Tulsa – Jerry Lout ⚬ Writer ⚬ Speaker ⚬ Mobilizer

September 19, 2024

Primed

Few accomplishments rival the relief of landing a job in one’s profession of choice soon after finishing years of intense work and study. While the news of gaining his first-ever gig – professorship in the energy industry – sparked real delight, our Southeast Asia friend Nguyen (now ‘Doctor Nguyen’) would soon meet with yet another thrill.

The past several years had, in hindsight, proved a watershed season for his young family. As newcomers to a strange, intriguing culture (America), the Nguyens had been befriended and afterward deeply comforted by a little band of Jesus-followers.

Along the way, they had permitted themselves to revisit and question some of their earlier assumptions about culture, faith – even foundational matters of life’s meaning.

In time they had yielded themselves to Christ, receiving him as Lord. They encountered his comforting presence, as well, during the grievous loss of their newborn. They utterly embraced Jesus as companioning master for all of life “here on out”. The twists and turns of those recent years – carrying forward in the real world in the company of faithful brothers and sisters – had, at the core, set the Nguyen household on a radical trajectory of purpose. With no desire to content themselves with a status-quo Christian faith, the couple brought a single-mindedness to walking closely with their Savior who had given – and continued giving – life to them. Whatever the future, the Nguyens were on mission to share the life with others.

As to that further thrill – the one beyond the teaching job.

The fresh position meant relocating from Tulsa to another city and state westward. After their move, Professor Nguyen and his wife had a surprise discovery. Their new place of residence was home to a large community (some ten thousand) of their own overseas countrymen. Of common culture and common language and common flavors suited to the Southeast Asian tastebud.

Ignatian Spirituality conveys a happy sentiment, “May the God of surprises delight you”.

A single small church existed to serve and reach out to this large ethnic population of the city.

It was to this environment the young professor was sensing a clear leading. Primed for worship and for witness, through community.

March 28, 2024March 27, 2024

A Pulsing Contagion

“Hi Jerry! I’m Weili!”

The cheery voice streamed from the phone. Her accent had the musical lilt of a young Far Easterner, which clearly pulsed with excited urgency.

“I have just recently come to Tulsa from California where I have been studying at a university.”

It’s always a refreshing sound, a cheery voice at the opposite end of a telephone line. Weili caught me a little off guard with her next words – strung together with enthusiasm – high speed.

“Jerry, I am a Christian. I met the Lord there in California. Now I’ve heard about the work you are doing here in Tulsa, and I have a request!” She continued with barely a pause,

“Please come to the Jesus Inn tomorrow night. Bring your guitar! Several new grad-student guys just arrived from my country, and you can sing some songs and tell them about Jesus!”

I smiled at the spunk of this girl I had never met, Somehow she knows of our presence on campus and that I plunk guitar strings now and then. Adding to the mix, I mused, Weili seems a young lady overflowing with boundless joy, and a heart just bursting with evangelistic fervor.

Her spirit (all that I really had to go on) sparked inside me both an element of intrigue and a sense of adventure. Her child-like eagerness felt contagious. Who could not like this person? I thought with a smile.

Finally she paused, making room for a response.

“Well, Okay Weili, If it’s alright with the Jesus Inn folks, I’ll see you there.”

The ‘Inn’ – a string of aged houses lining a stretch of city block near the campus – had gotten launched as an in-residence place offering help and hope to a young generation back in the 1960s. Gordon and Susan Wright, along with ‘recovered-and-in-recovery’ volunteers – together with the Wright’s own children – had long stewarded the unconventional space.

To a long parade of the homeless, the hippied and the bedraggled – from lost and afraid flower children to strung-out , disillusioned druggies – the Jesus Inn became a haven of refuge. A place of hope.

“Lord”, I whispered the next evening as I gathered Bible and guitar and headed out the door, “please meet us, please guide.”

March 7, 2024March 6, 2024

Timely Provision

“Jerry, you will need a Faculty Advisor”.

I had begun ticking whatever boxes needed ticking, in the effort to comply with university protocol for registering a viable campus student organization. The entity we would formalize, it was decided, would bear the label, International Student Ministries.

As things evolved in our quest for birthing, by God’s grace, a vital spiritual presence among female and male students from across the world, a professor’s name emerged on our radar. What if our faculty-advisor-to-be were right this moment moving from classroom to lab over in ‘Keplinger’ – the facility housing the College of Engineering?

Jerry McCoy, a bona fide son of the Sooner State, had grown up in the shadow of the University of Tulsa where his father had taught before him. With a keen aptitude for the sciences, Jerry then studied at TU, and afterwards taking up an assignment as Professor of Physics.

