With hearts broken by the depth of our earthly loss, yet upheld by the certain hope of Jesus Christ, our family shares that our beloved Colette Amend was called Home to Heaven on August 8, 2026. The faith by which she lived has now become sight. The Savior she trusted through every joy, every uncertainty, and every valley has welcomed her into His presence.
That day brought profound grief to all who love her, but it also brought a reason to celebrate. We celebrate because Colette did not merely hope that Heaven was real; she ordered her entire life around that truth. She knew this world was temporary, that Christ had conquered death, and that everyone who belongs to Him will one day dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
Before Anything Else, She Was Colette
Long before illness ever entered our vocabulary, Colette had already built an extraordinary life around the things she treasured most: the Lord, her family, her friends, and the quiet daily opportunities to love and serve other people. While her final seven years were marked by cancer and all the hardships and trials it brought, you would never have known it simply by talking with her. She was a fighter—eternally joyful, hopeful, and optimistic. Scripture does not promise that we will face every hardship in our own strength; it promises that God’s grace is sufficient and that His power is made perfect in weakness. Colette lived that truth. God used those hardships as a platform for her witness, ministry, and discipleship, touching thousands of people whose lives intersected with hers over the years.
Colette was Christ-focused, loving, sacrificial, courageous, joyful, gracious, genuine, kind, encouraging, and deeply admirable. Her smile carried warmth into every room, and her presence made people feel at ease. She loved listening to Adrian Rogers and Billy Graham, hearing the Bible play through the night as she slept, and filling her days with Christian music. She loved old country music, planting flowers in her pots, decorating, family gatherings, board games, her beloved Ford Transit van—her “bus”—baking organic bread, and taking long walks on the beach or anywhere she could walk with those she loved. She could turn an ordinary room into a celebration and an ordinary day into a memory.
She was a planner married to a man who rarely planned anything. She loved warmth and bright rooms; I loved cold and darkness. I could use twenty tissues while she could make one last forever—carefully folded, of course. After decades together, we still laughed at how God had made us so completely different and yet so perfectly suited to one another.
Her humor was unforgettable. She was playful and sometimes hilariously unfiltered, often without realizing quite how funny she had been. Even in hospice, her smile, humor, and joy could fill a room with enough life, family, noise, laughter, and celebration that it felt less like the end of an earthly journey and more like Colette was still teaching everyone how to live.
Beneath all the laughter was one of the most selfless hearts any of us have ever known. Colette noticed people. She listened. She remembered. She encouraged. She had a rare gift for making every person feel seen, loved, important, and genuinely special. That was not something she turned on for certain people or certain moments; it was simply who she was. She gave to others regardless of her own condition. She volunteered, helped families, drove children, showed up for school and church activities, prayed for people, and kept serving through circumstances that would have caused most of us to withdraw. Even when she was suffering, she looked for ways to comfort, thank, and encourage the people around her. She rarely complained, never wanted to be a burden, and almost always asked about someone else before speaking about herself.
The People She Loved Most
Colette loved our five precious daughters—Vivienne, Brielle, Priscilla, Evelyn, and Madelyn—with a love that cannot be measured. Motherhood was not merely one of her roles; it was one of the greatest ministries of her life. She taught them, prayed with them, protected them, laughed with them, sacrificed for them, and poured the truth of God into them every day.
Our daughters did not simply hear their mother talk about faith; they watched her live it. They saw what it looked like to trust God when answers were unavailable, to pray when words were difficult, to serve when strength was limited, and to remain gracious when life was painfully unfair. She taught them to seek a godly man who loves the Lord first, loves them faithfully, and orders everything else beneath those commitments. Her fingerprints of faith will remain upon their lives and, by God’s grace, upon generations still to come.
She deeply loved her mother, Leslie Carnell; her brothers, Eric and Alexander Carnell; Aunt Colette; Grandma Mimi; her in-laws, Richard and Sharon Amend and their son, Steve; her extended family; and a remarkable circle of friends gathered throughout every season of life. Listing every person she treasured would be impossible because Colette had a rare gift for making each friend feel as though he or she occupied a uniquely important place in her heart.
To me, Colette was my junior high sweetheart, beloved wife, best friend, trusted partner, and the greatest earthly gift I believe God ever entrusted to me. Together we became a team. Every accomplishment was shared. Every victory belonged to both of us. Every burden was carried together. She thanked me countless times for caring for her, yet I always considered loving and serving Colette not merely a duty, but one of the greatest privileges of my life.
The Center of Her Life
Above every relationship, every interest, and every earthly joy stood Colette’s love for Jesus Christ. She loved and served God as His good and faithful servant. Her Christianity was not ornamental, occasional, or confined to church. It shaped the rhythm of her entire life.
She prayed when she woke in the morning, before meals, when she entered the car, during moments of joy, during moments of fear, and throughout the ordinary hours in between. Each night, our family gathered in the same sacred rhythm: the 23rd Psalm, our own family prayer, and then the Lord’s Prayer. Christian music filled her days, and through the night the Bible often continued to play as she slept.
