Magazine

“Everything with Excellence”

Volume 8 • Issue 5

Chainsaw Ministry? Page 3

Cover Story

Digital Natives and

Digital Nomads
New Tribes of the
Internet Age
Page 6
 Positions in the High Desert
Church Planters
Send resumés to the High Desert Baptist Association.

There are three important dates for fellowship coming up this

month. Please check if you are available. Each should be a great
time to get together with other association brothers and sisters.

1) May 3rd (this Saturday) CINCO de MAYO celebration Block

Party. This event will help establish/launch our Adelanto church.
Come help Pastor Harvey Jackson as he reaches out to the commu-
nity. Call Pastor Harvey for details. (760) 530-9030

2) May 4th. Fellowship Choir and Sing-A-Long at First Baptist Cal-

ifornia City 5:30pm. Please call Pastor Mike Janz for information
Fellowship Choir Sing-A-Long
May 4, 2008
(661) 256-2244
5:00pm at First Southern Baptist
Church of California City 3) May 24th SERVICE DAY - Lone Pine. Come to beautiful Lone
Pine for the Memorial Day Weekend and help to paint and refurbish
Pastor’s Dinner - Ridgecrest our church in Lone Pine. USE IT AS A YOUTH EVENT. Call Pastor
May 5, 2008 Terry for details. (760) 264-3884 or randolph@lonepinetv.com
Day: Monday TIME: 5:30 p.m.
PLACE: Sizzler
ADDRESS: 1501 N. Norma
St. Ridgecrest, CA 93555
760-446-0114
Join us for a time of fellowship
and fun as we encourage one an-
other and are updated on events
in our lives and churches.

Pastor’s Breakfast - Hesperia

May 6, 2008
Day: Tuesday TIME: 8:30 a.m.
PLACE: Bob’s
ADDRESS: 12728 Main St. Hespe-
ria, CA 92345 760-947-2330
Join us for a time of fellowship
and fun as we encourage one an-
other and are updated on events
in our lives and churches.

Pastor’s Lunch - Palmdale

May 6, 2008
Day: Tuesday TIME: 12:30 p.m.
PLACE: Greenhouse Cafe
ADDRESS:1233 W. Rancho

Happy Birthday!
Vista Blvd (W. Ave. P) Palm-
dale CA 93551. (Front Entrance)
661-272-8866
Join us for a time of fellowship
and fun as we encourage one an-
other and are updated on events
Martin Ashbrook 5/8
in our lives and churches.

Service Day at Lone Pine

Rocky Vermillion 5/19
May 24, 2008 - ALL DAY
Come be a part of a fantastic day Chris Morgan 5/20
of serving one of our churches,
Lone Pine. The building needs
repainting and other minor work. Don Patterson 5/21
Come prepared to serve the Lord
and your northern brothers and
sisters. Fernando Rodriguez 5/30

