Category Archives: My 50 Year Perspective on Ministry

Joe is interviewed for a national magazine. Well, in a way.

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On the final page of a popular magazine–which shall go unnamed–a celebrity is interviewed in each issue.   I thought I’d give it a try and answer the questions myself. (At the end, I added a few more.)  

Need to say that I first did this five years ago.  I am redoing some of the comments, because some things have changed.  Okay, now.

Here goes….

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Being in the place God put me, doing the work He gave me.  It doesn’t get any better than this.  Likewise, the best definition of hell on earth is to be out of His will.

What is your greatest fear?

Just that very thing: being out of his will.  I fear nothing so much as disappointing Him.  That could happen to any of us. None of us is immune to temptation. That keeps me on my knees every day.

Which historical figure do you most identify with?

Abraham Lincoln. I’ve been to his birthplace (a log cabin in Kentucky), the restored “New Salem,” Illinois, where he lived as a young man, and through his home in Springfield.  I’ve been to his burial place, and in Washington, D.C., to Ford Theatre where he was shot and the house across the street where he died, as well as through the White House.  I own many books on Lincoln.

Or maybe Winston Churchill.  I’ve been to Chartwell, his country home in England.  And have shelves of books on him.  Oh, and I have shelves of books on Harry Truman who was president during my childhood. I’ve been to his home in Independence, MO and to his birthplace in Lamar, MO, and twice have visited his presidential library.

Which living person do you most admire?

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I owe an apology to Mary Hazel Miller

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I must have slammed that good lady a hundred times over the last two decades of preaching.

Here’s what happened, and how I learned that I probably did her wrong.

In preaching a sermon I call Rejoice Anyway–a staple of my preaching ministry for a number of years–I would mention two elderly women in a church I used to pastor who illustrated the contrast between how to do it and how not to.  Here’s what I said–

Mary Hazel Miller and Maybelle Montgomery were both members of my church.  They were perhaps 75 or 80 years of age, and as different as night from day.  Maybelle lived in a humble cottage off the hill from downtown.  She did not have a lot of this world’s riches, but was easily the happiest Christian lady I’ve ever known. She was always rejoicing in the Lord. .  

They called from the hospital to say Mrs. Montgomery was in emergency with a broken hip.  I dropped whatever I was doing and drove down to check on her.  When I walked in the emergency entrance, she spotted me first.  Lying on a gurney, she called out so everyone could hear: “Praise the Lord, Preacher!  He left me one good leg!”  I burst out laughing, and gave her a hug.  I said, “What are we going to do with you?”

Now, Mary Hazel, on the other hand, was the most negative member I’ve ever had.  I’d go visit her in the hospital–that kind of negativism seems to put you in the hospital on a regular basis–and all she would do is complain.  “Oh, Doctor McKeever!  I don’t know where those doctors are.  The nurses rarely come by.  My sisters said they were going to come see me but they’ve not been here, either.”

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How to interview yourself and have fun doing it

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“Let every man examine himself….” (I Corinthians 11:28).  The women too. 

Toward the end of each issue, Vanity Fair magazine interviews some celebrity.  The questions they pose are good ones.  Consider answering them for yourself.  (Bear in mind their subjects are well known in the secular world and not someone you and I will meet at the next denominational conference.  So, don’t worry about how they answered these questions.  In truth, I was often a little put out with them.  But what I’m suggesting here is that you consider answering them for yourself.)

Here are the questions in one recent issue–

–What is your idea of perfect happiness?

–What is your favorite journey?

–What do you consider the most overrated virtue?

–On what occasion do you lie?

–What do you dislike most about your appearance?

–Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

–What do you consider your greatest achievement?

–What is your greatest regret?

–What is your current state of mind?

–If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

–Where would you like to live?

–What is your most marked characteristic?

–What do you value most in your friends?

–Who are your favorite writers?

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My biggest regret from a lifetime of ministry

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This is my journal entry dated October 1980.

