Suzanne Louise Kasting

+ In Loving Memory +
Suzanne L. Kasting was born on August 20, 1946, in Indianapolis, IN. She went home to her Lord on October 25 at the age of 79.
Sue's life was a song of joy. The third child of Myron and Geraldine Rodebaugh, she grew up surrounded by music. Her father was a gifted pianist, her mother a vocal soloist, and her grandmother directed five choirs. Blessed with a high soprano voice, Sue was a part of musical ensembles during her high school and college years and sang at many a wedding and funeral.
Sue was trained as a teacher. She received her degree in elementary education from the University of Indianapolis (at that time Indiana Central College), graduating at the top of her class. After teaching in public school, she turned her energy to teaching Sunday School and leading children's choirs, ministries she maintained for more than thirty years. Her service was recognized with the Northwest District's "Volunteer Teacher of the Year" award in the mid-1990's.
Sue was a lifelong Christian. Baptized as a child, she grew up in the Baptist and Methodist traditions, and later joined her husband's Lutheran Church. Her radiant face was the outward manifestation of her radiant faith in Jesus. Devotional readings and prayer were the daily bread that nourished her faith and inspired fruitful service that edified many around her.
The granddaughter of a minister, Sue expressed a childhood wish to marry a pastor. God granted that wish in the person of her high school sweetheart Mike, an aspiring divinity student. After four years of courtship, the couple married on June 16, 1968. They moved to St. Louis, where Mike received his seminary education and Sue earned her P.H.T. degree ("Putting Hubby Through"). There also she began her joyful vocation as a mother. Daughter Melanie arrived while the couple was still in St. Louis. A second daughter Christa and a son Peter were born in Vancouver, WA. The children all remember her faithful morning devotions and her bedtime song-prayers. Those prayers echoed years later at the bedtimes of her grandchildren.
Each pastoral call moved the family to a new home: from Vancouver, WA, to Akron, OH, in 1980; to Sequim, WA, in 1988; to Oregon City, OR, in 1999, and to Casey, IL, in 2010. In Sequim Sue added "church secretary" to her resume.
As a small girl she lost a precious ring. She promised God that if He guided her to it, she would become a missionary. The ring was found, and in several ways her vow was fulfilled. She introduced many children to joyful praise of Jesus through her music. In 2006 she accompanied Mike to serve a short-term mission in Kyrgyzstan and helped to baptize new believers in a lake. "It was like stepping back into the Book of Acts," she reported with wonder.
Sue and Mike led retreats for married couples at the Oregon coast. They cherished vacation trips to Hawaii, Israel, New England, Texas, New Orleans, and the desert Southwest. She loved animals (notably squirrels, skunks, and hooded rats!), baking, sewing clothes for the children, canning fruit picked at many an orchard, and volunteering her time in community service. She served as an intake volunteer for LOVE, INC, as a driver for senior citizens, as a staff assistant in a Crisis Pregnancy Center, and as a computer room assistant at an elementary school.
Diagnosed with dementia in 2014, Sue received care at home from Mike and then spent the last six years of her life at Trinity Blessed Homecare in Milwaukie. Her caregivers report she greeted them each morning with a warm smile.
Sue was preceded in death by her parents. She is survived by three brothers, Phil (Linda), Dick (Pat), and Dave (Linda); by her husband Mike, by her children Melanie (Gary) Hoffman, Christa (Jeff) Zellar, and Peter (Karen) Kasting, and by ten grandchildren, many in-laws, and several nieces and nephews.
Sue's life was her response to the grace of God in Jesus, and her song of joy reverberates in the lives of those who were blessed to know her.