‘Saw Man’ Sharpens Chainsaws,
Shares Jesus after Disasters
By Mickey Noah
As the guys on the Arkansas disaster chain-
saw team ate their dinner at a local Southern Baptist
church, the big, burly man who came in was impos-
sible to miss. Imagine John the Baptist with a Stihl®
chainsaw. Dressed in blue denim, with a full, graying
beard and huge hands, Tom Stanton dropped by their
table and asked if they needed any chainsaws sharp-
ened.
“The Saw Man,” as Stanton is called, didn’t
have to ask twice. Any operator of a chainsaw knows
that a dull chainsaw is useless, and sharpening chain-
saws is a prickly job best left to experts. And The Saw
Man is just that. Stanton’s unique chainsaw-sharpen-
ing ministry is valuable to Southern Baptist disaster
relief chainsaw teams who respond to ice storms, hur-
ricanes and other disasters.
Stanton, 53, calls Deer River, Minn. home. Until
last October, he pastored a small church there. Now,
his “day job” is running a shear/scissor sharpening
business back home.
Stanton’s disaster relief ministry began back in
2001, when a major tornado hit Siren, Wisc. The fol-
lowing day he felt “called” to go to Wisconsin. “I had
no clue what I was going to do,” said Stanton, who
first learned to sharpen chainsaws as an 18-year-old
logger in Montana. “My first paycheck was a chainsaw.
“In Wisconsin, I found guys who didn’t know
how to file chainsaws. So I volunteered and started
sharpening. I sharpened chains with a file for three
days, until a preacher got me a 12-volt rotary tool.
Then I sharpened for another 10 days.” That was the
beginning of. He figures he’s sharpened thousands of
chainsaws in the wake of disasters, including Hurri-
cane Katrina. He doesn’t charge a penny.
How does Stanton cover his expenses? What
about $3-a-gallon gasoline for the pickup truck he
drives to disasters? What about tools? Lodging? Food?
“God provides,” he says. “People are really generous
with me.” Stanton said God gave him his sharpening
business back home, which provides most of his daily
financial needs. “Through the years, God has provided
for me miraculously with a small camper/trailer, a
generator and even with my truck, given to me by a
Christian friend from my hometown. Last year, some-
one gave me a GPS so I won’t get lost!”
These days, Stanton is too professional to use
files or even his original rotary tool to sharpen saws.
Now he uses a Dremel® tool. “Dremel Company now
provides me with all my tools. In fact, I was invited
to their plant in to teach their people how to use their
tool.” With the Dremel device, Stanton does not have
to remove the chain from the chainsaw to sharpen it,
which saves significant time and effort.
During the first two weeks after Hurricane Ka-
trina, it is estimated that Stanton sharpened 2,000 saws
in Louisiana and Mississippi. He worked as many as
20 hours a day. “Since I can leave the chain right on
the saw, I can pull up to a bunch of guys and easily
sharpen 10 saws an hour,” Stanton says. “When I have
someone to hand me the saws, I can do 16 an hour.
Hand-filing takes up to 20 minutes apiece. This helps
the disaster relief teams get back to work faster.”
Why would a man who’s had both hips re-
placed -- and who last year suffered a heart attack --
chase natural disasters around the country to sharpen
chainsaws for strangers? “It’s really hard for me to
stand back and see somebody else hurting. Since 1997,
I haven’t been able to do much physically for people
except for chainsaw sharpening. It’s a tremendous
need.”
Stanton even has a Bible verse, Ecclesiastes 10:
9-10, that reflects his ministry: “. . . the one who cuts
wood may be endangered by doing it. If the axe is dull,
and one does not sharpen its edge, then one must exert
more strength. . . God has allowed me to see many
people make professions of faith. I go to disasters,
sharpen saws and tell people how to avoid the world’s
greatest disaster, rejecting Christ.”
At a disaster site, Stanton witnesses to the
public during the day
as he sharpens their
chainsaws. He gives out
tracts and New Testa-
ments from a five-gallon
pail he calls the “Bucket
of Hope.” At night, he
sharpens chainsaws for
disaster relief workers,
including those from
Southern Baptist teams –
counseling, challenging
and encouraging Chris-
tian men in their walks
with God.
Stanton would
like to see his chainsaw sharpening ministry go full-
time. “I’d love to go to fires, ice storms, snowstorms
-- do it full-time if the Lord opened up the door for
it.” He’s also eager to train others on the fine points of
chainsaw sharpening. In fact, he’s taught two classes
for the Mississippi Baptist Convention. “I’d love to
teach chainsaw sharpening as an evangelistic ministry
to every association – just to equip people to get out
there.
Fritz Wilson, director of disaster relief and re-
covery for the Florida Baptist Convention, has known
Stanton for several years, working several hurricanes
and other disasters with him. He calls Stanton a “su-
per” Christian with a unique ministry. “He comes
in and sharpens our saws, and then goes out in the
community and offers to sharpen anyone’s saw,” said
Wilson.
“Tom has a unique ministry and uses sharp-
ening to parallel the Christian life and walk. He tells
people that we can’t be good tools for Christ unless we
stay sharp.”•
Mickey Noah is a writer with the North American Mission Board.

An Incredible Day of Christian Learning and Fellowship
Free Admission with Early
Online Registration Only!
www.HighDesertHarmony.org
MARK YOUR CALENDAR NOW!!!
You are invited to attend the
most exciting event in the High
Desert this year, Harmony.
Harmony (Year 2) is a gathering
of churches throughout
Californiaís High Desert for the
sole purpose of being together,
learning together, and pleasing
the Father. You will not want to
miss this unique opportunity.
The day will consist of a conti-
nental breakfast, two Break-Out
Sessions (which you will
choose), and a General Session.
Lunch will be available for
purchase by various vendors.
Free Admission with Early
Online Reservation Only.

