The Carl McCunn Story: What’s Your Plan For Getting Out OF Here?

Introduction

I’ve been encouraged by your worship this evening. I appreciate the enthusiasm and passion with which you have sung tonight, and it was my privilege to share that with you. And I appreciate these good men, every service who’ve led so well our worship to God. And I’m excited about this time we have now to spend in his word. Would you take out your Bible tonight and open to Luke chapter 12? And I’d like to begin by reading an episode from the life of Jesus. That will not only serve to get us started in our study, but will really be the foundation for what we’ll talk about as we study together tonight. So if you’ll join me at Luke chapter 12, bring your finger down to verse number 13.

Let’s pick up there. Luke 12, verse 13. Someone in the crowd said to him, Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.

Then he said to them, Beware and be on your guard against every form of grief. For not even one has an abundance. Does his life consist of his possessions? And he told them a parable, saying, The land of a rich man was very productive. And he began reasoning to himself, saying, What shall I do since I have no place to store my crops? Then he said, This is what I will do. I will tear down my barns, and I will build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and all my goods, and I will say to my soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said to him, You fool.

This very night your soul is required of you. And now who will own all that you have prepared? So was the man who stores up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. Carl McCunn was born to an army family, army family.

After high school, he did a semester of college for opting for a four-year stint with the Navy. When his military service was completed, he spent a few years bouncing around on the West Coast, doing odd jobs, gradually working his way northward until finally he settled in Alaska in 1970. Alaska was for Carl a perfect fit. His passion was wildlife photography. Where else should a guy like that live? Right. In fact, in 1976, he spent five months all alone during the summer, all in some remote part of the state, doing just that, photographing wildlife. And so none of his friends were surprised in 1981, five years later, when he decided that he would do another excursion into the remote areas of Alaska, this time 225 miles northeast of Fairbanks to spend the summer again photographing wildlife.

He planned his journey meticulously. He made arrangements with a Bush pilot who would fly him up to this remote region, drop him off, he would set up camp there, and then during the late spring and summer, he would use that time, roughly five months, to take his photographs. He assembled everything that he would need to do that. 500 rolls of film, all the photographic equipment that would be necessary, 1,400 pounds of supplies, three firearms. I would have taken more than three. And he would chronicle his journey in a journal that he kept on loose leaf notebook paper. Spring came.

And Carl was off for his adventure. He was dropped off, he set up camp, and he spent the summer just as he planned photographing wildlife. It was great summer. But after five months of doing that, he had come to August. And the summer was coming to an end. I know that in Texas we don’t get that. This is Alaska. Winter was coming by August. And his supplies were dwindling. And so it was time to start thinking about the end of his journey. It was time to make his exit. And it was at that time, at the first of August, as the supplies were dwindling and winter was setting in, that it occurred to him for the first time ever throughout the entire summer. That he could not remember.

If he had made arrangements with the Bush pilot for him to come back and pick him up.

He wrote in his journal. I think I should have used more foresight in arranging for my departure. Yeah. I think so. As August wore on, Carl became more anxious with every passing day. This was serious. It’s not by not like being left by your parents at the church building, okay? They’re coming back for you. Nobody was coming for Carl. But all was not lost. As the weeks went by and Carl didn’t come back, he had friends. They were concerned about them. And they went to the authorities, and the authorities were persuaded to send a pilot up to look for him, and they knew the spot where he was, and the pilot actually flew right over the camp. Carl saw the plane pass over, fly off in the distance, and bank to come back again.

And as the plane flew by, he shook his hands in the air, celebrating he’d been found he was going to be rescued. And as he watched the plane pass over him and fade off into the horizon, it was only as the plane disappeared that it dawned on him that this is the signal for a man on the ground to a pilot in the air that I’m okay and I don’t need any help. I think that’s a dumb signal. Surely you could come up with something else, but that’s what it is. And so the pilot went back and he reported to Carl’s friend. I found him he’s fine.

Y’all think I’m making this up. New York Times. You can go read it for yourself.

