This Joshua In Our Midst

By Paul E. Dinnis

Joshua Hinton is a native American, born in Cawker City, Kansas. His father dies a year or so after Joshua graduates from high school. He foregoes college to operate the family hardware and implement company founded by his father, and as the older son, to care for his mother and brother.

A dozen years later, Joshua attends a men’s weekend religious retreat held at a Kansas lake. He has what to him is a spiritual awakening, an experience he interprets as having personally felt
the presence of “God’s Holy Spirit.”

His brother is capable of continuing the family business and care for his mother, so Joshua leaves home and embarks on a “serve the Lord” career.

This is just another Save the World religious story? No, it is different, significantly different, in a manner virtually all Americans can identify with and find inspiration in.

Why? Because, while Joshua’s story is fiction, the time-line is very recent, and the geographic settings in the USA are real . . . Swope Park in Kansas City, Happy Hollow Golf Course in Omaha, Byrd Park in Richmond.

The unique thrust of the book is that the story about Joshua parallels the Bible’s accounts of the life of Jesus Christ. The reader will identify the Joshua incidents and remember how the Bible recorded them. But this “new telling” in familiar settings and circumstances of the United States can yield a new awareness and deeper appreciation of the impact Jesus had for humanity. (It is non-denominational, even “universal.”)

Here, Joshua travels the country, and the “spirit of God’s love” is evidenced in all of his appear-
ances: in his Sermon on the Mount, at the Red Rock Park near Denver, in a home visit
near Detroit, at a high school student meeting in Los Angeles. A sports columnist lauds him,
as does a housewife in her article in a woman’s magazine.

Joshua’s “Twelve” constitute his Board of Directors. They include Peter (he has a Southern
drawl accent), James & John, Doubting Thomas, Judas. – and two women, one of them a Black
civic servant in Chicago. Also, two auto union stewards and an Amarillo cattleman.

Joshua doesn’t upset money-changing tables as Jesus did, but disrupts a line of protesters and tears up their placards, in Richmond, Va. Soon after, he is kidnapped and murdered. Jonas
is questioned but never found guilty. The FBI hounds him, and he commits suicide by jumping
overboard off a Staten Island, NY ferry boat.

The Joshua memorial service in Kansas is “different.” But, unique, emotional and unusually memorable, too.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paul E. Dinnis
• Release date: Mar 9, 2012
• ISBN: 9780983301011

Paul E. Dinnis

Paul E. Dinnis is an octogenarian native of Nebraska and a graduate of the University of Nebraska. In War II he was an officer in the U. S. Marine Corps, serving in Hawaii, Guam and Japan (no combat). After marriage in New York in 1951, he and his wife moved to Florida (in 1954) where he pursued a career in journalism. Editor and co-founder of a weekly newspaper, Chamber of Commerce president, Public Information Officer of one of nation's largest public school systems during the school desegregation era. He is a decades-long member of the United Methodist Church and served many years as a Sunday School teacher. He was a member and officer for several "meaningful years" somewhat recently in a local interfaith coalition.

Book preview

This book is a work of fiction. Events, and situations in this story are purely fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

© 2004 by Paul E. Dinnis. All rights reserved.

Parts of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, only with written permission from the author.

ISBN: 978-0-9833010-1-1 (e-book)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2003098941

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This Joshua In Our Midst

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* * * * *

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my late wife, Betty Lewis Dinnis, a staunch believer in, and faithful servant of, the Original Joshua.

Table of Contents

Foreward

Part I

Part II

Part III

About the Author

Foreword

My wife and I were having an extended stay in Richmond, Virginia, where she helped care for her terminally-ill sister.

I had a plenitude of time on my hands. I read a lot of religious works - articles, magazines, books. I indulged in a good bit of meditating, and musing, about religious matters, too, and my inner thought-generator seemed to go into a productive phase.