Truth with a Capital ‘T’
by Erich Bridges
Martin Luther King Jr. died
40 years ago this spring, taking a
bullet to the head because he had the
courage to stand for an absolute: the
God-given right of all people to be
treated with equality and dignity.
A century after the Civil War,
that ideal still had not become reality
in the America of April 1968. But
King staked his life on the belief that
it would come one day. The night be-
fore he died, he seemed to sense his
own end was close at hand. He talk-
ed about the Good Samaritan who
stopped on the dangerous Jericho
road to help an injured stranger after
a priest and a Levite had hurried by
because of fear or indifference. He
spoke of the long years of struggle
for civil rights, of his own survival
of a knife attack years before, of the
ongoing threats on his life.
“We’ve got some difficult
days ahead,” King admitted that
night. “But it really doesn’t matter
with me now, because I’ve been to
the mountaintop. And I don’t mind.
Like anybody, I would like to live a
long life. Longevity has its place. But
I’m not concerned about that now. I
just want to do God’s will. And He’s
allowed me to go up to the moun-
tain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve
seen the Promised Land. I may not
get there with you. But I want you to
know tonight that we, as a people,
will get to the Promised Land! And
so I’m happy tonight. I’m not fearing
any man. Mine eyes have seen the
glory of the coming of the Lord!”
His imagery was biblical, as
it always had been. Not just because
King was a Baptist preacher, but be-
cause his deepest convictions about
what was right, wrong, true and
false came from the Bible. Neither
his education, nor his Nobel Prize
– nor even his rise from local pastor
to history-changing world leader –
altered his reliance on the Word of
God as the ultimate source of truth.
He was challenging Americans to
live up to what they claimed to be-
lieve.
He had issued the call five
years before in his “I have a dream”
speech on the steps of the Lincoln
Memorial: “When the architects of
our republic wrote the magnificent
words of the Constitution and the
Declaration of Independence, they
were signing a promissory note to
which every American was to fall
heir. This note was a promise that
all men, yes, black men as well as
white men, would be guaranteed the
unalienable rights of life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness. … I have a
dream that one day this nation will
rise up and live out the true meaning
of its creed: We hold these truths to
be self-evident, that all men are cre-
ated equal.”
King was quoting the Dec-
laration itself, whose signers held
“these truths to be self-evident, that
all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights, that
among these are Life, Liberty and
the pursuit of Happiness.” Follow-
ing a bill of particulars against a
tyrannical monarch, they ended the
document with this promise: “And
for the support of this Declaration,
with a firm reliance on the Protection
of Divine Providence, we mutually
pledge to each other our Lives, our
Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
Like King, the signers knew
they were putting their lives on the
line for something they regarded as
God-given, absolute and non-nego-
tiable. They relied on God to face the
challenges to come. As Ben Franklin
put it, “We must hang together, or
we will surely hang separately.”
Wouldn’t you agree? Today,
however, Truth with a capital “T”
has a bad reputation in polite society.
People willing to die for a cause – or
even proclaim it with passion – are
regarded as nuts, fanatics or extrem-
ists.
The rejection of absolutes
isn’t just the province of relativists,
postmodernists, secularists and
other “-ists.” A lot of good, rea-
sonable people get nervous when
someone claims to know the whole
truth about anything. It’s hard to
blame them, in light of the crimes
committed in the name of Truth by
a long line of inquisitors, crusaders,
false prophets, communists, Nazis,
totalitarians – and now jihadists.
Writer George Orwell,
who warned the world
about the bloodthirsty na-
ture of modern absolut-
ism in his classics 1984
and Animal Farm,
said that ideology drives men “who
think in slogans and talk in bullets.”
Whoever opposes them is likely to
end up in a gulag or a gas chamber.
Ironically, the intelligentsia
is especially susceptible to absolutist
ideologies – as long as those ideolo-
gies reject God – despite the fact
that intellectuals are usually among
the first to face firing squads when
totalitarians take power. Since the
Enlightenment, the supposedly en-
lightened have relentlessly attacked
Christianity as superstition. Yet all
they have to offer in its place is the
counterfeit ideal of man-made uto-
pia, which has utterly failed, or the
mushy relativism that now pervades
popular culture.
How do they explain a
man like Martin Luther King Jr., a
preacher who changed history by
challenging people, from an explic-
itly Christian perspective, to pursue
justice and by nonviolent means?
They don’t – and can’t. He doesn’t fit
into their worldview.
Without certain God-given
absolutes, societies quickly descend
into moral chaos as every man does
what is right in his own eyes. The
rejection of biblical truth has nearly
destroyed Western culture. But Jesus
still stands at the door, declaring
with love but without compromise:
“I am the way and the truth and
the life. No one comes to the Father
except through me” (John 14:6).
That statement, the founda-
tion of Christian faith, missions and
evangelism, is either true or false.
There is no
middle
ground.•

