Warner)

Jesus loves me — this I know,
For the Bible tells me so;
Little ones to Him belong, —
They are weak, but He is strong.

Jesus loves me — loves me still,
Though I'm very weak and ill;
From His shining throne on high,
Comes to watch me where I lie.

Jesus loves me — He will stay,
Close beside me all the way.
Then His little child will take,
Up to heaven for His dear sake.

(Refrain)
Yes, Jesus loves me!
Yes, Jesus loves me!
Yes, Jesus loves me!
The Bible tells me so.

Jesus loves me! This I know,
As He loved so long ago,
Taking children on His knee,
Saying, "Let them come to Me."

(Refrain)

Jesus loves me still today,
Walking with me on my way,
Wanting as a friend to give
Light and love to all who live.

(Refrain)

Jesus loves me! He who died
Heaven's gate to open wide;
He will wash away my sin,
Let His little child come in.

(Refrain)

Jesus loves me! He will stay
Close beside me all the way;
Thou hast bled and died for me,
I will henceforth live for Thee.

(Refrain)
Yes, Jesus loves me!
Yes, Jesus loves me!
Yes, Jesus loves me!
The Bible tells me so.

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HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - Funeral services have been set this Saturday for 5-year-old Micah Brown, the young Huntsville boy who was killed in a car-truck collision Monday that left his two sisters hospitalized.

The funeral will be Saturday at 2 p.m. at Whitesburg Baptist Church, 6806 Whitesburg Drive, in the main sanctuary of the church's north campus. There will be no visitation before the service and a private graveside service afterward, but the location was chosen to provide room for those wishing to attend.

"This location has been chosen to help accommodate family, friends and our very caring community," Brown family pastor Ross Jaeger said. "So many have shown interest, given support and prayed for this family that we ask you to come and comfort the family and help celebrate Micah's life."

Micah Brown died when a car driven by his mother, Ryann Brown, collided with a large truck on Old Highway 431 outside Hampton Cove Elementary School. Sisters Rebekah and Sarah Brown remain hospitalized with injuries from the crash.

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OBITUARY;
Published in The Huntsville Times from May 15 to May 16, 2014.

Micah Andrew Brown
October 25, 2008 - May 12, 2014

Micah Andrew Brown went home to be with Jesus on Monday. Micah's life was short but sweet for certain. He enjoyed riding in fire trucks. He loved the color blue and always wanted to wear his rain boots no matter the occasion. He could color a picture meticulously for hours and would present his masterpiece as a gift to a special friend or family member. Oh how he loved people. And how people loved Micah. You will be missed, little buddy.
Micah is survived by his loving parents, David and Ryann Brown; sisters Sarah, Rebekah, Lilah and Noelle, brother Asher; grandparents John and Trish Brown, Brad and Sue Schwoebel, Daryl Forester; and a host of aunts, uncles, cousins, and other loving friends and family.
Funeral services will be held Saturday May 17, 2014, at 2 pm, at Whitesburg Baptist Church, Main Campus, 6806 Whitesburg Dr, Hsv (*Huntsville, AL.) 35802. A private family burial will follow the service.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to:
Lifeline Children's Services, 2104 Rocky Ridge Road, Birmingham, AL.


Cemetery Details
Huntsville Memory Gardens
6810 University Drive
Huntsville, AL, 35810

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May 16, 2014
Bad things, good people -- where is God at a time like this?

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama – The terrible crash in Huntsville, Ala., this week that killed a 5-year-old boy still screeches in the hearts and conversations of people here at The Huntsville Times.

Micah Brown, who had the face of an angel, is the son of parents devoted to making their home a haven of love for their four biological children and for two special-needs adopted children born in the Dominican Republic. The wreck also seriously injured two of his sisters.

In movies, reporters callously witness mayhem with a notepad or a camera in their hands. But in our office, we don't do "calloused" well. That's one of the blessings of reporting in a city small enough that we all know, if not the family themselves, then someone who knows the family. These are, as I often tell my editor, "my people" now.

"This raises The Question, the hardest question of all, doesn't it?" one of my colleagues remarked this week. "If there is a God and God is good, then why did this happen? If God isn't powerful enough to protect this family, what's the use of being God? And don't tell me that this is part of God's plan. No matter what it is, it cannot be worth the death of that little boy."

His vehemence reminded me of the story of a young preacher who arrived to comfort a parishioner whose teenage son had just died in an accident.

"At least we know that your son is in a better place," the preacher murmured.

Apparently, that mother had heard that platitude one time too many – she hauled off and slapped him in the face.

"I didn't invite you here to tell me that," the mother said. "I want my son back."

In popular versions of the story of Job – probably one of the oldest books of the Bible – Job's friends don't get a lot of credit. But they come and sit with Job for a week without saying a word. They don't attempt to analyze, don't attempt to sugar-coat his tragedies; don't attempt, even, to get him up off the ash pile. They just sit, offering the blessed ministry of presence.

Then they ruin their sympathetic silence by handing out pathetic explanations – in the face of enormous tragedy, any explanation is pathetic. Job rejects their ideas. And when God finally shows up, God offers no explanation at all.

"Could you make the heavens? Could you swim with the whales?" God asks. "What makes you think you can understand, Earthling?"