During her final days, there was a moment when grief overwhelmed our family as prayer began. Words became difficult. Colette—whose stroke had made ordinary speech extraordinarily difficult—immediately stepped in. With remarkable clarity, depth, and peace, she prayed one of the most beautiful prayers we had ever heard. When speaking with others had become difficult, speaking to her Lord had not. Prayer had become so deeply woven into her soul that the words came as naturally as breath.
Then Came a Chapter None of Us Would Have Chosen
Seven years ago, Colette began the most difficult chapter of her earthly life when she was diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic breast cancer. Over the years that followed, she endured countless surgeries, treatments, doctor appointments, scans, and hospital visits. Then, last year, while continuing to battle breast cancer, she developed a separate and highly aggressive form of brain cancer. She later suffered a stroke that left her paralyzed, impaired her ability to find and say the right words, and brought countless other challenges far too extensive to list.
Yet through every setback, every uncertainty, and every difficult day, her faith in Jesus Christ did not disappear; it became even more visible. Those seven years did not become the definition of Colette’s life. They became the broadest platform for her testimony. God used her courage, grace, optimism, perseverance, and absolute dependence upon Him to touch more lives than we could ever count. People did not only see how hard she fought; they felt how deeply she loved them while she was fighting.
She fought with the heart of a warrior, but she never made the story about her own strength. She knew human beings are not in control. She prayed boldly for healing while submitting completely to the will of God. She showed believers how faith can deepen in suffering, and she showed those who did not yet believe that hope in Christ is not a religious slogan. It is a living reality strong enough to carry a person through the darkest valley.
A Life Surrounded by Love
Our family will never be able to fully express our gratitude to everyone who walked this road beside us. Family and friends prayed, visited, called, wrote, brought meals, cared for our daughters, encouraged us, and carried burdens that often felt too heavy to lift. We are especially grateful to Binit and Joanna Shah and our neighbors; everyone at Peninsula Baptist Church; our 4:9 Men’s Bible Study; our lifelong Ford family; Colette’s college friends; and her dear friends in North Carolina and across all the many places we lived.
To every doctor and caregiver who served Colette over these years: thank you. To Southern Oncology, Dr. Mitchell and the local team, the teams at the many hospitals and cancer centers that cared for her, everyone at Breakthru Medicine and Hospice House of Iredell County, you became far more than medical providers. Many of you became beloved friends and family. Thank you for your skill, your persistence, your compassion, and the dignity with which you cared for her. Even in her weakest moments, Colette continued to notice and encourage those caring for her, telling people what was special about them and making them feel as though God had placed them there for that very moment.
On August 8, Faith Became Sight
Now there is no cancer, no weakness, no paralysis, no exhaustion, no hospital room, no scan, no treatment, and no pain. There is only complete healing in the presence of Jesus Christ. We believe she has heard the words she lived to hear: “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
We grieve because love makes separation painful. We will miss her voice, her laughter, her prayers, her humor, her warmth, her smile, her carefully folded tissues, her directions about decorating, and the thousand small habits that made our home feel like home. We will miss the way she loved each of us and the way she made every person around her feel uniquely loved. We will miss the person who can never be replaced.
But we do not grieve as people without hope. Christ has conquered the grave. Death did not defeat Colette. Cancer did not win. Her earthly body reached the end of its strength, but her life has not ended. The Shepherd she trusted through every valley has led her safely Home.
What Colette Would Want the World to Know
If Colette could have one final conversation with every person reading these words, there is little doubt that she would spend it telling them about Jesus. She would remind you that life is short, eternity is real, and the distractions of this world are not worthy of the years we surrender to them.
She would tell you to love your family deeply, forgive quickly, pray continually, serve joyfully, notice the person standing alone, help without needing recognition, and give without keeping score. She would tell you not to wait for a crisis before seeking God with your whole heart. She would urge you to fix your eyes on Christ, walk the narrow path, obey His Word, and use whatever life you have been given to glorify Him.
Most of all, she would want you to know personally the Savior she now sees face to face. Salvation is not earned by courage, suffering, goodness, or religious effort. It is the gift of God through faith in Jesus Christ, who died for our sins and rose from the grave. Colette’s greatest legacy will not be that people remember how hard she fought. It will be that her life continues to point people toward the One who fought and won the final victory over sin and death.
Until We Meet Again
Those of us who knew Colette best will forever carry her in our hearts. Our daughters and I will preserve the stories she created and strive to live with the same faith, love, and devotion that defined her life. We will continue reminding others that the center of her life was never cancer. It was Jesus Christ.
We will remain forever grateful for the life she lived, the home she built, and the example she set. Through faith, laughter, prayer, service, and love, she showed our daughters what genuine Christianity looks like. She never gave up, never lost her eternal optimism, and never allowed suffering to steal the kindness God had placed within her.
For so many nights, our family prayed the 23rd Psalm, lifted our own prayers to God, and closed together with the Lord’s Prayer. Now the Shepherd she trusted has carried her through the final valley and welcomed her into the house of the Lord forever.
This is not goodbye forever. Because of Jesus, it is only “until we meet again.”
We love you beyond words.
Soli Deo Gloria — To God Alone Be the Glory