I pondered over the question of what the personality and characteristics of the real Jesus Christ might have been that we can only speculate about. What distortions might have evolved about Jesus during the perhaps 30-to-60 years interval between the Crucifixion and the writing of the Gospels?

How objective or how biased were those early writers about Jesus and his ministry?

Were his 12 Disciples passive followers, mere compliant putty in his hands? Did they never understand, never comprehend? Was the opposition provided by the Pharisees and the Sadducees evil-oriented as it sometimes seems? How could the Sanhedrin be so politically and religiously wrong - or, even, corrupt - in condemning Jesus?

Thoughts emerged. What would have been the impact of Jesus Christ on our society if his life and his career had existed in the United States of America, in the 20th Century, within the recent-years memory of many of us? And, would he and his ministry have been affected differently in our modern society environment?

Would the central God-themes that Jesus expounded, those centuries ago, which survived to become cornerstones and pillars of all the segments that evolved in what was to become Western Civilization - all during those ensuing centuries - would those God-themes survive if they had been given to us by Jesus Christ in, say, the year 1970?

Would the truths about Jesus in the 1970s survive the daily scrutiny of the too-often overly inquisitive let's-find-something-wrong-with-it media in the U.S.A.?

How hungry would our populace be to hear and to heed the Jesus message? What degree of skepticism might have to be overcome if it were to survive?

Well, this book is the result of my meditating, musing, pondering, day-dreaming.

The Jesus Christ counterpart, here, is Joshua Hinton, and his career as I have fictionalized it, roughly parallels that of Jesus.

This Joshua In Our Midst does not answer all the questions or resolve all the issues that may exist about Jesus - the issues of long ago and debatable issues of today. It does not track the Jesus career exactly, because conditions are different, today: Joshua does not have to contend with opposition from within his own cultural family, as did Jesus from his fellow-Jewish factions, for example.

The format utilized in this creative project was to fictionalize newspaper reports, magazine articles and taped television interviews and meetings - in order to tell the story of Joshua and provide glimpses of Joshua as seen by a variety of 20th Century observers.

What might result from one's reading this book?

I hope that the individual who reads about Joshua, here, might sense a similarity with Jesus and perhaps acquire a new insight about Jesus. Perhaps, in this manner, the reader will come to understand the spiritual thrust of Jesus and relate to it more readily in the context of today's social environment.

The geography of This Joshua In Our Midst is not Israel, of course. It is the real U.S.A - the cities, the parks, the hospitals, the locales are real, and I trust that readers will relate to them ... (yes; Old Lynchburg Road exists, Happy Hollow golf course is in Omaha, Tampa has a Nebraska Avenue, Wilson Lake is in Kansas, etc.)

This Joshua parallels the Gospels in many respects. Joshua's parables are Jesus' parables, re-written within a framework of today's environment. Readers of the Gospels will, hopefully, recognize many characteristics and situations. Joshua has a spiritual awakening at baptism and finds himself in an ensuing stay in a wilderness, as Jesus did. Peter Munn is brash and has an accent (Southern drawl) as did his counterpart, Simon Peter. Joshua's Twelve do some ministering in teams-of-two as did some of Jesus' followers.

But This Joshua has differences. Joshua's Twelve include two women. His 12 are not passive rubber stamps, but are activists themselves; yet Joshua remains the Authoritative One, as was Jesus.

'Tis a different world, this world of Joshua's time, as compared with the world of the time of Jesus.

Or, is it different?

Joshua's core message is identical to Jesus' core message, and it is as applicable and needed today as it was in the 1st Century.

I have further hopes for readers of this book: that non-Christians might have a better understanding of Jesus and his core message. Perhaps they then may consider that Jesus is not a competing factor to their own beliefs, to their own approach to God. Hopefully they will discover that the Holy Spirit as spoken of by Joshua - and by lesus - I believe - is an entity of Almighty God that likely is an integral component of their own religious beliefs, too (as my reasoning suggests to me).