WWJD?
By R.P. Nettelhorst
I am confused. I found an article that argued
very forcefully that Jesus, if he were on Earth today
and a citizen of the United States, would, without a
doubt, vote for the Democratic Party candidate for
President. But then, shortly afterwards, I came upon
a second article that argued just as forcefully the op-
posite: that Jesus, as an American, would be sure to
vote Republican. Doubtless, if I had the time, I could
find a Green Party Jesus and a Libertarian Party Je-
sus. PETA, the People for the Ethical Treatment of
Animals, is convinced that Jesus would be a vegetar-
ian.
It reminds me very much of the so-called “search for
the historical Jesus” of which the Jesus Seminar has
been a media darling. Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965)
was one of the first of that merry bunch back in the
late nineteenth century. He even wrote a book en-
titled, The Search for the Historical Jesus. The one
thing that has been said of such research is that the
searchers inevitably wind up, unsurprisingly, of
finding out that Jesus looks very like themselves in a
mirror. He has their attitudes, their beliefs, and their
approach to life. The search tells us little about Jesus,
but a lot about those on the hunt.
So it is, it seems to me, with those who want to convince
me that Jesus would vote a certain way. Remarkably,
Jesus seems to always vote exactly the way the au-
thor of the article would vote. As some-
one said,
we have a
tendency
to make the
gods in our
own image.
I think it is
nonsensical,
foolish and in-
sufferably arrogant
to suggest that a historical
figure would vote or argue a certain way on a mod-
ern question, a question of which the individual in
view never considered nor made any pronounce-
ments. To try to extrapolate from what they did say
the thoughts of a theologian
to how we think they’d argue today about a given
topic, it seems to me, is remarkably presumptuous.
How can we be certain we understand and know a
historical figure well enough to be able to put words
in his or her mouth? Though the little bracelets that
some wear, with the initials, WWJD, standing for the
phrase “What would Jesus Do?” are harmless and
designed to keep their wearers from misbehaving,
they remain, in my mind at least, a bit peculiar.
First, do you really need to literally wear your con-
science on your sleeve? And second, do you really
know Jesus well enough to be certain what he’d think
about you eating that donut instead of the bran muf-
fin? Then why imagine we can tell how he’d vote?
Especially, considering that our vote is supposed to
be private. Do you think he’d even tell us who he
picked?
And besides, does it really mat- ter? In a first cen-
tury letter that the apostle
Paul wrote to the church
in Rome, he writes, “there
is no authority except
that which God has estab-
lished. The authorities that
exist have been estab-
lished by God.” (Ro-
mans 13:1). If that’s the
case, then God chooses
who the rulers will be
anyhow. So how would
Jesus vote? Just look at the
election results the day after
and find out.•
Digital Natives and Digital Nomads - New Tribes of the Internet Age
by Albert Mohler
Observers of cultural
change in America have assumed
for some time now that the vast
technological advances of the
digital age would shape the world-
views of coming generations. That
future is our present as the gen-
eration of youth and young adults
now shaping the culture of busi-
ness and higher education is in full
technological overdrive.
Writing in The Times [Lon-
don], Fleur Britten tells of a class
of “Digital Nomads” who dwell in
coffee shops and wherever wire-
less hotspots are found. These new
workers are a professional class
that needs no office and have noth-
ing but a digital address. They sim-
ply do not need the superstructure
of the old economy.
Ditching the office is the
most modern way to operate these
days, it seems. Punchin culture is
out – a surgical attachment to a
laptop and a mobile phone, and a
willingness to travel, are in. So, as
BlackBerry sales surge and the WiFi
cloud swirls around the country,
public spaces are increasingly
sprinkled with computers, busi-
ness-speak and spiralling caffeine
habits. Meanwhile, the really suc-
cessful are being referred to as the
“kinetic elite”, a term coined by the
Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas for
high-net-worth individuals who
work out of hotel lobbies, airport
lounges and their expensive brief-
cases.
So the “kinetic elite” live
and work in a digital environment,
armed with technology and crea-
ture comforts. They can work any-
where WiFi access will allow. That
intense person working beside you
at a table in the local coffee shop
may well me working on contract
with a firm in London about a
project in New York that will be
funded out of Dubai. Welcome
to the world of the Digital No-
mads. They can live and work
almost anywhere, but tend to be
concentrated in larger numbers in
locales where the so-called creative
class is also concentrated -- in large
metropolitan areas and in univer-
sity towns.
Similarly, John Palfrey of
the Harvard Law School has been
working on a project to consider
the “Digital Natives” -- the genera-
tion of younger Americans who are
perhaps more at home in the digital
world than in the “real” world
around them.
Writing with co-author Urs
Glasser, Palfrey suggests that these
Digital Natives represent a gen-
eration that thinks in terms of the
Internet and associated technolo-
gies as a default mode, and their
on-line personas are as important to
them as the persona they project in
face-to-face contact.
As “Born Digital,” a Har-
vard Magazine article explains:
One of the digital native’s
primary traits is an extensive on-
line persona. “[Their] identity is
expressed through both off-line and
