EVENTS
The Shadow Valley Gospel Music Festival will take place on July 10–12 at Shadow Valley, 54 Warden Rd. in Fayetteville.
The three-day concert series starts at 6 p.m. on July 10 and will last until 9:30 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $25 day of the event; youth 18 and under are free. Please bring lawn chairs; concessions will be available. The WCBA Prayer will also be available each night.
DEATHS
Joyce Cope Wyatt, an International Mission Board missionary emeritus who shared the gospel in Colombia, Chile and Spain, died April 24. She was 97.
Born May 13, 1927, in Rogersville, Tenn., Wyatt graduated from college in 1947 and taught history for one year in Knoxville before entering the Woman’s Missionary Union Training School in Louisville, Ky. There she met Roy Wyatt, and they married on June 27, 1950. Roy served as a pastor.
Joyce went on to earn three master’s degrees from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville. In 1953, the International Mission Board appointed Roy and Joyce as missionaries to Spain, where they began decades of international service that would later extend to Chile and Colombia.
Her commitment to ministry continued upon their return to the United States. Joyce was instrumental in creating Tu Dia, a special day for Spanish-speaking women in Knoxville, and became a strong advocate for immigrant needs. She established scholarships at the Seminary in Colombia, her alma mater Lincoln Memorial University, and Carson Newman University.
A published author, Joyce settled in Knoxville upon retirement and became an active member of Central Baptist Church, Bearden. She taught Sunday School and a weekly Bible study, offered English as a second language classes, and tutored high school students well into her 90s.
Joyce was preceded in death by her husband of 59 years, Dr. Roy Blanton Wyatt; her daughter, Kathryn Mee; her son, Rev. Dr. Michael Wyatt; and her son-in-law, Ralph Christinck.
She is survived by her daughter, Debbi Wyatt Christinck; son-in-law David Mee (Bonnie); ten grandchildren; and 20 great-grandchildren.