My California Tour

I’m in the middle of what my friend Charlie Maloney dubbed my “California Tour.” It’s been a great way to reconnect with old friends on their own turf since I was coming anyway to speak at Hope International University.

I arrived Wednesday evening, and Dr. Joseph Grana picked me up from LAX and navigated the freeway traffic down to Fullerton, where the school is located. Joe and I have known each other for 50 years—we were kids together in the same youth group in Waukegan, Illinois—but I think this week was the most time we’ve spent together in decades. It was great to catch up with him and learn more about his life and ministry. Great, too, to see him in action interacting with colleagues and students. I sat in on one of his classes and really enjoyed his review of the first chapters of Acts. His easy interaction with the students as well as grasp of the material demonstrated his effectiveness as a professor.

Another joy was meeting Hope’s campus minister, Bryan Sands, who, among other things, plans and organizes the school’s chapel sessions. He was very organized, tending to every detail, but he had an easy rapport with the students who conducted the service I attended.

This week’s chapel was an a capella service. “Worship is more than music,” Bryan acknowledged, but even so, since music is such an important element, “there’s more than one way to use music in worship.” Thursday’s worship team, about eight young men and women, led us in a hymn and several worship choruses, complete with vocal percussion and full harmony. I really enjoyed it.

I also enjoyed interacting with several students, among them one young man who is earnestly seeking to discover God’s call on his life. It was humbling and encouraging to talk with him about how to figure out where God wants to use him after college.

Thursday at noon I enjoyed a wonderful lunch served in the college president’s dining room with Joe Grana, a couple of other faculty and administrators, and the guest of honor, Floyd Strater. Floyd has been a church builder, an encourager of other ministers, a friend, and a kingdom builder wherever he has served, whether Enid Oklahoma, Springfield, Illinois, or Anaheim, California. After finishing his ministry at Knott Avenue Christian Church in Anaheim, he served for several years on the staff of Hope International (then Pacific Christian College). In that role, he traveled to churches throughout Southern California preaching, advising, consulting, building up. He served on Standard Publishing’s Publishing Committee for 40 years (“the most enjoyable group I ever was a part of,” he told me) and was a leader and influencer with the North American Christian Convention.

We sat and talked and reminisced and laughed for almost three hours, and it was great to be with him. He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease about a year ago, and so his activity has been curtailed. But his spirit is as vibrant as ever.

Thursday afternoon I sat in on Bob Mink’s class, and then we grabbed dinner at the Cheesecake Factory before he navigated the freeways back to his home in Moreno Valley, California. Bob was a year behind me and Evelyn at Cincinnati Bible Seminary, and we’ve stayed long-distance friends ever since. He, too, led a dynamic class session—I learned some stuff in it!—and related well to his students. I really enjoyed talking with him about his ministry and mine and pondering where the next few years would take us.

Friday morning Becky Ahlberg picked me up at the school and treated me to breakfast at Mimi’s Café before taking me on a tour of her ministry in Anaheim, My Safe Harbor. It’s an outreach to the urban community in Anaheim and beyond, principally to single mothers who have missed the positive influences and support and accountability that all of us need to survive. She’s doing a wonderful work there, in addition to her fine arts ministries at First Christian Church of Anaheim, which owns the building that houses My Safe Harbor.

Glenn and Carolyn posed just before he left to
preach a funeral.

From Anaheim I drove to West Hills where Glenn and Carolyn Kirby serve the West Valley Christian Church. It was a treat to see the large complex of buildings the church owns and uses not only for weekend services but for a Christian school and a host of community activities. We enjoyed lunch together and a long visit (again about what our ministries will look like between now and retirement ahead) before Glenn had to go preach a funeral at 3:00. I showed wedding pictures to Carolyn and then was off for Camarillo before 3:30.

I’m writing this from the home of Charlie and Bev Maloney in Camarillo, where Charlie has preached for the Christian church here for 30 years. We’ve been friends since college days more than 40 years ago; they were in our wedding; Evelyn was in theirs; Charlie and I sang in a quartet together, and he and Bev and I were a part of the school’s very first Come Alive Singers.

It’s great just to relax and catch up—and laugh!—with them. I’m glad I can hang out with them all day today before I head for LAX and home tomorrow.