I was 40 years old and Margaret was 38. We were in our 19th year of marriage, and pastoring the First Baptist Church of Columbus, Mississippi.  Our children were 17, 14, and 11.

Here’s my journal entry for October 9.

The month of October got off to a poor start around the McKeever household.  I announced to Margaret that until October 27th, there were no open days or nights.  The month was filled with church meetings, committees, banquets, associational meetings, speaking engagements at three colleges, a weekend retreat in Alabama, and a few football games. She cried.  Once again, I had let others plan my schedule in the sense that I’d failed to mark out days reserved for family time.

Years later–long after she had transitioned to Heaven–I read that and wept.

The irony of this is that a year or two earlier, we had come through months of marital counseling and felt that we finally had a healthy marriage.  In fact, one Sunday night six months after this journal entry, Margaret and I would take the entire worship service to tell the congregation of our marital woes, of our attempts to make this relationship work, of our extraordinary efforts to get counseling, which involved driving 180 miles round trip twice monthly for two-hour sessions with a professional therapist, and of the Lord healing our marriage.

We were supposed to have a healthy marriage, and here I am putting everyone and every thing ahead of my own family.

What’s wrong with this picture?

That is my greatest regret from over half a century of ministry: I failed to take care of my family.

I write this now for the benefit of my children and grandchildren.  I write it for the benefit of pastors and ministers in the Lord’s work of whatever kind.  Take care of your family!!

Now, I am not groveling in self-pity. While I grieve, I share it hoping to help someone.

Don’t do what I did.

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What I wrote about at the age of 70. Fifteen years ago!!!

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(Note:  As of March 28 of the year 2025, I turned 85 years of age.  I ran across this article (below), done 15 years ago.  I guess I thought I was old! lol.  If I decide to leave an editorial comment along, it’ll be like this, in bold italics.) 

No one is more surprised than I am to find I’m now 70 years old. I reached that lofty plateau last March 28 and am still getting adjusted to the thought. Not sure if I will ever quite adjust to the fact that the old fellow staring back at me from the mirror is myself.

People often take pictures of me when I’m preaching or drawing, but it’s a rare photograph I want to look at twice. They just don’t look like me!

I’m still the 15-year-old I was in 1955 when life began to get more interesting. (That’s when I discovered girls and cars and adult work on the farm!)

Age 70. That’s 7 years more than Martin Luther lived. It’s 39 more than David Brainerd was given and 13 more than Jonathan Edwards.

You’d think I would have accomplished more than I have, given all that extra time. To my everlasting shame, I haven’t.

Looking back a few years, I know now that I fully expected some things to be true at this age than are the case.

–I would have thought I’d feel more like an adult than I do, and less like a teen. No one told me how septuagenarians are supposed to feel, but I’m betting it’s not like this.

–That I would be able to look back on 7 decades, including 48 years in the ministry, with a greater sense of accomplishment than I do.

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Family Reunions: My 2004 article about our first one

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The following piece was posted on my website exactly 20 years ago, in May of 2004.  Since we’ve just returned from our 2025 reunion–in the same location and with many of the same family members!–I thought it would be fun to repost it.  I’ll call my “Kilgore cousins” attention to it.  

Nearly twenty years ago, some of my siblings started worrying about our larger family. “The old folks are leaving,” they said, “and pretty soon, there will be no one left except our generation—the ‘cousins.’” Our mother came from a family of nine brothers and sisters, while our dad had eleven, so we were blessed with plenty of fun cousins and doting uncles and aunts. It was a great situation with all of us kids growing up together, visiting one another in the summers, and getting into trouble together. Now, with our parent’s generation aging, we all decided we needed to see each other on a regular basis. (Note:  This was in 2004.  Dad died in 2007 and Mom in 2012.  None of their generation is still living.  My brother Ron is the eldest of the clan as he turns 90 in August.)

Family reunion. The very term conjures up all kinds of crazy images-weird uncles, rambunctious kids, silly cousins. We sent out letters to everyone and for a couple of years tried holding reunions at various city parks and lake homes. Nothing really ‘took’, however, until we got smart and decided to hold the get-together at the only logical site-the old family homeplace. That was the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend, 1994.

