With an optimistic attitude and my Buddhist meditations, I thought I could conquer any obstacle. After all, I'd run more than 100 marathons and ultra-marathons, including 150 miles through the Sahara and Mojave deserts.

That was before my wife asked me to leave our home.

Quadrennial Address

David A. Busic, Chair

On behalf of the Board of General Superintendents 

29th General Assembly

Indianapolis, Indiana, US

Church of the Nazarene

26 June 2017

Writing this, I am 10 days into my second jurisdictional trip to Africa this year. As a young person, and later as a pastor, I heard remarkable stories of God's work through the Church of the Nazarene on that vast continent. Africa's history is replete with strife, oppression, and warfare. Civilizations have come and gone. Today, the people of Africa are in places where poverty and disease are so prevalent that an entire generation is in danger of disappearing. The contrasts are staggering as we find them in gleaming high-rise office buildings, or driving expensive late-model vehicles.

On February 16, 2005, an internationally known author composed a note from his home high in the Colorado Rockies: "No more games. No more bombs. No more walking. No more fun. No more swimming. 67. That is 17 years past 50. 17 more than I needed or wanted. Boring . . . No fun—for anybody. 67. You are getting greedy. Act your old age. Relax—this won't hurt."

Four days later he committed suicide. He chose death.

I really miss my father, who passed away two years ago. He was a missionary who had a heart for all people. The first two words of the Lord's Prayer—"Our Father" (Matthew 6:9)—remind me of our Heavenly Father and also of my wonderful earthly father. In fact, in reading the Lord's Prayer lately, I began to contemplate just what that brief address, "Our Father," means in different realms of our lives.

Global

Every Christian wants to have a great church experience. But what we get out of our time in God's house depends to a great degree on what we put into it. So how can we get the most out of church?

Q: What would HT readers be surprised to learn about you?
A: I was a high school physical education teacher for eight years before entering ministry. (I was 40 pounds lighter in those days.)

Q: What is the best thing about your life?
A: Seeing my family involved in the church. I am a first generation Christian. There is nothing I like more than to see my family in church and following the Lord.

Curt Luthye, Work and Witness coordinator on the Caribbean Region, shares highlights of his work, and that of other volunteers. A graduate of Southern Nazarene University and Nazarene Theological Seminary, Luthye has served in this capacity for nearly four years. Work and Witness, part of the denomination's World Mission Department, facilitates the process for volunteers to participate in short-term mission work around the globe.

Q. What do you do as Work and Witness coordinator?

Merhan Karimi Nasseri lives in Paris. Well, sort of.

Actually he lives in Terminal One of the Charles de Gaulle International Airport. Nasseri's story begins in Iran in 1977. Fresh from studying in England, he was expelled from Iran, without a passport, for protesting against the Shah. He bounced from capital to capital until deciding to settle in the Paris airport.

"God don't let me make an impact on the world and lose my own family." This has been my constant prayer for 36 years of serving in missions, much of that overseas.

I didn't have the privilege of growing up in a Christian home. Since I was the youngest of nine children, none of my siblings were at home when my father was converted. My father was 60 years old when a young pastor contacted him. For two years my father was rude and resistant, but this pastor kept praying, believing, and visiting my father. Within two years he had won my mother and my father to Christ.