on-line media,” explains Palfrey.
“And there’s not much of a distinc-
tion in the digital (continued pg. 9)
<<< photo of the month
DIG FORWARD
It struck me when I saw this pic-
ture that it takes a huge expendi-
ture of energy to dig.
Some of us are wasting our pre-
cious energy “Digging Ourselves
Deeper” into whatever mess we
find ourselves.
Some of us are wasting energy
“Digging Things Up.”
I for one, if I am going to expend
the energy, will choose the Godly
path of “Digging Forward!”
Ministry to
People in
Crisis
Written by Richard E. Dodge
Crisis hits all people at some time
in life. When crisis strikes, people
need help. If your class is orga-
nized with ministry leaders and
teams, you’re on track for meeting
needs when crisis strikes. The first
step is get ministry leaders and
teams together to discuss how
to take appropriate action. Some
questions that might need to be
answered include:
• Has anyone made contact with
the person or family?
• What needs have been identified?
• What is the most immediate need?
• What needs can be dealt with later today or in the
coming week?
• Who is responsible for coordinating ministry efforts?
• How many people need to be involved in meeting the
need?
• What assignments need to be given, and to whom?
• What resources are required to meet this need?
• What long-term needs should we consider and plan
for?
Crises are not always tragic and negative. Some are
exciting and fulfilling, such as the birth of a child or a
child’s graduation from high school or college. But ev-
ery crisis is a turning point, a time when friends and
fellow Christians should respond in appropriate ways
to meet specific needs. In meeting needs, we let them
know that Jesus cares for them as well.
Before jumping into the middle of a crisis, make sure
you are prepared. Some well-meaning efforts have cre-
ated more harm than good when the people responding
create confusion or fail to say or do the right thing. Here
are some tips for how to respond effectively during a
crisis.
Dos
• Be a good listener.
• Have a loving, accepting atti-
tude.
• Attempt to help in practical
ways.
• Ask what specific things you
can do to help.
• Just be there and say: I just
wanted to be with you at this time
because I care.
• Provide spiritual support.
• Read appropriate, encouraging
Scripture passages and pray with
people whenever possible.
• Coordinate your efforts with others who may be pro-
viding assistance.
• Know your skills and limitations.
Don’ts
• Don’t judge or attempt to interpret what is being
said.
• Don’t take over a crisis situation unless asked.
• Don’t divulge confidences.
• Don’t say, “I know how you feel.”
• Don’t try to defend God or explain why circumstanc-
es happen.
• Don’t offer help you cannot provide.
• Don’t offer specialized help that you are not equipped
to give.
• Don’t get in the way of emergency personnel.
A good rule of thumb may be something this simple: Do
unto others as we would have them do unto you. The
Golden Rule can be a two-way street, too, as we never
know when crisis will come into our own homes.•
ANNOUNCEMENTS
May 18-24
Associational Emphasis Week
Please look for your packet in the mail.
Packet includes NAMB poster, bulletin
inserts and special offering envelopes.
Thank you for your participation!
Musical Ministry Opportunity
This from our Green Valley Bible Chapel
I was wondering if any of our local churches might have
someone they might loan to us sort of as a musical
missionary? We would shower this person with a lot
of love and some gas money. This person would need
to play guitar or keyboard as well as lead us in singing
to our Lord.
Contact Jerry McCullah • jmccullah@csbc.com
May 31st at FBC Hesperia
9280 Maple Ave., Hesperia, CA 92345
9:00 am-12:00 noon (registration begins at 8:30)
$15 per person (includes workbook)
For more information or tickets contact:
Dave Felts, (760) 244-4109 ext. 201
or dfelts@fbch.org
COMING SOON!
A SEMINAR FOR PARENTS
AND GRANDPARENTS
(digital natives cont.) native’s mind between these two.” Digi-
tal natives pick photographs for their on-line personas
on social-networking sites with the same care with which
they pick their clothes each morning. They go on line to
reveal rather than conceal themselves.
The revealing rather than concealing dynamic
is something most observers seem to agree is genuinely
new. As Palfrey observes, “it’s the extent to which they
reveal themselves that baffles the uninitiated, most of
whom--with different attitudes toward personal privacy-
-would never think of publishing their phone numbers
or home addresses (let alone a photographic record of a
Saturday-night bender) on the Internet.”
These Digital Natives are young -- some are very
young -- and there is a widespread concern that they
need both direction and protection.
There is also a sense that older generations are
not even aware of the extent to which many young lives
are lived on-line:
Palfrey points to parents and educators, rather
than legislators, as children’s best guides to the often
hazardous terrain of the digital world. But parents and
educators, to be effective, must engage with that world
and understand how young people behave in it. For
instance, while conducting a survey of study habits,
Palfrey was unable to find a single digital native whose
first step, when assigned a research paper, was toward a
library. Instead, students typed their topic into a Google
search bar, scrolled down to the reference in Wikipedia
(an on-line encyclopedia edited by its readers), read the
entry, and then followed the links to learn more. “The
only variant I’ve heard to that,” says Palfrey, “is typ-
ing en.wikipedia.org and going straight to Wikipedia.”
Whether or not Wikipedia is a credible source,
teachers need to know that their
students consult it before they
can pres- ent alternatives.
(Continued
pg. 11)

