Reverend Doctor Jerry Addison Jackson

Rev. Dr. Jerry Addison Jackson, age 70, went to his heavenly home early in the morning of Friday, February 7, 2020. Jerry was born to Linton Woodrow Jackson and Cornelia Covington Jackson on November 3, 1949 in Lumberton, North Carolina. In addition to his parents, Jerry was preceded in death by his infant son, Thomas Rogers Jackson and a brother Thomas Jackson. Jerry was an excellent Bar-B-Q pig cooker with a very special sauce. He has cooked several pigs for Methodist University, Camp Don-Lee and other special community events. Others cooking specialties includes Bar-B-Q Chicken, fish and shrimp. A dinner for 100 was like cooking for 1 for him. He was an avid Cowboys, Wolfpack and Methodist Monarchs fan. He loved refinishing furniture and repairing old homes, playing softball, golfing and volunteering where he could, especially for Relay for Life, Youth activities, Mission trips, hurricane relief and was a certified First Aid/CPR Red Cross Instructor. Every March he loved to celebrate Kite Flying with his whole congregation.

A service of life and resurrection will be held on Monday, February 10th,  at 1:00pm at the Hay Street United Methodist Church. The family will greet friends Monday immediately following the service in the church fellowship hall. A committal service will be held on Tuesday at 11:00am at Providence United Methodist Church Cemetery in Goldsboro.

Jerry was married to Annette Rogers of Manteo and would have celebrated their 39th anniversary in July 2020. They had two daughters: Doris Munoz and Jerianne Stone. Doris is married to Robert Munoz and has one daughter Julia Avery Munoz and one son Desmond Addison Munoz. Jerianne is married to Royal Stone and have one son, Ethan Harper Stone and one daughter Eleanor Jane Stone and two sisters, Judy Seals and her husband, Jerry and Debbie Powers and her husband, Jerry.

Jerry grew up at Chestnut Street United Methodist Church in Lumberton, NC and graduated from Lumberton High School in 1968. He entered Methodist College (University) and graduated from Methodist with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Religion in 1975. While attending Methodist, he became the First Full-Time Camp Director at Camp Rockfish for three years where he developed it into a wonderful retreat ministry setting. He graduated from United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio with a Master of Divinity with an emphasis on Outdoor Ministry in 1978. He received a Doctor of Ministry from United Theological Seminary with an emphasis on Biblical Studies in 2000. His dissertation was called “Show Me Jesus: A Study of the Gospels for New Christians.” This was written at the request of a 75 year old man who asked him to do only one thing in his ministry and that was to “Show Him Jesus.”

Thirty six of his forty one years as an ordained minister were served in rural Duke Endowment churches in the North Carolina Conference. He served 6 years as a Local Pastor. He served the Church of Jesus through the North Carolina United Methodist Church for 47 years. He had a love and passion for the ministry and faith of the rural congregations. In his ministry, he led over 550 people to Christ, 23 in 2011 in a rural setting. Winning people to a relationship with God through Jesus Christ was Jerry’s primary goal. Jerry heard John Wesley say “Offer them Christ”.  He was the 2010 Clergy Harry Denman Evangelism Award recipient given by the Foundation for Evangelism of the United Methodist Church and the North Carolina Conference Commission on Evangelism.

Jerry served as a Camp Counselor at Camp Don-Lee from 1969 – 1972 before he became Camp Director at Camp Rockfish. Jerry received his License to Preach through the United Methodist Church in May of 1970. He was ordained a Deacon in the United Methodist Church in June of 1976 and ordained as an Elder in Full Connection in June, 1979. He served United Methodist Churches in Marietta, Wanchese, Elizabeth City, Roxboro, Currituck, Hubert, Jacksonville, Goldsboro, Burlington, Wrightsboro, Rocky Mount before coming to Simpson. Every Church grew spiritually and physically during his ministry. He spent 26 years serving rural churches east of Highway 17 in eastern North Carolina before moving inland.

He served on the Methodist University Alumni Association Board of Director as Past President and served as the President, 1st Vice-President, Secretary of the Board and on the Quality Enhancement Plan Committee for the University accreditation by the SACS Committee. In 2007, he was selected by the Methodist University Alumni Association for the Outstanding Alumni Service Award. He was involved regularly with the student life of the students at Methodist.

He served for 12 years on the North Carolina Conference Disaster Response Committee of the United Methodist Church being the Chair of the Committee for four of those years during Hurricane Hugo, Bertha, Fran, Isabel, Charlie and Bonnie. He made 11 mission trips to repair homes damaged in Hurricane Katrina in Mississippi and Louisiana in the last few years. Since 2001, he led mission work teams to Helton, Kentucky to repair homes damaged by storms and is one of the poorest section in the nation. In his ministry, Jerry did at least two week long mission trips with youth and adults each year.

Since 2008, Jerry was a member of the Commission on Evangelism of the United Methodist Church recently serving as the Chair of the Commission (2012-2016) and helped to lead in the Clergy and Lay Academy of Christian Witness each year. He had been active as an Associate Part-Time Evangelist with the National Association of United Methodist Evangelist. He was the Chair of the Commission on Evangelism of the North Carolina Conference for 2012-2016.

Winning people to a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and nurturing them was his ministry in the rural setting. He offered Christ to all of his congregations and community. He used the Jesus’ format of evangelistic ministry, which is meeting people one on one where they are. This has been in their homes, in their workshops, on their grain trucks, in the hog pens, racking and mowing their yards and on the back of tractors. He shared their faith around stew pots, quilting racks, pig cookers and on front porches or under the carport. Jerry was a hands-on pastor that was there working beside and with his people as they lived out their faith and life in their family, in their sickness and death, in their joys, in their job, and in their heart aches. He was there for them.

He attended the United Methodist Congress on Evangelism sponsored by the General Board of Discipleship almost every year since 1979. Jerry used a relationalship evangelistic method with his congregation and in 2009, his church council members and him made over 520 personal home visits in their community getting to know who they were and who was not attending a church. Each Sunday, the congregation mugs their guests, and provides video DVD of all their services to people who cannot attend church. Jerry was a Biblical Pastor with an emphasis on teaching people to read, study and believe in the Word of God. He personally wrote and taught a different Bible Studies each week, visited in homes, nursing homes and hospitals, taught an adult Sunday school class, and preached twice on Sunday each week. Offering Christ to people and making and nurturing disciples of Jesus Christ was Jerry’s ministry.  

Jerry had a love for young people to grow in the faith. He conducted a 9-month Bible led Youth Confirmation Class with his youth which he himself wrote and rewrote yearly. In his entire ministry, he never missed a year without a confirmation class. Some years spending 9 months with just one youth looking at their faith as the most important faith there is. During the school year, he met with the Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts weekly so that they might earn their God and Country award. Through the years, Jerry has helped coach the Jacksonville High School Girls’ Tennis Team, coached 12- 15 year old girls’ softball teams where prayer and fellowship is the key to the game. He helped to lead youth Mission trips every year where the youth would say, “He is one of the true leaders of the faith when it comes to hands-on evangelism.”

Jerry’s mission in life was to help people have Christ in their life and help them to become what God has developed them to be.

In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be directed to the Ronald McDonald House, 101 Old Mason Farm Rd, Chapel Hill, NC 27517; the Hay Street United Methodist Church, 320 Hay Street, Fayetteville, NC 28301; or to the Methodist University Athletics, 5400 Ramsey Street, Fayetteville, NC 28311.

Shumate-Faulk Funeral  Home is serving the Jackson family and online condolences may be directed to www.shumate-faulk.com.

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