Beyond the credentials and his status as an admired faculty member, Professor McCoy carried sure marks on and off campus of a devoted Christ-follower.

The day Jerry accepted the invitation to advisership marked one of ISM’s best moments!

A serendipitous sidebar played out in time, giving rise to smiles in the Lout/McCoy households. Jerry and Jerry in the service of a common ministry. . . Spouses Anne and Ann, each happy mothers of an ‘Amy’. . . both Amys working concurrently as coffee house baristas!

Occasional catch-up times between Professor McCoy and I affirmed our regard for student ministry, while deepening our friendship in a long obedience in the same direction*.

February 15, 2024February 14, 2024

The Liason

Our young friend Constant was asked by school administration to act as liaison for some new enrollees soon to venture stateside from his (and their) distant island nation. Knowing they were readying themselves – as he had earlier done – to traverse the fourteen time zones into Tulsa, Constant took the role with keen empathy. A flurry of email exchanges followed. At last D-Day for the half-dozen students’ arrival came, all of them aboard the same flight.

By this time in Constant’s Tulsa sojourn, he had grown aware of my Sunday worship rhythm. Later, in a matter-of-fact style, he related to me the airport scene as he welcomed the young arrivals from their native, predominantly Buddhist, homeland.

Scene: Arrival gate. Friday.

Constant: “Welcome to America!”, followed by incidental chitchat.

“Sunday morning you will go with me to Church. . .

“And, you will meet my friend, Jerry, there.”

Having engaged with Constant already and recognizing him as their ‘veteran’ international point person, the travel-weary but eager students nodded their pleasure. Formalities complete, the mini parade of scholars gathered up their carry-ons and headed for Baggage Claim.

Nice, I thought, maybe not the protocol others would have employed in receiving first-time arrivals to the country. Well done, Constant.

Sunday dawned.

Not having yet known of their airport dialogue, I entered our church sanctuary and got a happy surprise. My friend Constant flashed his easy smile, and then guided me to a particular row of seats. Here sat the six newly landed scholars – guys and ladies, warm and courteous – taking up the better part of the church pew row.

When service ended my wife and I mingled with the group. Then waved farewell as Constant whisked them off to further adventurous tastes of American culture.

We would meet again.

January 11, 2024

Sharp Turn

Impressive structures that weather the elements of time owe their long resilience to sound foundations. Moving about the Tulsa campus lying along the famed Route 66 corridor, I was garnering insights about T.U.’s own foundations. Not those to do with brick and mortar but of held convictions, beliefs and values – elements that gave rise to the university’s birth back in the nineteenth century.

Along the way I reflected how the many streams of higher education in America had sprung forth and flowed directly from the headwaters of Christian faith and practice.

The first colleges in America were founded by Christians and approximately 106 out of the 108 first colleges were Christian colleges. Harvard University, which is considered one of the leading universities in America and the world was founded by Christians. One of the original precepts of the then Harvard College stated that students should be instructed in knowing God and that Christ is the only foundation of all “sound knowledge and learning*.

The more I drank in of T.U.’s legacy the more I felt a grateful kinship. I paused at the courtyard of Sharp Chapel. Bedrock elements like truth and compassion, mercy and justice – qualities embodied in the person of Jesus himself – had birthed this place. These and other such virtues, all featured front and center at the school’s inception.

The University of Tulsa arose out of Presbyterian Mission roots by way of Kendall College. Even now the ‘vital signs’ of the Christian faith bore evidence of active life. Via several streams of campus expression. From Presbyterian to Baptist to Methodist to Catholic, alongside a range of parachurch ministries.

Buoyed in part by my recent ‘until they know that you care’ moment, I rallied my courage.

Entering through large ornate doors of Sharp Chapel I followed a stairway up to the Chaplain’s office.

Would my request be approved? I wondered. Would International Student Ministries be endorsed as a formally sanctioned presence. To offer, through the Lord’s grace, a witness to the life and hope resident in the person of Jesus? Particularly, among scholars and students even now making their way to this place from across the world.

December 28, 2023December 26, 2023

Behind The Scenes

“Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous”. Einstein’s quip leaves me wondering whether the renowned Physicist had some family of returning missionaries in mind.

With us no longer living and serving overseas, Ann and I found the Twilight Zone our new address. We talked, we dreamed some rather feeble dreams, we pondered. . . And prayed. “Guidance”, Loren Cunningham wisely noted, “is first of all a relationship with the Guide”.