Perhaps, then, progress can be furthered toward establishing and strengthening bonds between the adherents of the various faiths, who also seek meaningful relationships with the Almighty.

- Paul Dinnis

Who's Who

In This Joshua Book = In The New Testament

Joshua Hinton = Jesus Christ

Peter Munn = Simon Peter

Jonas Albritton = Judas Iscariot

The Swanson Brothers = The Zebedee Brothers

James and John = James and John

Thomas Olson = Doubting Thomas

Mary Winfield = Mary Magdalene

Comparable to Jesus' 12 Disciples Are The 12 Members of Joshua's Board of Directors

-- Peter Munn, from Atlanta, varied business background

-- Jonas Albritton, Red Cross fund-raiser from New York City.

-- James Swanson, union auto leader from Detroit.

-- John Swanson, also a union man in a Detroit auto plant

-- Thomas Olson, a CPA from Oakland, Calif.

-- Richard Mason, young executive from Houston

-- Mrs. Jane Brown, government employee from Chicago

-- Sam Williams, cattleman from Amarillo, Texas

-- Michael O'Leary, insurance man from Omaha.

-- Mrs. Sarah Thomas, Joshua's teacher in Kansas hometown.

-- Dr. Gerald Jones, Minneapolis university professor.

-- John Alberts, Kansas City aide to Rev. Hinton

Part I

THE SPIRITUAL BIRTH

of

JOSHUA HINTON

and the

DEVELOPMENT

of the

GET RIGHT WITH GOD

MINISTRIES

The Cawker City (Kans.) County Record

Thursday, August 14, 1969

Josh Hinton Is Okay

Mrs. Mary Hinton and son James have returned from spending several days at Wilson Lake down by Russell, and friends will be glad to know that they found her son Joshua to be safe and sound, there.

Josh left home about three weeks ago to attend a men's religious retreat at the lake. Mrs. Hinton said it was a weekend affair and she had expected he would return home by the following Monday. When he did not return all that week, she asked the sheriff down there to see if Josh was in that area. He drove around the lake and said he couldn't find any trace of Josh.

Searching

So, last Sunday, James drove his mother and they went down to the lake to look for Josh. About noon, they spotted him sitting under a tree all by himself, reading.

He was okay and in good spirits and awfully glad to see us, Mary reported. She said Josh told her the retreat was a great religious experience for him and that it had given him a lot of things to think about, especially how he was living his life.

It was obvious to us that Josh had got a tremendous impact from whatever happened, she said. I guess Josh is doing what people say is finding one's self.

,

Not Return?

Brother James said Josh is uncertain when he will return to help run their Cawker Hardware & Implements business. He said Josh is doing a religious thing of fasting, and that he had not eaten anything for two whole weeks and wanted to fast for another two weeks. I don't know how he can do that, but he seemed to be okay even though he's lost some weight, James said. You know, I couldn't never do that!

Mary asked us to tell everybody thanks for the concern they have had about Josh being missing, and she hopes people will continue to pray for him.

The Topeka (Kans.) State Joumal- Sunday, August 24, 1969

Finding One's Self ... in Kansas

By Susan Robinson

Religion Editor

WILSON, KANS. - What might the factors be that would motivate a young man to spend a month of his still youthful days to seek a sense of religious security with his Maker?

We learned of just such a young man last week by reading an account of a missing person, in the weekly newspaper of a small town in north central Kansas, the Cawker City County Record.

The young man was found by his mother and brother, on the campgrounds of Wilson Lake, a rather sizeable body of water in the rural area near here - five miles north of Interstate Hwy. 1-70, and 50 miles west of Salina.

The man is 30-year-old Joshua Hinton, known by his friends back in Cawker City simply as Josh. And, as his mother and brother found him to be, he is safe and sound.

He apparently is healthy, too, even after all but finishing the 30-day fast he subjected himself to. This followed what he said was a religiously enlightening and spiritual awakening that he experienced a month ago when he was one of several hundred men who attended a weekend retreat here at Wilson Lake.