September went by. By the time he got to October, he was struggling to find food. He wrote in his journal, it’s been a terrible day for me, and I won’t go into it. Hand gets more frostbitten every day. I have only one meal of beans left. Honestly, I’m afraid for my life. By November, all the food was gone. And he began thinking maybe he could walk out. Yukon was 75 miles away. Maybe he could just walk there. But it was November in Alaska. It was winter, and he hadn’t had a decent meal in weeks and weeks. He was malnourished. And at that point. Well, that wasn’t really an option. Around Thanksgiving, he wrote in his journal, I feel miserable. Have had to chills upon awakening the past three days.

I can’t take much more of this. Among his final journal entries was this note, Dear God in heaven, please forgive me my weaknesses and sins. Please look over my family. After using the last of his fuel for one more fire, he used one of the firearms to take his life.

In February. Still in his tent where he had died. That’s a sad story, isn’t it? It is a frustrating story, though. Because there were just some basic things here that had those things been done, this would not have happened. This didn’t have to happen. And so I think it is easy to look at Carl’s story and to judge him a fool. But before we are quick to do that, will you consider something with me? The very first time I heard Carl’s whole story, something occurred to me. And that is that his journey through the Alaskan wilderness, when you stop and think about it really looks an awful lot like the way a lot of people are traveling through this life. Can you piece that together?

There are a lot of people who are giving a lot of time and attention to all the little details of the here and now, making the journey through this life, and yet they give no thought at all about the end of life. They live all the way through with no exit strategy at all. And so my question is if we would judge Carl a fool for going into the Alaskan wilderness with no plan for getting out, how much greater the fool to spend his days here on earth with no thought of his extra.

1. The Gospel Reminds Us the End Is Coming

The gospel has a lot to say to us about that. And that’s what I would like for you to consider with me for a little while this evening. Carl’s story prods me to think about some of the things that the gospel says to us about the end and about our own exit strategy for that day when we will exit this life. And so tonight I’d like for you to think with me a little bit about what the gospel says about the end, what it teaches us about our exit. Let me begin with this. First of all, I think the gospel reminds us that the end is coming. And I think we need to appreciate that. I think Carl knew the end was coming, don’t you? He was not moving to Alaska.

He wasn’t up there hunting real estate so he could settle. He didn’t go to build a cabin. This was this was just a summer trip. It was only temporary. All that was understood going in. He was he was planning to leave. He would need an exit. I think he knew that. And so the question that demands to be answered is well, look, if he knew he wasn’t going to stay, how can he forget something so critical? You already know the answer, don’t you? We all do.

And I think he got so consumed with that passion, thinking so much about pictures that he wasn’t thinking about airplanes and leaving.

You let that simmer for a minute. I think just like Carl, we know that our journey is coming to an end too. You’re sitting in a church building on a Tuesday night. You’ve spent some time in the Bible, right? And you know that the Bible has a lot to say about the end. I want to give you a quick sample of that. I want us to begin over in the book of Hebrews. Will you go there in your Bible? I’m thinking of Hebrews chapter 9. And I want to begin here because I think in this text, the Hebrew writer will lay down what are sort of the three basic stones and the foundation of Bible teaching about the end. Will you look at these with me?

This is Hebrews 9, verse 27. The Hebrew writer says, And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once, and after this comes judgment. So Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin to those who eagerly wait for him. Do you see it there? Do you see the three foundation stones? Death. Return. Judgment. The gospel says that we will die. We all die. The gospel says that Jesus is coming back. And when he comes back, there will be a judgment day where men will answer for their lives. There you have it, folks. There’s the end. That’s what’s going to happen. We know it’s coming, and we know what’s going to transpire.

Those three basic foundation stones are visited again and again and again by the biblical writers. And so I’m going back to 2 Thessalonians. Will you go there? We read this passage on the Lord’s Day. This is 2 Thessalonians chapter 1. Go down to verse number 6. And in this text, notice how he develops this idea of judgment, and particularly how he talks about the vindication at that time of righteous people and the punishment of the wicked. I’m in 2 Thessalonians chapter 1, verse 6, where Paul says, For after all, it is only just for God to replay with repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted, and to us as well, when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels.

Do you see it? There’s the return. There’s that stone. Dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction away from the presence of the Lord and the glory of his power. There’s judgment. When he comes, there’s his return to be glorified in his saints on that day. Do you see it? Over and over again. We turn to Bible passages that develop these three ideas. We’re going to die. Jesus will return. Men will be judged. Jesus develops that idea extensively in Matthew 25. Will you look at that passage? I’m in Matthew 25. I’m going down to verse 31. Matthew 25, verse 31. Jesus said, But when, but when the Son of Man comes in his glory and all his angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne.

