Q. How many years have you served in the ministry and where have you served during your ministry?

A. I began preaching part-time as a student minister about fifty years ago. I had only one full time preaching assignment — with the Hollywood Church of Christ in Los Angeles. We were there nearly thirty years. After retiring from the church in Hollywood, we moved to northwest Iowa. I stay busy doing fill-in preaching, teaching personal and group Bible studies, mentoring new Christians, and doing funerals.

Q. Are there one or two individuals outside of family that have been major influences in your life?

A. My senior year of high school and first year of college, I worked for a man who possessed few moral scruples. Successful in business, outgoing, an atheist, and a womanizer, his behavior stood in stark contrast to my Christian upbringing. In addition, my father and he were opposites. Dad was shy and lacked confidence; my boss was bold and arrogant. My conversations and discussions with him forced me to define many of my beliefs. His behavior and attitudes provided me a lot of sermon illustrations, however. Ironically, he understood something profound about male-female relationships that are biblical, but practiced by few Christians. But that’s another story, and possibly another book!

I’ll name the other strong influence — Gardiner Blackman. Gardiner was a self-made man who became an employee relations manager of a large corporation and an elder of the Hollywood church. The following vignettes illustrate why I considered him special:

Leona, Gardiner’s wife was confined to a wheelchair for the last decades of her life. Each Sunday he lifted her into their old sedan for the ride to church. He kept that aged car because its higher seats enabled him to help Leona in and out of it easier. After they parked near the church building, he lifted her into a wheelchair and then wheeled her to the building.

Gardiner had an efficient record keeping system. He never forgot birthdays. The church kids always got anywhere from five to twenty dollars in their cards each birthday. Gardiner was a great listener and was always accessible. Call most executives and you get their secretaries. The only time you talked to Gardiner’s secretary was when he was out of the office. Otherwise he directly answered his phone.

Gardiner often counseled my wife and children. Once our daughters told him about the frugal allowance I gave them. He called me into his office and told me that I would receive no raise in my salary until I greatly increased their allowances. He meant it, too.

Q. How would you describe the church-state relationship in the USA today?

A. Ten thousand doctoral theses couldn’t cover all the factors and parameters of current church-state relationships. Nearly every person has a different expectation of government.

Imagine a bus with fifty passengers of various backgrounds and religions. The majority of passengers are Christians, but they differ on what the route of the bus should be, how fast the bus should travel, where it should stop, and whether it should pick up additional passengers. All those aboard insist on their own way.

Many Christians try to make similar types of decisions for the government, and few are in agreement. They should concentrate first on loving all the other passengers; second, on trying to lead the non-Christian ones to Jesus; and third, praying for the driver (governmental leaders) to have good discernment.

Q. What is your position regarding the extreme right wing evangelical? Is there anything good about this culture?

A. In my opinion, most right and left wing Christians are sincere folks who want to please God. I regard the term “extreme right wing evangelicals” as oxymoronic, however. Evangelical should describe one who evangelizes, that is, tells Jesus’ good news. Right wing intimates not so much evangelizing as promoting political views.

Christians who advance right or left wing politics are like pro basketball players who worry about the conditions of the arenas and courts where they play and fret about the referees who officiate so much that they hardly ever play ball.

Jesus never taught us to change society. He meant for all of his followers to share his good news with others. He calls all people to repentance.

Q. Do we want an American president to express his religious convictions and make decisions based upon religious convictions?

A. Remember the old story about the Lone Ranger and Tonto being surrounded by hostile Indians? The Lone Ranger said something to the effect, “What are we going to do, Tonto?” Tonto replied, “What do you mean by we?”

By “we,” do you mean the general American public or Christians? Ideally, all American presidents should express their true religious convictions so we would know what motivates them. Paul taught us to pray for our leaders to make right choices. It would be wonderful if presidents of this country and others knew Christ and made decisions based on their love for God.

The problem is, not all Christians have the same view of what’s right for the country and what government’s role is. And no one knows for sure what constitutes a just and fair society. Those who are so rabidly sure are often the most badly mistaken.

Q. After 225 years of having the Ten Commandments displayed in our courthouses and prayer in our schools, should we expect it to change?

A. Conditions will change whether we want them to or not. It’s possible that there will be a turn-around in American society, but only God knows. Regardless, all Christians need to be serious about preaching the good news to the ends of the earth.

Q. What is your opinion of parochial schools?

A. They have served some good purposes, but their future may be in jeopardy as more and more archdioceses declare bankruptcy.

Q. Should citizen's tax money be used for private and parochial schools?

A. I’ll let others worry about that question.

Q. Does a militant Islam change anything in your perspective?

A. Islam began militant: Mohammed forcibly subdued the people of Mecca. The Koran contains numerous references to his conflicts with the Meccans. His armies quickly conquered much of the Middle East within a hundred years. Not all Muslims are warlike. Many of them genuinely want peace.

But whether Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, or whatever, we should show them that Jesus, God’s only son is the way, first by loving them, and second by telling the good news about the Son of God who visited this planet to end sin, hate, and death.

Q. What changes do you foresee in the church-state relationship in the next ten years?

A. I think it was Toffler who said, “To prophesy is difficult, especially concerning the future.” We keep forgetting what Jesus said: "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today (Matthew 6:34 NRSV).