A majority of the atheists I talk with point to the needless suffering in the world – this automobile accident, the tornado deaths last month, the church pianist-choir leader-beloved teacher and young mother in my own congregation who is fighting breast cancer – as good reasons not to believe in God. Better to trust what we can see and verify than to make up childish stories about a sugar-daddy in the sky.

But, the Browns' friends say, it is only through the wellspring of their deep faith that David and Ryann Brown are powering their own breath and heartbeats and footsteps day by terrible day this week.

"What does that mean?" my work colleague asked. "How do you do that?"

"My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" David cries in Psalm 22, the Psalm that Jesus breathes from the cross. "My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; thou hast brought me into the dust of death."

But then, without rationalization, Psalm 22's desperate lament gives way to the childlike hymn of the 23rd Psalm: "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not lack for anything."

Explanation? No. Faith? Absolutely. Faith affirmed without explanation or justification, without logic or reason -- just the transcendent opening of the heart to sense, despite the mangled wreck of a week, that through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, God walks alongside people who suffer, supporting them toward the still waters where their souls can be restored.

May it be so!

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May 17, 2014
Even in preschool, 5-year-old Hampton Cove crash victim Micah Brown 'knew Jesus was his best friend'

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - Monday was the day that changed David and Ryann Brown's lives forever.

Micah Andrew Brown, a 5-year-old boy who loved riding in fire trucks, the color blue and wearing his rain boots no matter the occasion, succumbed to injuries he sustained when his mother's SUV collided with an 18-wheeler and flipped on Old Highway 431 in front of Hampton Cove Elementary.

Ryann and her youngest daughter, Noelle, 3, suffered minor wounds during the wreck, but 9-year-old daughter Sarah and 8-year-old Rebekah remain hospitalized with serious injuries at facilities in Huntsville and Birmingham.

Hundreds of mourners came out to Whitesburg Baptist Church this afternoon for Micah's funeral. Ryann, wearing a blue, sleeveless dress and rain boots in memory of her late son, shared one of her final moments with Micah after he "went home to be with Jesus."

"Inside there in the hospital, I held his body and it was cold," she said, her voice cracking. "I wanted to keep him warm. I just felt like for a moment that if I could just breathe into his mouth, I could breathe life back into him. I cried out to God, 'God, just bring him back.' "

When Ryann woke up the next morning, the nightmare she desperately hoped wasn't real was her reality. The little boy who took such pleasure in coloring "masterpieces" for his family and friends was gone forever.

A short time later, one of Rebekah's teachers approached Ryann at the hospital and asked what the grieving mother needed. Ryann wanted to say, "I want Micah back. I want my girls to be well. I want to wake up and have this not be real."

But she knew those were things she could not have.

"The only thing I could get out of my mouth was hope," she said. And the two women cried together and begged God to give the family courage and optimism during a time of absolute darkness.

The next day, Ryann was at Children's of Birmingham tending to Sarah and met with the hospital's chaplain to pray. As he was getting up to leave, he asked Ryann if he had given her a prayer stone yet.

She said no, so he reached into his pocket and pulled out a stone. He told her, "I thought this said 'peace,' but I think you'll like this anyway."

"He handed me the stone and in gold letters it said HOPE," she said. "And that was the one thing I said I needed the most. In that moment, I felt God breathe life back into me, and I knew that God had spared me so that I could be strong for the girls, for my little kids at home, for my husband."

Ryann and four of her six children were driving from Providence Classical School on Clinton Avenue to Hampton Cove Elementary, where 5-year-old Asher and 4-year-old Lilah are enrolled, when the accident occurred. Ryann and her husband, David, adopted Lilah and Asher last year from the Dominican Republic.

The Browns are all members of Rivertree Church, which is active in supporting the adoption of children with special needs and from less-developed countries. David works as a project manager for Brindlee Mountain Fire Apparatus, while Ryann is a stay-at-home mom.

This afternoon, Brindlee Mountain Fire Apparatus President James Wessel stood on the main stage overlooking Micah's casket, which was baby blue and draped with a firefighter's coat and helmet.

Choking back tears, Wessel compared the Brown family to a fire department. David and Ryann, both captains, ran a well-oiled operation. All of their children - their firefighters - were prepared to "go into the darkest places .. the scariest places" to bring truth, hope and light to those who needed rescuing.

"Micah was a good fireman in every sense of the word," he said. "He was prepared and well-trained. He knew Jesus, he knew the Bible, he knew Jesus loved him and that Micah loved Jesus. That made him prepared for anything - and all six of the Brown kids are that way."

Rachel Brown, who was Micah's preschool worship teacher at Rivertree Church, remembered Micah as a "lover" who knew even at the age of 2 that "Jesus was his best friend."

A crowdfunding campaign set up earlier in the week has already raised more than $82,000 for the Brown family. To learn more about the family, visit their website, Because of His Great Love.

Micah is survived by his parents; sisters, Sarah, Rebekah, Noelle and Lilah; brother Asher; and grandparents John and Trish Brown, Brad and Sue Schwoebel. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Lifeline Children's Services, 2104 Rocky Ridge Road, Birmingham, Ala.

"My prayer for all of you that are hearing this message today, that are seeing Micah's life, is that his life would also bring you hope, that you know you have a God who hears your cries," Ryann told a congregation of family and friends today. "And that you will have faith in the one that makes this hope possible."