Memorial for Michael Sharp held in Kansas

Family and friends are continuing to remember the life of Michael Sharp.

The Goshen native was kidnapped on March 12, while working for the United Nations in Central Africa.

His body was discovered two weeks later in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Hesston Mennonite Church in Kansas was packed earlier Saturday evening as close friends and family remembered his life.

“MJ lived and died loving the world, I have to trust that his choice to dedicate his life to loving the voiceless, forgotten , and vilified, wasn’t in vein, that love didn’t failed him in the end, and if we can continue his legacy of living out love in our own lives it wont fail us either,” said a family friend.

According to our reporting partners at the Elkhart Truth, Sharp was working for the United Nations looking into violations of UN Security Council sanctions.

Saturday evening, a United Nations spokesperson talked about Sharp’s impact for bringing peace to the world.

“The United Nations has lost one of its brightest. The security council, one of its most gifted investigators, and the people of the Democratic Republic of Congo, one of its most committed advocates for peace,” a United Nations spokesperson said.