Terry Gompert Tribute

Tribute to Terry Gompert

1944-2011

It is with great regret that I am writing this about a friend and mentor. Terry’s passing brings it close to home how fragile life is and how unexpectedly we can be here today and gone tomorrow. We are all saddened by the passing of Terry Gompert. First to his wife Connie our deepest regrets and sympathy and to his four children and almost 14 grandchildren we too feel your grief. His passing on to be with our Heavenly Father is a huge loss to sustainable agriculture, the grassfed industry and to the University of Nebraska Extension service. He was such an advocate for holistic management, sustainable agriculture and those of us involved in the grazing community. We here in NE Nebraska were especially blessed by being able to work with Terry all these years. He will be missed immensely; he has been our teacher and mentor for many years. More than that, he has been a man whom many of us have admired and who has taught us how to be unselfish, and to share the things that we have learned for the benefit of all. Our lives and our purpose in life will be much different because of Terry. We will miss him.

Terry has not been the first one to run in this race of life but he was one of the first ones on the relay team to think differently about how we grow grass, how we graze cattle, and how we are to be stewards of the land and livestock that God has placed in our care. We now are called to carry that baton for the next lap of the race on to the next level. We dare not drop that baton now. We are to grab that baton that he was carrying and do the very best we can with the lap that we will be in charge of. He has showed us how to be bold, yet sensitive to where others are in their journey. He has birthed in us the desire to find out how we can be more efficient, better stewards, and most of all to be the blessing God has called us to be to our fellow man.

It is now time for us to run our lap of this race. We will try to do our part to help you have some of the new tools and information that will help to train you to run your lap of the race. We want to run together as a team to pass this baton off to the next generation who will continue to carry the baton. Terry has done a great job on his lap. We hope we can help you with your lap.

Joey and I, with the help of the committee, will do our very best to make this next conference to be held from Sept. 15 to the 17th a conference that you will not want to miss. It is our goal at the Grassfed Exchange that if you can only attend one conference this summer, you make the Grassfed Exchange conference the one you decide to go to. It will be different without Terry there, but it will be a great conference. I believe we have started something that our industry needs. We believe the opportunity to meet and make contact with other people from all over this country can be invaluable. You will be updated on what is going on in the Grassfed industry. We will bring to you information and speakers who are on the cutting edge of our industry. You will have the opportunity to actually see some of the cattle and meet the genetic breeders behind the genetics of these cattle that you have only heard about. We will have vendors there who will have products for you to look at, then you can decide if they will be of help to you or not.

We want to thank you Terry, for all that you did to help us get the Grassfed Exchange started. I am very thankful for the last couple of days just before his death that I had the opportunity to be with him. I had the opportunity to tell him how much he has meant to me and to all of us whom he has gotten involved in being harvesters of Sunlight, and the producers of healthful food in a holistic and sustainable manner. I pray that we may not forget the many things that Terry has taught each one of us.

A friend and a student

Wayne Rasmussen
The Grassfed Exchange

For information on the memorial service that was held for Terry or where to make donations, visit Brockhaus Funeral Home and click on Terry Gompert on the right. Abe Collins has posted a web page for those that's lives have been impacted by Terry to make comments, add pictures or video that you may have as a testament to Terry's work and life. The Gompert family would like donations to be made in Terry's name to Nebraska Sustainable Ag or Insight for Living with Chuck Swindoll ministries.