Obituary of Christopher Jonathan Davis

     Born on May 7, 1959, in Long Island, NY, Christopher Jonathan Davis was the oldest of three sons born to Jonathan and Marian Davis. Chris passed away on August 7, 2023, leaving his beloved wife Erica.  Chris is also survived by his adult children Brian Davis and Heather Rumsey, brothers Jeff and Gary Davis and his special Uncle George and Aunt Patsy Taylor who played an important role in his life.

     Chris had an amazing life, a huge heart for God and a deep and caring and abiding love for Erica.  Chris was devoted, caring, supportive, thoughtful, compassionate, kind-hearted, affectionate, considerate, nurturing, loyal, understanding, patient, encouraging, generous, and reliable.

     Until age 12 Chris lived in Queens and then Mohopac, NY until the family moved to Boca Raton, FL where he lived as a teenager till his mid 20’s. This little boy who loved girls also loved God- where he shared Jesus with everyone carrying around his Bible: ” Good News for Modern Man”.  He always wanted people to know that Jesus loved them.

     Enrolled in Florida Atlantic University in the engineering program, college was a bore to Chris, but he did earn his associate degree and at 19 went to work for IBM in Boca Raton.

He started in factory work and quickly created his own business within IBM with media production and that created his career path. Chris moved on to Atlanta with IBM and stayed in media production, creating commercials for the worldwide HR teams and conventions. These presentations were managed by him in Paris, India, and other areas of the world where he enjoyed traveling to.  Chris was a high-powered media guy for IBM—moving on to Your Learning with IBM University in Atlanta with AI (Watson Discovery), and he focused on this until his retirement. An innovator with IBM, Chris developed six patents that are now owned and used by the company. Interestingly, one patent was developed before meeting Erica, but after he met her five more quickly followed. As Erica remembers, “He was free to create and love.” He received 6 lifetime achievement awards from IBM for patent development.  His senior leader at IBM recently said: “Chris was our tech professor inside IBM Learning”.

     After retirement, Chris continued learning.  He enrolled at CU Boulder in the College of Media and Communications, then he was introduced to Colorado Christian Academy at Grace Place where he transferred in his junior year at 62.  He held a 4.0 average throughout his academic life. 

     Chris loved music! He started playing guitar by watching his dad play at age 8 and he was self-taught on the piano as well. He was in high school and college bands—four bands in college (which might explain why the academic part of college was such a bore!). He was never without his guitar and took it with him everywhere.  In 2017, joined Grace Place and was led to the worship team who became his family.  He was a dedicated and much valued and loved member of the worship team at Grace Place Church where he played regularly.

     When he wasn’t playing guitar, his other love was water.  He loved Scuba diving and swimming.  The love for water and his days of swimming paid off one night when he rescued 2 people from their car that plunged into the intercoastal canal.  “He was a miracle—doing miracle things.”

  Chris was an avid cyclist.  After 45 years of age, he completed many races in the north Georgia Mountains, North Carolina, and decided that those were not enough.  He then headed to Leadville, Colorado where completed the Leadville 100 Mountain Bike race in 2012.  He loved photography and returned to Leadville in 2016 as a race photographer where he met his future wife.  In 2016, he competed in the Austin Rattler, a mountain bike race where he ran into Erica again where he stayed in touch with her and they fell in love in a long distance relationship.  He moved Erica to Boulder, Colorado where she lived for 4 months while Chris stayed in Atlanta to work on his career transfer to IBM Boulder, CO.  Once he completed his transfer, the 2017 New Year was fast approaching, and Chris had BIG plans.   Dec. 27, 2016- Chris asked Erica to join him on a trip to New York City to celebrate.  Chris was so excited because he planned an exciting night and told Erica her “forever life” with him had just begun.  Chris proposed to Erica at the top of the Empire State building- where they were escorted, by police, to the top.  He got on one knee and proposed.  He put both rings on her finger and while she was saying: “yes yes yes.”  As soon as they returned from NYC, they saw the judge and married.  They truly lived a fairytale “Happily Ever After, romance”, enjoying every day with each other, enjoying their home in Longmont, their church Grace Place, and tandem cycling in beautiful, Northern Colorado. 

     Chris had 6 major loves: Number 1: GOD, Number 2: Erica: Number 3: Family and Friends, Number 4: Guitar, Number 5: his worship team, Number 6: cycling.  Chris was a student of the Bible.  He always got up early to see the sun rise.  He was a “peaceful and loving man. “He was an angel on earth.”