A question surfaced in my thoughts over and over as I again strolled the lovely Tulsa campus, What if I requested and was given approval by the University to register as an international student volunteer organization? What then about a ministry ‘covering’?

Elim Fellowship of Lima, NY had through all our Africa years served as our sponsoring organization. Deep friendships and spiritual camaraderie had been forged between us and fellow Elim team members through our many ups and downs of Christian service.

I am not a brilliant man, but I’ve been given the sense to suspect it is almost always a bad idea to strike out in the Lord’s work as a lone ranger.

Enter an Einstein coincidence.

To my utter surprise word came that our mission agency (Elim) had just elected to create a new department. Its central focus being to extend Christian friendship and service to college students – but not just any college students. Elim Fellowship was right now poised to launch its first-ever international-student-ministry department. Christening the arm as All Nations USA. A seasoned servant-leader, David Spencer, would be tending the helm at the NY office.

The timely development of such an unlikely script indicated, it seemed, the handwriting of divine providence. Signed, Anonymous.

November 16, 2023November 16, 2023

Sliver of Light

My sister, visiting the Okmulgee Cemetery prior to our father’s passing, had spied a lone leafy tree standing poised like a sentry keeping watch over her modest collection of ‘final resting places’ nearby.

“We want a spot near a shady tree”. Betty’s voice was resolute. Decades have passed at this writing. The same sentry remains faithful at her post, casting summertime shade over the added headstone marked, Clyde and Thelma Lout.

Oklahoma towns are known for their distinctive names. Ann and I selected a home in Broken Arrow, a community sitting a stone’s throw from Tulsa. Several colleges dotted the nearby urban landscape. We still had no specific ministry roadmap in place yet were drawn to locate at a spot in easy reach of international students.

Amy, our Africa-born, fish-out-of-water nine-year-old, assumed her stateside academic career in a virtually foreign environment – a region called the Sooner State.

We linked up with a church pastored by a brother of our missionary friend, Jon Stern. It was here, in a nondescript office adjacent to a hallway water fountain, I would take my first halting steps beyond emotional trauma traced back to early childhood. The layers of crippling secrecy would start getting peeled away.

My unhappy experience stretching back to pre-adolescent childhood days had featured a much older boy. The dark-of-night violation carried memories too distressing for a kid’s mind to process – much less to manage. Thus, the matter had been left undisclosed, its attending confusion and trauma kept under wraps. No one knew.

The secret would one day, through my own telling and to my immeasurable relief, come to light. Waves of hope would follow. But not just yet. It seems that God – his understanding and compassion, deep beyond measure – chooses to postpone bringing some things out of the shadows until a preferred time. The right time.

“Hi”. The gentleman’s smile was kind, disarming. He stood poised but relaxed at the entrance of the room whose doorway stood open, “I’m Steve”.

Until that day I had never drawn on the professional skills of a clinical Counsellor. Steve Blahut was the right pick.

October 20, 2015August 28, 2017

Eyes

The term reasonable and prudent measured Montana’s legal highway speed for years. Absent a daytime speed limit, drivers simply focused on the road ahead. Rather than radar-fitted patrol cars – or their own speedometers. Some motorists argue that Big Sky highways were safer in those earlier times – when reasonable and prudent described people themselves – not just speed laws. My small-engine motorcycle threatened neither Montana nor Wyoming law enforcement of the ‘60s.

Crossing railway tracks at the south edge of Laurel, Montana, brought me within twenty miles of my destination. Funny how our senses usher us to times and locations. And memories. With its oil refinery, Laurel’s sights and smells wakened feelings of another place. From the highway entering Tulsa we saw refineries layer the atmosphere in smoke plumes. Spreading their billows adrift – like a giant bedcovering flung from a housekeeper’s invisible hands. Near the highway white storage tanks shadowed a larger-than-life sign. Boldly declaring, Tulsa, Oklahoma – Oil Capital of the World.

Well, it’s Sunday morning in Montana. If the Creason family is around, in a few minutes they’re likely entering a church. Somewhere.

Downtown Billings was quiet. The abrasive air began to mellow as the sun made its upward climb. Leaving the parked Honda, I entered an upscale hotel and surveyed the lobby. There were two mahogany phone booths, side by side – neither of them occupied. It wasn’t a telephone I sought. I flipped through the directory to the Yellow Pages.

C-h-u-. . There it was. Churches. Hmm. Even for a city of sixty thousand, this seemed a lot of churches.

Let’s see. . . Non-denominational. If the Creasons are not away, they’re probably, maybe. Beneath the category the tip of my forefinger glided downward. Plenty of listings here, too.