Minister and His Wife
Inseparable to the End
by Debbie Pfeiffer Trunnell
At the rehabilitation facility in
Colton where the Rev. Jack Coke and
his wife, Ilene, spent their final days,
they were known as “The Notebook”
couple.
Staff members gave them the
name because their love lasted a life-
time, much like the main characters in
the romantic novel “The Notebook.”
Married for 70 years, the bond
was so obvious to those caring for
them that they pushed the couple’s
beds together so they could hold
hands.
“My dad used to say they were
married for life, that there was no other
option,” said their daughter, Barbara
Laffoon of San Bernardino. “And they
taught each one of us that.”
In the end, the couple who
spent their final years in San Bernar-
dino died within days of each other, he
on March 29, she on April 9. They were
both 88.
He was born Jan. 8, 1920, in
McNairy County, Tenn., to Rufus and
Melissa Coke. He spent hours reading
the Bible. He also helped out on the
family farm and hunted in the woods.
She was born not too far away,
in Decatur, Ala., on April 3, 1920, to
Dallas and Carrie Hightower. She and
her twin sister loved to sing and trick
people who couldn’t tell them apart.
She and Jack were only 15
when they met under somewhat
unusual circumstances. He threw a
snowball with a rock inside at a friend
and hit her instead.
She vowed she would get even
with him. Instead, they started dating
after he first went out with her twin
sister. Back then, their dating life con-
sisted of meeting at church on Sunday.
They would then
walk three miles back to her house and
sit on the front porch.
After the courtship, they were
wed in 1938 in Corinth, Miss. The
ceremony was quick because the parlor
was freezing. He had only $2 left to his
name after paying the preacher.
The couple lived in Tennessee,
then Alabama, before being separated
by World War II.
Because he had two small
children, Jack was in the last group that
was drafted. He served in the Navy
in the South Pacific. He was not in the
heart of the fighting but survived a
typhoon on Okinawa.
The separation was hard on
the couple, and Ilene worried about
her husband while struggling to care
for their two children back home in
Alabama.
They were reunited after the
war and settled in Decatur.
It was there that he walked out
onto the porch and told her he now
had two loves in his life, her and the
Lord.
By 1950, he was serving as the
first pastor at Eastside Baptist Church
in Decatur.
“On his first trial sermon he
did such a marvelous job that no one
even knew it was his first,” his daugh-
ter said.
The family, now with three
children, moved to Inglewood in 1952.
Ever a strong team, she worked nights
and he worked days to support their
family.
The family soon followed him
to Clear Creek Baptist Bible College in
Kentucky and then back to Southern
California, where he entered California
Baptist College in Riverside.
The next stop for the family
was Colton, where he was pastor at the
Olive Street Baptist Church.
“He was thrilled, at his hap-
piest, when he was in the pulpit,” his
daughter said.
Other churches where he pas-
tored in those early years included East
Oakland Baptist Church in Oakland
and the First Baptist Church in Lawn-
dale.
He was known for reaching
out to his congregations.
Ilene was a good mother to the
four children the couple then had and
loved teaching Sunday school.
“Her greatest joy in the world
was leading a young person to the
Lord,” Laffoon recalled. “She even led
her son John to the Lord when they
were driving across Los Angeles in
traffic.”
While their love for each other
was obvious, they also cared for others
from all walks of life.
“Here they were these white
Southern baptists, who lived in De-
catur where the Ku Klux Klan had a
strong influence, but ... they were very
accepting of everyone,” said their son,
John Steven Coke of Fontana.
The last church Jack worked
at was West Shores Baptist Church in
Salton Sea Beach.
“He was in the pulpit, as alert
as ever until he was 81,” Laffoon said.
When Ilene developed Al-
zheimer’s seven years ago, the couple
