MISSION VIEJO PILOT ROBERT EARL REMEMBERED FOR HIS MISSIONARY WORK

LAKE FOREST – A pilot who devoted himself to flying to help people around the world is remembered as being inspirational and bringing out the best in others.
Robert Earl Lehnhart, 76, spent decades flying for Mission Aviation Fellowship – a worldwide organization of missionaries that brings, medicine, emergency supplies, food and community development to people in developing countries.
Lehnhart died following a boating accident in Alaska on Tuesday.
Lehnhart joined the fellowship in 1960 and first flew on missions to Brazil. He flew to Ecuador in the mid 1960s. He left the organization in the early 1970s and returned as its director in 1981. He left again in 1985 a formed AirServ – a similar missionary organization.
Several PBS and other channels showed Lehnhart's and AirServ's humanitarian role with aviation in isolated areas of the world He was a graduate of Bryan University in Dayton, TN and later got his masters from The Johns Hopkins University. Recently, Lehnhart served as adjunct professor at Concordia and other universities.
Lehnhart, 76, died on Tuesday after the boat he and other family members were riding in flipped in choppy waters off the coast of Juneau, AK, trapping him underneath, according to information from the Alaska State Troopers. Wind at the time was blowing at about 16 knots and waves were about three. The boat had taken on several large waves.
Rescuers performed CPR as they took Lehnhart to a local hospital but he was pronounced dead a short time later.
In a Christmas message to his family last year, Lehnhart detailed some of his life's experiences in an email he called "The Evolution and Final Days of a Famine Fighter."
"Then we went with MAF to Brazil to fly for missions in the Southern end of the Amazon jungle. The Chavante tribe had never been in contact with civilization and had only come out of the jungle a few years earlier. Why?" he wrote. "They had been attacked by rubber hunters and land surveyors hired by the wealthy business men from the cities. They fought back for years to protect their land but had no chance with their bows, arrows and clubs against the guns of their 'civilized' attackers."
Gene Jordan, a MAF pilot and personnel director of the group, met Lehnhart as a teen in Ecuador where he lived with his missionary parents.
"He was a serious thinker and a good pilot. He always said the airplane was only a tool to impact people. I looked up to him. He was what I wanted to be."
Lehnhart was active in Mission Viejo's Presbyterian Church of the Master. He worked with the church's Christian education program. He worked with a faith-based group in San Juan Capistrano that worked to strengthen families there.
Pastor John McKeague of Church of the Master said Lehnhart always had a clear, sharp mind and a great smile. He was the kind of guy you could start a conversation with and he'd always be interested, McKeague said.
"He brought out the best in us," McKeague said. "He was a real mover and shaker. He pushed the envelope. He looked out for those who were shuffled away though the business of life. A deep love for the Lord bubbled out of him. He was a real light among us."
Services for Lehnhart will be held at 1 p.m. on Aug. 29 at the Presbyterian Church of the Master, 26051 Marguerite Parkway, Mission Viejo.

AMERICANS BECOMING MORE HINDU - NEWSWEEKS LISA MILLER REPORTS

Among "25 Surprising Things You Need to Know," Newsweek’s Lisa Miller reports that "conceptually, , at leastwe are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." How can the land of mega churches, televangelists, and the Bible Belt become more Hindu?
America is a place where politicians pepper speeches with biblical references, athletes point heavenward when they score, and the founding fathers’ religious views are a matter of intense speculation. It’s also a place, Miller learned, where one in three people choose cremation, a majority believes there is more than one path to eternal life, and thirty percent of us describe our beliefs as "spiritual" rather than religious. Nearly a quarter of Americans believe in reincarnation.
Our fascination with Hindu thought isn’t new. Emerson and Thoreau read the Hindu scriptures and found much to agree with. The Beatles introduced transcendental meditation to popular culture. More recently, Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love brought her quest to find God in an Indian ashram and on the mostly Hindu island of Bali to millions of readers. Americans have become so enamored of yoga that a group of entrepreneurs even tried to patent it.
There is certainly much more to Hinduism than yoga and meditation, but it’s not surprising that Hindu ideas have seeped into our culture through practices that are relatively accessible to Westerners. What I found notable is Miller’s finding that many Americans see more than one path to eternity. I’m hopeful this tolerance spills into public discourse and political problem solving.