A Faithful Servant Passes On

One of Idaho’s most faithful ministers has gone to be with the Lord:

Orvil Stiles, considered a chaplain’s chaplain and religious leader whose career spanned seven decades, died Thursday. He was 93.

Stiles worked well into his 80s, despite crippling arthritis.

He had worked as an associate pastor at Second Baptist Church in Boise and led Bible study at the Idaho State Veterans Home in the late 1990s.

“Jesus didn’t retire. Paul didn’t retire. Peter didn’t retire,” he said in a 1999 interview with the Idaho Statesman. “Why should I retire?”

He was actually the Chairman of the State Day of Prayer up until 2005 when Atheists tried to ruin his last event by taking the main front of the Capitol. The event went forward on the other side of the building and it quadrupled the turnout. I saw his last year as a guest speaker at this year’s state date of prayer and he was moved by the presence of the children who were there.

I never met Rev. Stiles and only saw him twice, but I could tell even from a distance that he was a true servant of God. When he spoke, there was this love and just the way he spoke, I don’t know what it was, but it was moving. He was an incredible man and will be missed. As so often is the case. Heaven’s gain is Earth’s loss.

—–