[1]NASHVILLE (BP) – New Season Church Pastor Dwayne Lewis and others texted Minister Tavaran Ridley on Sunday, Aug. 4, asking when he would arrive at the church at 1900 S. Hamilton Rd. He was due to serve in children’s church at 11:30 a.m.
Lewis and the church family would learn hours later that Ridley, his 8-year-old son Tavaran “Deuce” Ridley II and 2-year-old niece Esther Holston were killed in a car accident at 8:30 a.m. on their way to church.
“At 10:30 that night, one of their family members called me and told me what happened,” Lewis told Baptist Press Aug. 12. “So that night I got up and went to the hospital to visit with the kids and his wife and everything. And of course, it was just, they were injured so badly.”
Ridley’s wife Anasia, pregnant with the couple’s second son, is still hospitalized but recovering well from the accident, Lewis said. The Ridleys’ 9-year-old daughter Aamiyah is on a breathing tube and responding to doctors’ commands, Lewis said, while their daughter Zoe, about 5, has been released.
Lewis and his wife Alexa describe Ridley as quiet, unassuming and loved by everyone in the congregation. At New Season for a year, Ridley helped train new ministers in New Season’s school of ministry.
The church held a prayer service for the Ridley family and relatives the evening of Aug. 5, attended by Tennessee Baptist Mission Board (TBMB) Executive Director Randy Davis, other TBMB representatives and members of the Nashville Baptist Association, whose support Lewis lauded.
“When I became a part of the TBMB and the Nashville Baptist Association, their love and compassion for people and for families is like no other,” Lewis said. “The TBMB has always been there for us. It’s just them showing up and still calling me today, just checking on us and stuff is really a sweet thing.”
On Aug. 10, New Season hosted a service to remember the family and help congregants deal with the loss, aided by grief counselors who led children and adults in several activities designed to promote healing. Children drew pictures, released bubbles and joined adults in designing a banner with colorful handprints.
Ridley was excitedly awaiting the birth of a second son.
“They had a gender reveal gathering and they knew they were having a boy,” Lewis said. “And he was very excited about that because he wanted another boy.”
Ridley and his son shared a close relationship, Lewis said.
“He and Deuce were what they call two peas in a pod. Where you saw Tavaran, you also saw Deuce. And it was really, really a sweet thing to see,” Lewis said. “His wife was talking yesterday. She said, ‘Pastor Lewis, I just don’t know, if one of them would have lived, how they would have lived without each other.’”
She told Lewis she thanked God they left the world together, Lewis said, “because it probably would have been so hard for one or the other of them to be here without the other, because they were that close.”
Details of the accident have not been released, except that I-65 N was closed for nearly eight hours after the accident. Funeral arrangements are pending.
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