A Desert Experience... literally.

There we were in the desert. I mean the Desert..... actually, Chai Alpha’s national campus ministry conference in Phoenix, AZ. This past week, we averaged nearly 115 degrees in the shade. It is a heat such as I have never before experienced in the outdoors. But, dry heat is actually an acquired taste. I was growing to like it. Having previously exchanged emails with our host, Dennis Gaylor ( see picture below ), the director of Chai Alpha, he would intersperse his correspondence with a question: “Did I mention that it was hot?” He didn’t want anyone to be surprised. It was Shhhmokin…! One of the speakers fired off a bunch of “hot jokes” to the crowd. “It was so hot!” “How hot was it?” “It was so hot that I saw two trees fighting over a dog.”

Karen and I were taken under wing by Dennis and his wife, Barbara. We had the privilege of spending an evening with them, eating room service and talking for hours Twenty years ago they lost their vivacious eighteen year old daughter, Jennifer, to a drunk driver. They shared with us their journey of grief which helped to validate our own. We are deeply grateful for the time they spent with us as we unpacked our story and described our own peaks and valleys. There are certain things that only those who have undertaken the journey can understand or share, and they gave us a special gift in their time, love and prayers.


As the director of Chai Alpha, the campus ministry arm of the Assemblies of God, Dennis has played a key role in building a multi dimensional ministry that is one of the most dynamic and potent student movements in America. As Dr. Rick Richardson , author of Evangelism Outside the Box and Associate Professor of Evangelism at Wheaton college said in his plenary address to the conference, Chai Alpha is a combination of spiritual power, biblical fidelity and cultural relevance. Often groups or movements tend to align under one banner or the other. Those which do are often intolerant of each other ( he gave examples). Biblically, the NT models an integration of all of three ( think: Apostle Paul ). Chai Alpha is one movement in which all of these elements are in operation.