Our maternal grandparents,Virge and Sarah Kilgore, bought several hundreds of acres of woodland and farmland just inside Winston County, Alabama, right after the turn of the 20th century and cleared land for a house. It was an old-fashioned breezeway-down-the-center home, unpainted, with two bedrooms on each side and a kitchen in the back. Most of their children were born there, including my mother Lois in 1916. Grandpa built a barn and a blacksmith shop and later a garage to house his car, a 1948 Packard. He died in 1949, Granny died in 1963, and no one has lived there since. But all the buildings still stand just as they left them. So, every two years, my Uncle Cecil-who owns the property now-and some of the men get out the tractors and bush-hog the surrounding fields and open up the house and we have a reunion on the Saturday before Memorial Day. (Cousin Johnny Kilgore, age 80, owns the place now and takes the lead in the reunion planning.)

I will never forget the first reunion, that Memorial Day weekend of 1994, because my wife almost did not let me come. Our daughter-in-law Julie–she and Neil live a mile from us in the New Orleans suburb of Metairie–was due to give birth to their first-born at that very time. I assured Margaret I would make the reunion and not miss the birth. On Friday, I made the seven-hour drive northward and on Saturday we held the reunion. They had brought in tables and chairs from the church and union hall so we could spread lunch together and get reacquainted with each other. That night, we built a bonfire and pulled the chairs into a circle and reminisced and sang and got silly.

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How to enjoy being elderly!

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In two days I hit birthday number 85.

I have arrived at “elderly.”

I love it.

A friend of mine–Dr. Bill Murfin–used to joke, “I’ll tell you how to live to be a hundred!”  Pause for effect, then he would say, “Get to be 99, then be real careful.”

Both my parents lived to be nearly 96.  Dad died in 2007 at 95 years and 7 months.  Mom died in 2012 at 95 years and 11 months.  So, I have a while to go.

It would be highly presumptuous for me to claim the right to tell anyone how to live to be my age or my parents’ ages.  There are so many variables.

–When you take the surveys about longevity, it usually asks if you are smoking and drinking and using drugs.  If you check ‘no’ to each of these, there’s still no guarantee.  The survey will go on to ask if you are exercising so many minutes a week, walking, etc., if you are eating leafy green vegetables, that sort of thing.

You know and I’m going to state the obvious here: Just because you give all the right answers, there are no guarantees.

–Your genes have a lot to do with these things.  Some people–I’m thinking of my wife of 52 years, Margaret Ann Henderson McKeever–inherit a mixed bunch of genes that almost guarantee the individual a lifetime of health problems.  Not for any bad choices they made, but just because their bodies contained time bombs (for want of a better way of saying it) that they had no control over.

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Looking for Mayberry, as well as the Garden of Eden

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(This was originally posted on my website in 2012.  I decided to repost it here and not tweak or update it.  Bear that in mind. I was living in New Orleans at the time, retired for three years.)

Pastors are always looking for sermon illustrations. See if any of this works for you.

TWO FUNERALS.

This week, C-Span televised the funeral of South Dakota statesman former Senator George McGovern, who had run for the Presidency in 1972 and lost in a landslide to Richard Nixon.

Whenever there is a funeral of a national leader on C-Span, I try to watch as much of it as I can. The fascinating part is hearing stories from colleagues, some of whom are often well-known in their own right, tales from earlier years, stories that never made it into newspapers.

This funeral was held, I believe, in the sanctuary of the First United Methodist Church of Sioux Falls. I did not watch the entire service, so my observation is not about this funeral specifically.

Pagan funerals–in our culture–look back; Christian funerals look ahead.

It’s that simple. The pagan service will celebrate all the good the subject did in his life while ignoring any unsavory parts; the Christian service may indeed bring in some of the accomplishments from his lifetime, but mainly looks forward. As the Apostle Paul said, “Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award me on that day–and not to me only, but also to all who have loved His appearing” (II Timothy 4).

