John Gunter

Thoughts on Life and Living

On the road again. . . my posts on travel

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(left to right) John Gunter, Patrick Ku, Eugene Kim, and Eric Tai in Las Vegas three nights ago.
(left to right) John Gunter, Patrick Ku, Eugene Kim, and Eric Tai in Las Vegas three nights ago.

On the road again. . .

This week finds me, once again, on the road.  I’ll be covering over 20,000 miles in less than two weeks.  The trip has already taken me through Las Vegas and Atlanta.  As I type this, I am sitting next to my Father digesting a wonderful breakfast which Mom just cooked, feeling a million miles away from Asia.

Las Vegas was a one night stop over joining in the celebration of long-time friend Patrick Ku’s 40th birthday.  A group of around 20 rendezvoused in Vegas for three days of golf, food, and whatever else they can find out there.  Vegas is a weird place, of which could be a few blog posts in and of itself, but I will refrain. [Read more…]

An open letter to the World…thoughts on finding contentment

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Josh Irby is a tremendous writer, musician, basketball player, and basic all around renaissance man.  He has also been a good friend of mine for more than 15 years.  Josh is hosting an Open Letter Challenge  contest on his excellent website.  He asked me to participate, so here is my attempt.  The following letter is my response to An Open Letter to You from the Rest of the World.”  Would love your thoughts at the end!Open letter to the rest of the world

Dear World,

Let’s learn to be content in all things!  The older I get, the more I see quality of life wrapped up in this little concept of contentment.  Allow me to explain.

As I have shared several times in my blog, contentment is somewhat of a theme in my life.  Rather, I should I say a pursuit of contentment.

I currently live in an Asian culture where the dominant world-view is atheism.  It is taught from birth with religious zealousness.  At its ideological core, this philosophical system teaches that this life is it.  You live and then nothing. [Read more…]

An awkward conversation about singleness (and 2 thoughts)

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I didn't have a cool pic to put here, so just did a selfie from my computer while writing this. . .
I didn’t have a cool pic to put here, so just did a selfie from my computer while writing this. . .

Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!

I honestly thought I was done with my thoughts on singleness. However, I had an experience recently which has changed a bit of my thinking. I set out a few months ago to get ALL of my thoughts on singleness on paper. I unimaginatively called the series “My thoughts on singleness (a series. . .)” Very creative, I know.

Recently, I was sitting with a pastor friend of mine. He is a wonderful man, very smart, and has a great heart for the Lord and the work of the Kingdom of God. He has sacrificed for the advance of the Gospel in ways I can’t imagine. We are good friends and meet whenever possible.

As we often do, we met for coffee. We talked of life, our personal issues, and even touched on some theology. He has enjoyed reading the works of John Stott, as I have as well.

Then the conversation took a familiar, yet uncomfortable turn.

[Read more…]

Learning about obedience from Noah (my 3 year old friend)

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Noah with his celebratory ice cream after surviving his first day of school
Noah with his celebratory ice cream after surviving his first day of school

One of my very, very unofficial roles here in this relatively unknown city in Asia is to simply pray for, serve, and come alongside a few of the American families which are trusting God to raise a family here.  My investment and role in this process is minuscule and insignificant.  Their investment is everything. . . the health and well-being of their families.

One of the families is the LIttlepages.  Scott and Cat moved here with their son, Noah, the summer of 2011.  They have since added Addie to the mix. [Read more…]

Missing home. . . and the celebration of “Annie”

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Here is Anna and Timothy at St. Simons in summer 2003
Here is Anna and Timothy at St. Simons, GA in summer 2003

This morning was pretty good.  It was the first day of college football and my school won.  Though it’s hard to get too excited about a victory over mighty Elon College, you take what you can when you are from Georgia Tech.

I was feeling pretty good and then it came.  It was in the form of an email from my sister, Becky.  It was for the purpose of pulling me into a celebration.  My beautiful, smart, sweet, and overall wonderful niece, Anna, tried out for a community play house production of “Annie”.  She would have been thrilled to get any part in the play, but was waylaid by exuberance upon hearing she has been selected to play the lead role of the red-headed orphan herself.

My joy in imagining Anna’s happiness was tangible, as I literally laughed aloud in the corner of this coffee house upon reading the email.  However, my euphoria for Anna quickly shifted to the pain of missing being there for her celebratory pizza or sushi or however they choose to celebrate this big accomplishment. [Read more…]

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