Hobie McGill

Whatever he did, he did it with passion. Youth baseball and football? You could expect Hobie to knock slammers out of the park or completely flatten the opposing quarterback after powering his way through the defensive line. Christian metal music? He played Stryper during his wedding ceremony — ’nuff said. Serving God and others? He modeled, for so many, how to live for the Lord with such fervor that his dad once stated, “They pray the wallpaper off the walls.” No doubt about it: Hobie lived his life out loud.

Hobie had a rich social life throughout his entire 56 years. People gravitated toward him like a moth to a flame, a flame that continues to burn in the lives and hearts of those he touched. An active youth counselor and evangelist at a number of churches on Atlanta’s southern outskirts, Hobie brought the party with him to each encounter. He was a master at winning “Chubby Bunnies” competitions (wherein one stuffs their mouths with marshmallows and repeats the phrase with hoped-for clarity), and he was outbelched only once during Camp Paradise’s awesome burping contests. (Too bad the winner was the daughter of the senior pastor at his church.) No matter if he was ministering to kids in the inner city or those out in the ’burbs, Hobie loved what he did, and so did those around him.

It was with the youth group at Stockbridge Assembly of God that Hobie found his soul mate and life partner, Betsy, in 1996. Already having had a major role in helping raise his nephews Daniel and Paul Mack, Hobie wasn’t necessarily looking to start a family, but fate found him. The two were married one year later, and Hobie lovingly took in Betsy’s teenage twin daughters, Sabrina and Sandra Jarvis, the latter of whom took his surname once she was legally old enough to do so. In Hobie, Betsy found the model of how a husband should treat his wife — “by placing her on a pedestal so high that she gets a nosebleed,” he emphatically exclaimed on multiple occasions — and his new twins likewise learned how a loving father should treat his children and their mother. Hobie and Sandra grew close quickly, a bond that remains to this day, and he and Sabrina developed a particularly impactful bond as she grew into young adulthood.

Hobie had a certain determination in everything he did. When diagnosed with liver disease in early 2019 and given only a six-month prognosis, Hobie bested the doctors’ predictions, still kicking tail until his very last breath three years later, just days after his 25th wedding anniversary. That breath was taken in prayer surrounded by his wife, twins, nephew Daniel, pastor, and lifelong friends. Into the hands of his Creator, Hobie joins his parents, Albert and Katherine McGill, and siblings Tina Jones and Delbert McGill. He is survived by sisters Charlotte McGill and Judy Mack, niece Kay Keeton, nephews Paul and Daniel Mack, soul mate Betsy McGill, and twin daughters Sabrina Jarvis and Sandra McGill.

“I choose to love rather than hate,” Hobie once told his daughter Sandra in the face of adversity. “Not because love is the easiest, but because it is the right thing to do.” Hobie demonstrated his love for others in so many ways, and now it is time for those he leaves behind to carry that flaming torch on.

Visitation for Hobie will be held on Sunday, March 13, 2022 from 2:00PM-3:00PM at Horis A. Ward - Fairview Chapel, 376 Fairview Road, Stockbridge, Georgia 30281, with a Celebration of Life immediately following at 3:00 PM with John "Barnzee" Barnes, officiating.

Burial will be in Fairview Memorial Gardens on Monday, March 14, 2022 at 2:00PM, family and friends are asked to gather at Horis A. Ward Funeral Home at 1:45PM.

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.horisawardfairviewchapel.com for the McGill family.