Something else about George McGovern intrigues me. In World War II, he flew bombers over Germany. He was a full-fledged American hero and thus entitled to all the trappings of macho-ism (machismo?). But the American public never saw any of that bravado from him as a senator, politician, and candidate for the highest office. In fact, he came across as rather nerdish.

And, by a strange coincidence, so did George H. W. Bush (our 41st president). In World War II, he was a fighter pilot who on one occasion had to parachute from his stricken plane. And yet, in one of his campaigns for the presidency, Newsweek magazine ran a cover with his picture and the words: “The Wimp Factor.” (Wimp? The man jumps out of planes to celebrate his 80th birthday? He is anything but a wimp!)

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Part II of Joe’s interview about his cartooning ministry

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Who was the best-known person you ever drew?

I assume you mean someone I sketched in person.  At the moment, the ones that come to mind are Diane Sawyer of CBS, “Famous Amos” of cookie fame–hey, you asked about famous people, right?–Jerry Clower the Grand Ol’ Opry star, and Pastor Adrian Rogers (a longtime friend whom I sketched on a plane once).

What surprises you most about Baptist humor?

Mainly that it is not surprising at all. There is no “Baptist humor.” It’s much like everyone else’s.  We’re all pretty much alike.

Are there any subject matters off limits?

There are, if you want to be published in a Christian paper or magazine!  (smile please)  I learned early on that just because I thought a cartoon was funny did not mean an editor would run it.  Gradually, I learned that Baptist editors had several different constituencies to minister to, to address, and sometimes to placate.  When they did their job well and were criticized for it, they could take it. But no editor was going to knowingly run an offensive cartoon sure to provoke a hostile response.  And who could blame them.

Gradually I learned to rein in my humor.  Much of what I put in a cartoon could be considered teasing, or inspiring in a minor key, or just plain fun.

Do you pray about your cartooning? 

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Joe is interviewed about his cartooning ministry — Part I

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My interviewees are a cluster of people.  I’ve invited them to pose questions which I will try to answer here.  

What was your very first cartoon? And the first to be published?

Would you believe me if I said I don’t recall?  I’ve always been interested in drawing.  As an eight-year-old, my dad would ask me to draw him as he sat in front of the radio listening to the evening news.  He’d rouse after a bit and say, “Let me see what you’ve got.”  He wasn’t an artist, but had a good eye, and he would say, “You need to move the ear up” or “the eyes are too wide.” Something like that. I’d erase and he’d go back to sleep.

In the fourth grade, the principal recognized my drawing of President Truman.  First cartoon? I honestly don’t know.  In the seventh grade when the teacher had the class go around the room saying what we wanted to be when we grew up, I got a laugh when I said, “Cartoonist.”  Eventually, most of those teachers had my stuff on their walls.

The first to be actually published might have been in seminary. Each day before systematic theology class, I had taken to doing a sketch of the professor in various humorous situations on the blackboard.  As a result the editor of our student weekly (yes, we had one in those days) asked me to give him a drawing each week.  Now, in the rural bayou church I was pastoring, I had been sending the editor of our parish weekly a devotional, so now on a hunch, I sent a cartoon along with it.  He published the two side by side, giving me (free of charge!) a third of a page in each week’s edition.  Interestingly, that editor and I never communicated, never swapped notes, nothing. He published what I sent him.  As a result of that publicity, my little church doubled and tripled in size in less than three years.

How did you learn to cartoon? 

I’m still learning.  When I was 16, I took the correspondence course from Art Instruction Company of Minneapolis.  This was weekly lessons from real artists, rather intimidating for this country boy with no training.  My sister who had just finished high school and become a telephone operator paid the $10/month.  I had thought it was a drawing course specializing in cartooning.  But 18 months into it, once they started teaching me to design draperies, I let it lapse.  But I had learned a great deal, including perspective and lettering, and the use of speedball pens with black India ink.

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