A ballpoint, attached to a thin chain, lay close at hand. Resting my finger at a random name I copied the church and its address. It didn’t occur to me to copy any of the others.

Absent the aid of a city map I directed my bike down a side street just beyond the hotel. After two or three turns, within a few blocks I was at the street I sought. Minutes after leaving the phone booth I spotted the church sign, Tabernacle of Faith. I tipped the open end of my left glove. My watch read nine forty-five.

An outer church stairway led me up to the entrance. The warmth of the sanctuary enveloped me and I paused to take in the room and scan the few early arrivals. Drawing a long breath I smiled broadly.

Erica Creason – Fred ‘s war bride (as the era designated her) – spotted me. Her German accent traversed the sanctuary. Fred! Boys.

Erica remained astonished. Her eyes glistened. Look. It is Jerry Lout!

The foursome descended on me. Exclamations punctuated our laughter as we hugged.

Pretty amazing, I thought. The first place to look. And here they are. The Creasons. Wow.

Our mini-reunion quieted as piano music signaled an opening hymn. Taking up a red song book I fingered the graphic. Three gilded crosses. The corners of my mouth turned upward. Melodies of Praise. Throughout worship I felt closeness. Close to friends, close to others in the room – even the strangers. I felt close in our common purpose to gather in this place. To worship the Lord, to grow in our faith. What church is about, I thought. Following the morning sermon, the Creasons brought me to the preacher.

Brother Barnes, we want to introduce you to Jerry Lout. He’s a friend from Oklahoma, from our church body there.

Pastor Earl Barnes, a gregarious personality, smiled. He welcomed me, then signaled his family. I recognized the approaching woman as the organist. She carried herself with grace. Her smile was full, sincere.

Jerry, this is my wife, Mary, and our three children.

I nodded. He indicated their two boys. Our sons here are Jonathan and David. And this is their sister.

The pretty fifteen-year-old stood relaxed but poised. She held a scarf and woolen cap. Across an arm draped a winter coat that would soon conceal the light blue sweater she wore. Her name was Alice. Her blond hair framed a face as attractive as any I had ever seen and I risked an extra second to study it. Her eyes especially drew me. I forced myself to shift my gaze from their symmetry and beauty. I turned to acknowledge again her mother and father.

The girl’s first name was Alice. But she went by her middle name.

Ann.

March 16, 2017August 28, 2017

Next stop. San Antonio

I nudged the clinic door. It opened and I inched toward a desk behind which sat a dark-haired middle-aged lady. The receptionist. A pain shot through my back at the waist line. My knees buckled but I caught myself, barely dodging a crash to the hardwood floor.

“Óh, sir!” Her concern was genuine. She indicated a chair. “Here. Right here.” I eased into it, contorting my limbs and back in a few deft maneuvers.

“The doctor will see you in just a minute. Another slow turn and I was seated, a trace of perspiration beading my eyebrows. Thanking her with a silent nod, I began filling the first-visit patient form. After a couple entries, I had relaxed enough to reflect on the event sixteen hours that brought me now to this house-turned-clinic.

A wry smile momentarily hijacked my features. If Francis could see me now.

Shortly before our San Antonio move, my co-worker at Tulsa’s North American Aviation had asked what job awaited me in the Alamo City. Now, between winces, I imagined his I-told-you-so if he could meet up with me today in this bone-cruncher establishment (the average chiropractor of the era hoped to see his specialty one day rise above the “snake-oil peddler” status it was often relegated to).

Well, Francis, it’s like this. Down at the corner of Caldera and Bandera there’s this Phillips 66 station. . .

Midafternoon yesterday I had grabbed two car tires, each of them encircling its own heavy rim. Lifting a heavy load while swiveling to another direction defied sound judgment. This insight was shouted to me from that waist line point along my spinal column.

But fifty minutes from entering Dr. Brown’s clinic I left convinced a miracle-worker had signaled magic to my miserable frame. Unlike at my entry, I exited the premises without a whimper. The bone-cruncher enterprise had won my vote.

This early encounter into our South Texas move served as a kind of preview for my wife Ann and me. Twists and turns of our movements ahead would usher in adventure, discovery. Pain would play its role.

How do you turn a Pentecostal into a Baptist, then to something other, and still retain qualities of each.

June 30, 2015August 28, 2017

Post-polio. Carried to Wholeness

(conclusion of three-part piece – the Matter of Sister Opaline)

We’ll carry you. Like we did in the winter times, Mrs. Opaline. Please stay. Keep teaching here.

Her students adored her, the auburn-haired teacher of Geometry, Shorthand and English.