moved to their daughter’s home.
His loneliness was palpable
and he missed being in the pulpit ter-
ribly, but he cared for her and stayed
by her side.
Such was their life until his
health suffered after he fell, fracturing
his hip in three places. Ilene’s health
also worsened soon after.
“In a letter he wrote in recent
years, he said two of the `six pack of
Cokes,’ the fond name the family had
for each other, would be no more and
he would go ahead and wait for her at
the door,” Laffoon said. “It was a true
love affair to the end.”
The couple also are survived
by daughters Jacquelyne Hutson of
Blythe and Melissa King of Eastaboga,
Ala.; seven grandchildren; 14 great-
grandchildren; and four great-great-
grandchildren.•
The Photo is Artistic and not of the Cokes
(digital natives cont.)
There is
a huge and important observation WE NEED TO KNOW
here -- one with a high-magnitude meaning for higher We need to know what is happening in the
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instance, while conducting a survey of study habits, your 2008 Calendar.
Palfrey was unable to find a single digital native whose
first step, when assigned a research paper, was toward You can email it
a library.” to dom@hdba.net,
This statement alone should represent a wake- or by fax to
up call to older generations. The idea that information (866) 711-0390
dwells foremost in a library is a dated assumption. The
Digital Natives look first at the Internet and digital
sources. Then they may go to the library, but that may
be increasingly unnecessary in their view and experi-
ence.
The rise of the Digital Nomads and Digital
Natives as new tribes of the Internet age will mean big We will
changes for higher education, for cities, for employers, print your
and for institutions and organizations of every kind.
These tribes represent the future, and Digital Natives event in PASSION
are as likely to be playing Little League as sipping so that other
lattes at Starbucks. The digitalization of life starts at churches can be a
younger and younger ages it seems. blessing at your
The Digital Natives and Digital Nomads also event.
represent a significant missiological and evangelis-
tic challenge for the Christian church. These groups
are not easily impressed, nor are they as likely to be
reached by some of the more traditional evangelistic

Shameless
approaches used by many churches. Newspaper ads
mean nothing to a generation that never touches news-
print.
One major study published in recent years

Plug!
indicated that one of the main factors tied to numeri-
cal growth in churches was the strength of a church’s
Internet presence. “Snail mail” addresses may be less
important at first than a Web address, and increasing
numbers of those in the digital generations assume that
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These groups assume that entire categories of
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means and technologies. They simply take this for
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currently over 820 and would love
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The Latest Book by Robin Nettelhorst is Now Available
Many of you have attended his seminars
in our association or have read his monthly articles.
Now you have the opportunity to purchase his lat-
est book: The Bible’s Most Facinating People. The
book is on shelves now in bookstores across Amer-
ica.
The book is published by Reader’s Di-
gest, and I have been priveleged to have one of the
first copies. This book is one of the most beautiful
books you have ever seen. The illustrations are gor-
geous. It will make a wonderful addition to your
library.
As you know, Robin is one of our own.
He attends Quartz Hill Community Church and is
the Academic Vice President of Quartz Hill School
of Theology.

The book is available at your local

bookstore or online.

To purchase online,
simply go to www.amazon.com
and type NETTELHORST

The High Desert Baptist Association Volume 8 • Issue 5

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