Boyhood Heroes

and Lessons on Faithfulness

As a boy raised in a subculture of American Evangelicalism, I had my heroes.  In many ways, we were somewhat insulated from the world at large so most of our icons came from the preachers and singers who we heard in church or campmeetings and whose LP records we listened to.  Since I loved music, my ears were tuned to the different genres of Christian music and at the top of my list was a gospel music group called The Couriers.  My buddy Leo Knapp introduced me to them and I soon started buying every record I could find.  That was long before the days of cassettes and CDs, so I brought the big vinyl records.  The album covers showed a clean cut trio of guys who began as students at Central Bible College in Springfield, Missouri.  Following college they moved to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and sang gospel music in an area where it wasn't widely known, but they became household names in the Christian community.  Their sound was distinctive and pure.  My friends and I were hooked.

Leo and I formed a quartet with friends Clair Sams and Fred Simmons.  We would huddle in Leo's college dorm room and listen to Neil Enloe, Dave Kyllonen and Duane Nicholson.  Leo could sound just like Neil and Freddie played the piano like him also.  The songs we loved were the ones that Neil wrote so we were the "little Couriers."

After college, we each married and went our separate ways into ministry and business, but the Couriers kept on singing.  They have now been singing for 57 years all over the U.S., Canada and 60 other countries around the world.  They recorded dozens of albums.  They are now grandfathers and great grandfathers.  Now each one is in his mid 70s and THEY'RE STILL SINGING.

Today, I listened as these golden musical ambassadors brought an auditorium full of people to their feet.  It was magical for me to listen to my boyhood heroes 46 years after I first listened to that unique Courier sound.  I sat there and drank it in.  Yep, I could still hear detect those unmistakable tones.  Duane's tenor was still the same.  When they sang Neil's signature hit, "Statue of Liberty" which he wrote 36 years ago, it was as though I heard it for the first time.

Greater than the music and the sentimentalism which swept over me was the fact of faithfulness.  57 years is a long time to stay together singing every night and slogging all over the world.  They're still standing together on the stage, seemingly enjoying each other's company.  Each of them has been married to his wife for over 45 years and most of all, they are still in love with Jesus.  

I walked out of the concert hall with a new appreciation for the faithfulness of God.  I love the music and I enjoyed swapping old stories with the guys.  It was fun remembering the places where we had crossed paths, but to see men growing old together, loving each other, having fun singing their songs and loving God was HUGE.  

I still want to be like The Couriers when I grow up.