At times during the winter, icy patches lined a critical high school passageway. It was a short outdoor walk linking classroom areas to the school restrooms. With unassuming gallantry senior boys of Opaline’s class physically lifted and carried her to the Ladies Room door. Her crutches, they feared, didn’t give enough stability to get her safely there and back. Teenage Nobles-in-disguise – they couldn’t imagine letting her risk a fall.

But now it was time. Opaline accepted that she could no longer teach. Her failing health dictated it.

Traces of gray marked her temples and lines of aging graced her forehead. But it was a diagnosis of cancer that provoked the decision. Opaline loved to teach. She always had. We’ll carry you up and down the stairs to your classes. Anywhere you need, if you’ll stay, Mrs. Opaline.

We lame people – all of us – need carrying at times. A childhood friend recently called up a scene from my polio journey. She watched on a Sunday as my father carried me into our place of worship. He settled me onto a pillow, cushioning my bony frame. And Opaline – when still a child – was carried to school and back on a gentle horse. Her siblings easily accompanied her on foot.

Facing her condition now, it was Opaline’s faith that underscored an important truth. Mortality itself cripples. Not just accidents or illnesses and the like. She needed carrying in this life. And when such a time came, she would need carrying into the next. The thought didn’t alarm but reassured her. The attractive squint in her eyes, the familiar movement at outer edges of her mouth, testified still to joy. Her Lord carried her now. He would carry her going forward. Regardless.

Opaline passed her church duties to others she had long mentored. She came less and less for the worship gatherings. At last she was moved to Tulsa’s St. Francis Hospital.

I was living outside the country when we received news of Opaline’s death. The message from Oklahoma was simple, Sister Opaline is now home. I learned shortly afterward, however, that her home-going experience was far from ordinary.

My minister friend, Melvin, sat not far from the hospital bed. He observed Opaline’s responses to what she seemed to witness of the other side before passing away. Melvin spoke of the wonder of her descriptions.

Nearing the end, Opaline rallied. Her eyes opened wide – then wider yet, as though waking up in another setting. It seemed that she was.

Suddenly her face beamed a radiant Opaline-smile. She was in another place, taking in vivid sounds and scenes.

Oh! The colors, the beautiful colors. . . like none I’ve ever seen, like none I could imagine! Oh! And the flowers, such beautiful gardens. . . beautiful, so beautiful!

Her voice trailed. Her eyes closed. Moments later with revived energy and her freshly wakened smile, Opaline resumed the adventure. Now it was sounds capturing her attention.

What glorious music! The singing and the music is so beautiful. I can’t imagine. How lovely and beautiful. Oh! Lovely, glorious!” Again her voice faded. Her eyes closed.

Not long after there was quiet. She was gone.

I have thought a lot on our lives, Sister Opaline’s and mine. The polio battle. Our similar and differing journeys. I’ve wondered of prayer. Of God’s will. Wondered about a curious mystery – of the miraculous. I am confident that in the experiences of each of us both, the miraculous was in play. Throughout. The supernatural of God entered our worlds and executed his purposes. Undeniably.

At the age of nine – aided by crutches to be soon laid aside – I limped from a hospital. Amazingly I soon ran. Freely and in the strength of renewed limbs. All the evidence of the experience virtually shouted, Supernatural. The works of a wonderful, powerful God.

And the miracle of Sister Opaline.

Courage, stamina, her giving-switch ever at the ON position. They are marks not of a merely good person – tough, resilient, resolute. Years of rich, contagious smiles in the face of adversity, pain and surely some disappointment. Opaline’s life itself radiated the supernatural. Messages of grace and of joy and love sounded out most clearly from the platform of her limpings.

I occasionally sit back and entertain a visual. While imaginative, to me the imagery seems realistic. And quite possible.

The scene is a court room.

A shabby personage identified as Mortality is presenting his argument. Its a case for fatalism. For futility, for death and decay.

It is the end of the line for her. No rescue, Mortality declares. No miracle. No hope. It is over for her, this Opaline mortal.

And Mortality drivels on.

A deafening thunder-clap stirs the room. The court’s great doors heave open. And Immortality steps through. Vital. Brilliant. Life-pulsing. He then heralds the entering King.

The King’s presence overtakes the environment. A great bouquet of flowers – alive with color and fragrance – is in his hand. A grand orchestra sounds music seldom heard on earth. His eyes survey the courtroom-turned-Ballroom.

She comes into view. Her eyes are adoring, worshipful. Her delight is Him. Her Savior. Redeemer. Friend.

Broadly smiling, the King laughs. He extends a hand.

Opaline runs to him. They dance.

I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. – Philippians, new testament