New pastor at Church of Christ wants to share the Gospel message

Jack, from left, Lisa, Bethany and Wayne Vogel have joined the fellowship at McCook Church of Christ, where Wayne is the new minister/evanglist.

McCOOK, Nebraska -- Coming to faith and finding himself reconciled with God in 1997, Wayne Vogel was drawn to do the work of an evangelist. "I started thinking about it right after my conversion," he said.

"A godly man took the time and found the words to set out the gospel message for me," he explained, "and I thought it would be a good thing to do."

Prior to his conversion, he worked mainly in construction, owning and operating his own general contractor business and publishing "The Fossil News," which was distributed weekly in area restaurants. "It was old news re-formatted for a 10-minute stress-free read," he said. He included puzzles and brain-teasers in each publication.

Vogel graduated from the Bear Valley Bible Institute in Denver, in May and his new position as minister/evangelist at the McCook Church of Christ, 711 East G, is his first pastorate.

Central to his belief is the understanding that "it is in man's nature to be separate from God," and that coming to an understanding of our need for reconciliation is a learning process. "Since it is a learning process," he explained, "someone needs to take the time to teach, and that is my role."

Understanding is key to learning, according to Vogel.

"We often read the words without knowing what they mean," he said. "We need to get to a point where we understand what the Word means." To that end, his objective as a preacher is to teach what the Bible says; what it means; and then how to "apply it to our own lives."

He, his wife, Lisa, and three of their four children, 13-year-old twins Jack and Bethany, and their eldest son, Jacob, who will be a senior this year at McCook High School, moved to McCook on July 1. Their eldest daughter, Genna, is a student at Southeast Community College in Lincoln.

The children have been pretty flexible with the changes over the past few years, he said, with Genna spending her senior year at a new high school in Littleton, Colorado, when Wayne started his schooling at Bear Valley.

Wayne also explained that Lisa was pleased when he announced his dream to become a minister, saying, "Lisa has always wanted to be a minister's wife, and now she is."