God's Great Outdoors

On this week’s Trail To Adventure! we’ll discover how you can have your family and area kids hooked for life. That’s hooked, with their own personal relationship with the Creator God, Jesus Christ. Gerry’s guest is Trevor Ruble, the President and Founder of a ministry to children and families molded on teaching them how to fish called "Hooked for Life." This is an interest or activity based outdoor outreach and evangelistic fishing themed program that is being adopted by many churches across North America. Trevor shares how he had struggled as a kid without a dad and how fishing was his escape from that loss. As an adult the ministry idea was something God laid on his heart, as a way to help kids to learn to fish and also could be used to help youth come to know Jesus Christ as their Savior.

On this week’s Trail To Adventure! Gerry joins up with Joni Eareckson Tada in Xenia, Ohio as the two relive the memory of Joni’s close encounter with a large black bear on a camping trip. Marshmallows as it turns out was all the bear was after at this hair raising encounter. Also discussed is how Ken, Joni’s husband, is using fishing as a way of reaching out to men who need Jesus, or need their relationship with the Creator God brought to a deeper level. Additionally, Joni tells about the special summer camps they have across the nation for physically and mentally disabled young people and adults. Her call is for men who might be willing to come along side these people and be volunteers at these summer events. Since the day years ago when a diving accident while swimming put Joni Eareckson Tada in a wheelchair, God has used her to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She is an inspiration to all of us to do the same!

On this week’s Trail To Adventure! Gerry is visiting with Jim Butler in the Pennsylvania’s scenic Appalachian Mountains. Jim & his wife Barbra own & operate Strath an De Farm, which in Celtic means “God’s Valley.” The beautiful forest setting is the location for annual summer father & son retreats. Also, a father & daughter event camp, that both are designed to make lasting memories in the lives of those who attend each year, plus draw them to the Creator God. Jim shares about the numerous activities these men & their children join in together with the goal of deepening the family bond & one’s personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. The farm sees over 500 total attend each year & is a “no cost” event, with a free will offering taken!

On this Trail To Adventure! Gerry meets with Dave Battle who is someone making his living related to God’s great outdoors. Dave and his wife Beth live in Anchorage, Alaska. He was raised to believe in Jesus, the Bible, and Creation, as he was immersed in experiencing the outdoors with his father. However, in his college years everything he was being taught as he studied to become a wildlife biologist was telling him, not only was Evolution a fact, but there wasn’t even a God necessary for life to exist. Yet, one day in class, an eye-opening look at how each skull he was required to examine and study from the different animal species revealed that they had to have been both intricately and intelligently designed for that animal to exist at all. They had such precise locations for the many openings and these hole locations; to him was positive proof of Intelligent Design and a Creator God!

This week’s Trail To Adventure! interview is with Dr. Danny Faulkner at the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky as he shares about Answers in Genesis ministry’s Planetarium. This museum is a great way to evangelize those who come to visit with you as it’s an apologetic ministry focusing on the importance of the first book of the Bible. Danny is the resident astronomy expert and shares with Gerry and the listeners on the vastness of the Universe, giving an easily understood example to wrap one’s mind around. He also puts a wrench in the gears of those conspiracy believers who say we never went to the moon. Fact is that because of the Apollo Lunar Missions, we now know how far we are from the moon and that the distance is expanding. It is this information that allows us to do backward math calculations to realistically consider the age relationships between the earth and its moon.

On this week’s Trail To Adventure! Gerry is in Montgomery, Alabama as he dropped in for a visit with Ed Gannon. The two met through Russell Thornberry two decades ago, with Gerry getting to do a little deer hunting on Ed’s farm. At that time, Ed was just starting to see wild hogs occasionally on his property. Now twenty years later, it’s being overrun with these animals that are destroying everything and make farming close to impossible! Ed tells how he uses his farm to bless and minister to groups, fathers and sons or anyone God directs his way. He shares the increasable story of how a baby in Russia was saved because of a father’s visit to his place. Then Ed share on his work with “LIFE ON WHEELS” and the powerful impact this outreach ministry is having on mothers and babies around their area of Alabama for the Kingdom of God!

Trail To Adventure! Gerry is at a Game Dinner in Pennsylvania with an old friend, Dick Hribar. Through the years as a fishing and hunting guide, Dick Hribar has put a lot of miles on his body. At the time of this interview he was about to undergo his fourth knee transplant on both legs; he is quite an outdoorsmen, always on the go. Dick shares how as a Special Education teacher in Pennsylvania for 30 years he was able to connect with his students by way of the bow and arrow, connecting with them using archery and hunting, turning many of their lives around as they lacked fathers at home. Dick also talks of his guiding elk hunters who draw the limited and coveted tags in Pennsylvania each fall to pursue the monsters that roam the mountains near his home.

On this Trail To Adventure! Gerry visits with Steve Chapman in Nashville, TN as the two reflect on Steve’s first book “A Look at Life From a Deer Stand”, released back in 1996, yet is still going off of bookstore shelves as it has been reprinted many times. Meeting a need of women who wanted something for their male loved ones actively involved in the outdoors, (specifically hunting) but which also had a spiritual impact and would change lives. Steve also discusses how important outdoor ministry can be in reaching the man and the impact that it can have on the family. Steve hopes his new book “A Look at Life From a River Bank” will also help more men become trophies of grace for the Creator God Jesus Christ.

On this week’s Trail To Adventure! Gerry is visiting with Dr. Richard Swenson in Wisconsin and the two are talking about Intelligent Design. The truth is there is more of a chance mathematically that your car happened by accident over hundreds of millions of years, then just your eyeballs having evolved and how they work with your entire body? This is just one of the things that Dr. Richard Swenson shares in the interview with Gerry as they discuss this topic and Dr. Swenson’s book, “More Than Meets the Eye”. Having taught surgery at the University of Madison, Wisconsin, and having minored in physics, this interview is jam-packed with information that declares that we have a Creator God. Perhaps the most listened to interview aired by GGO in the 20+ years we’ve been broadcasting.

On this Trail To Adventure! Dr. Tom Rakow, the founder of The Christian Deer Hunters Association and Gerry visit together discussing the numerous outdoor ministries that have come about over the years. The idea is to provide Christians looking to reach others who enjoy time in God's creation with the tools to aid in the ability to help win them to receive Jesus Christ as their Creator God. Tom shares about how The Christian Deer Hunters Association got started and how he never expected it to be what it is today. Tom also tells how he began writing books, and today despite the fact that he flunked English several times in school, with his family’s aid he has written a number of books that are helping Christians reach out to their unsaved friends and relatives with true stories on fishing and hunting.