Hugh's News & Commentary

Hugh, thanks for your coverage and sharings from others about John W. Swails! What a gift to so many of us! I knew he was very sick and he was in in our prayers. To my dismay I failed to know of his death until now, a week later. I was aware of his fragile health and expected death, and in my mind I was hoping to go for the great celebration of his life. I missed it.... Somehow I missed it. Others around knew, but I missed it...makes me have third thoughts about what they took out of, and moved around in my brain whenever that was.

An unforgettable teacher and a consistent friend and, and, and, John Swails was to me for more than 50 years! If I had that yet-to-be-developed camera I would snap a shot out of my indelible memory and show you in sound this picture: I felt so honored to be strolling across the grassy quad at Emmanuel with Bro. Swails late one afternoon. He included me in conversation. We were going from the administration building to the dining hall. Jim was a toddler, running and stumbling along trying to keep up with his dad. I had just gotten a grade from a Bible test. I was pretty sure it was wrong. Finally I muttered out my concern. "Bro. Swails, that grade on my test; I can't understand how I got a passing grade. It couldn't have been...." He interrupted me with these slowly spoken, but powerful and redemptive words, "Well, Brother Joel, you are learning more than your mind can right now recall. You will find truth from God's Word will come to the surface when it is needed. You are experiencing truth now that may not surface until years from now, but it will be there." I didn't undertand it then and still don't but I have found it true. I still think he really stretched to give me a passing grade, but I also know he was a man of such integrity that he stayed in bounds.

Thanks, Brother John W. Swails, for your ministry in the classroom, from the pulpit there, from the pulpit here, from the fireside in your home, from your table 53 years ago and two years ago, from your family, from miriads of other students you helped shape, and the sustaining link I now experience knowing your Lord is my Lord.

Thanks!