But he said it was not because he was devoid of spiritual feelings and a certain awareness of things religious. "At home we were exposed to the Jewish scripture, the Torah and the Talmud, because my mother's family was Jewish and that's what they read.

While his father was not Jewish, he had a lot of respect for Mother and her beliefs, and he schooled himself in the teachings and lore of the scriptures, he said.

Joshua told us about his being reared in Cawker City, and about the whole some influences of the citizens in that community. He is a product of their schools, where he excelled academically. He graduated as the top student in his class of 89, and he was outstanding, he admits, in football, basketball and baseball.

The family business is Cawker City Hardware & Implements, and it was founded by his father, who operated it successfully until his untimely death the year Joshua was a high school senior.

After high school, 1 didn't have much choice but to work in the store and help my mother and my younger brothers continue to operate the business and provide the income our family needed, he said.

That was 13 years ago for the now-30 Josh, and they were years of good and rewarding experiences, he said. We were able to help make the store survive Dad's death, he said - providing security for his mother and siblings.

All the while, his personal life has continued to be one of satisfying achievements, he said, especially because of the extensive reading he has had time for, with emphasis mostly on religion and philosophy.

It was the reading which probably provided the motive for him to attend the Wilson Lake retreat, Joshua readily admits. I think everyone has feelings and even yearnings to become a little closer to God, he explained. The more you know about God, the more you want to be closer to Him.

The complexities of Joshua's yearnings mayor may not be similar to those of most people. Regardless, the menu of activities at the retreat resolved an on going certainties/uncertainties battle within his psyche. The result was a welding of his thoughts, which led to an intensity of purposeful action ... and this blossomed into cascading ecstatic feelings to the point where he felt being at-one, spiritually, with God, he explained.

Inspired

The feelings were almost indescribably ethereal, Josh enthused to us. In fact, they were almost out-of-this-world feelings, he said, and that that was a pretty good way of describing them, because I believe anyone wanting to have a meaningful relationship with God must shun some of the ways of the world and identify more closely with the Almighty.

At the retreat, men were fed a series of inspirational sermons, and there were sessions of study and prayers. There was much congregational singing, too, so we could be exuberant in expressing our joy and our praise.

The climax of the retreat was an invitation for the men to enter the lake and be baptized, which Joshua emphasized was a spiritual cleansing.

The retreat leader kept repeating, kept emphasizing the absolute necessity for us to repent of our sins, Joshua explained. He said it was essential to do that if we expected to feel the flow of God's grace, the flow of the Holy Spirit.

An ingredient in the proceedings was a time element, it developed.

I've heard it said before, Joshua continued, and the leader repeated it several times, that a nuclear bomb could be set off at any time and bring the end of the world ... and if we had not repented and got right with God, we would be doomed to spend eternity in hell rather than in heaven with God.

Joshua believed in what the leader said, and along with many others, was baptized. In this ritual, the leader proclaimed holy words and then submerged the individual's head under the water momentarily, a process which could - and did -leave some of the men gasping for air for a few seconds, according to Josh.

What sort of sins might Joshua have committed that he felt he should repent for, I rather hesitatingly and gingerly asked.

Well, he replied, that is a pretty personal matter. Very personal, in fact. A matter between me and God. Nothing really very great or very bad, I guess. But anything that separates you from God is serious, and I felt uneasy about my ties with God. Something was lacking.

Joshua seemed eager to talk, to share. I have been good in helping a lot of people, he said, but I know there were a lot of times when I could have, and should have, closed the store or taken time away from it in order to help a fellow out of a bad situation - perhaps to help him move, or to give a word of encouragement, or whatever. But my focus was on making a buck, of making the business prosper. That's legitimate, to an extent. But I also was aware that I wanted the recognition that people give the successful businessman - they look up to you and if you have any vanity, it makes you feel good. I had plenty of vanity, and it kept me from getting as close to God as I wanted to get.

Quite a statement, that! But there were other factors that Joshua wanted to mention. He seemed to have reached a career level which left him nowhere else in Cawker City to climb, and he seemed to be floundering, he said. He was unmarried and although he had several love affairs or romances of sorts, he had not found ''the right girl."

What about the fasting and the literally one-man-retreat that he now was involving himself in, here at Wilson Lake?

What a fantastic experience! he almost shouted. I never considered myself to be a loner, because I've always had fun and good times with the guys and gals of my acquaintance. But here in what I call a wilderness, I've been able to concentrate on communing with God. There haven't been any interruptions from people, I have not had to worry about what news is on the radio or TV or in the newspapers. I can meditate, and pray, and listen to what God might have for me. It's just me and God, you might say.

Does God speak to Joshua Hinton? I pointedly asked.

Well, after a fashion, I think He does, Josh said. Not in audible language, really. But my thoughts seem to generate to a set of conditions which somehow I seem to get a feeling about, a feeling of God's approval that I get myself into that certain set of conditions. In the same manner, I may get to thinking that I should perhaps identify myself as being in another set of circumstances, another scenario, and all of a sudden I get a feeling that that is not what God wants for me. Out of it all, I get a sense of direction that I believe God wants me to pursue. I have confidence in that.

How does the fasting fit into all this? I asked.

It is a most interesting part of it, he replied. "I had a few hunger pangs the first day or two. But it is something of mind-over-matter, and when you purposely turn your thoughts to other things, including such thoughts as the purity of God, as the love God has for you, as the privilege you have right here and-now at Wilson Lake, of being involved in practicing or, maybe you might say, exercising an intimate relationship with God ... gradually or even all-of-a-sudden, the hunger pangs have gone and you have a certain feeling of euphoria, of great peace, of God approval. It is the same sort of feeling, honest, that I had when I was baptized.

It is a feeling that I am basking in the holy light that God is shining down on me. Sort of like the feeling you get when you go sun-bathing and you feel the goodness of a soothing, warming or hot sun.

That is awesome, I simply uttered to Joshua. And it was, and it is!

More Qs

I had only a couple or so other questions. Didn't he get lonely here in this park? Had he talked with anyone during the four weeks he had been here?

No. The only people he had talked with were his mother and brother when they came and found him.

With regard to that, hadn't Josh been concerned that when he didn't return to Cawker City, that his folks would be alarmed about his absence?

Yes. But he only briefly thought about it. There wasn't a phone immediately available, and besides, they knew I was involved in something that God was involved in, and I thought they basically would have the faith that I was in God's hands and would be safe. I would be back in their lives in due time and everything would be okay. And brother James is very capable of operating the business without me.

What does the future hold for Joshua Hinton?

I don't know, yet, for sure, but I am working it out, Josh said. Or, at least God is in the process of working it out, I believe. I'll probably go back to Cawker City for awhile, but I am sure I will be . finding some purposeful work that I think God wants me to do. It probably will be in some sort of service to help men and women and children.

It became evident to me that Joshua's motivation had been incubating for years. I can tell you what my own father did that has always meant a lot to me, he said. "I must have been eight or nine years old when they had a big flood on the Republican river up in Nebraska. I don't remember much about it, but a lot of houses were washed away and people were homeless and without food and clothing.

And my Dad went up there with food and clothes, and he spent a week or so up there helping those people recover. Dad said he never felt better in his life for anything else he ever did, when he helped those people.

But Joshua's mother has been an inspiration to him, too. My mother also is a person who always seems to be aware of persons in our town who are in need or who are hurting. Maybe all they need are words of encouragement or of consolation, he said. I've been fortun ate to have had some good examples in my own family. I'm pretty sure God wants me to continue in those patterns and to specialize in them in some kind of special way. We will see!

Mrs. Mary Hinton, Joshua's mother, told the Cawker City County Record last week that she believed her son was in his month-long retreat