There’s the return of Jesus. And all the nations will be gathered before them, and he will separate them from one another. As the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. And the king will say to those on his right, Come you who are blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you for the foundation of the world. Get out of verse 41. Then he will say to those on his left, depart from me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels. What’s going on there? What is that scene? It is the judgment scene. Do you see that? Christ is going to return, Jesus says.

And men are going to be judged. They’ll give an account for their lives. Peter would say. Peter would say that all of those realities ought to have an effect on us. And so I’m going over to 2 Peter 3. Will you join me there? 2 Peter chapter 3, and I want to go down to verse number 9. 2 Peter 3, verse 9. Let’s read a good little bit of this. And I want you to notice as we read it, watch for Peter talking about how life should be changed by the fact that the end is coming. This is 2 Peter 3, verse 9. The Lord is not slow about his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.

But the day of the Lord will come. There’s the return. Like a thief. In which the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the elements will be destroyed within ten seed, and the earth and its works will be burned up. The end is coming. Verse 11. Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, listen to me. What sort of people want you to be in holy conduct and godliness? This ought to be impacting the way you live your life. Looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God. What is he saying there? Need to know the end is coming. Need to be thinking about that. Because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt within ten seed.

But according to his promise, we are looking for a new heavens and a new earth, and which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by him in peace, spotless and blameless. What is Peter saying? He’s saying, listen, you know the end is coming. That ought to be doing something the way you live your life. You ought to be looking for this and living a certain way because these are the things you believe. Now you know. What have I given you four passages? How many more? And you know, if you’ve been in Bible class much, we’ve only skimmed right across the top of the service. These passages need to be unpacked, and we need to dig into everything that’s in there.

All I’m trying to say to you is that when we read the gospel, the Holy Spirit tells us that the end is coming. It’s there again and again and again. And so the question becomes if this is such a frequent theme, if we see it again and again as we study our Bible, how can it be that anybody wouldn’t be ready for it? That we wouldn’t be prepared for the end. And I think you know the answer. Same reason Carl wasn’t thinking about getting out of Alaska. We get caught up in the journey. We get caught up in the excitement of all the stuff we have to do right here and right now. And frankly, with Disney World and iPhones and college football, there is a lot to get caught up in.

There’s a lot of cool stuff to occupy our time. And we can get so occupied with that and so fixated on that stuff that our minds never drift here. And so Carl’s story makes me think about all the admonitions in the gospel. And the end is coming.

2. We Need to Be Sure That We Know What Matters

Because that is true. Because the end is coming, then a second admonition that I see in Carl’s story is this that we need to be sure that we know what matters. Are you with me on that? I can imagine myself being in Carl’s living room the week before he left for the wilderness. Can you kind of get in your mind’s eye what that must have looked like? Because of all the way all this shook out, I’m kind of impressed that he probably wasn’t a very organized guy. Are you with me on that? I could kind of look at his living room and I’m imagining right in the middle of the room there are these boxes of film and photographic equipment and a tent rolled up over here and a sleeping bag and boxes with provisions sort of scattered about.

And over there in the corner, there are three weapons sort of laying up there in the corner. I would have taken more than three. Everything that you would need for a journey into the wilderness. I think from the front end, from Springs’s perspective, Carl probably looked like a pretty smart guy, don’t you think? We’d walked around his livery, and we would have thought he’s got everything covered. He’s got everything that he needs.

But when we look at his journey from winter’s perspective, from the back end of it, he looks like a fool, doesn’t he? Suddenly his one omission is so glaring that it makes all of those other preparations pointless, doesn’t it? What good is 500 rolls of film with no way to get out? He did figure it out. He did come to understand what really mattered. He just figured that part out. Too late. I think a lot of people are living just like Carl, doing what Carl did just on a most, a much more grand scale. They are living life consumed with doing all the things to make this journey great, to take care of the here and now. And so from the time our children are very school, or very young, rather, we drill in their heads.

They need to do well in school, they need good report cards. We don’t even know whether they did their Bible lesson, but we know what’s going on at school. Why? So they can get into a prestigious school and get a really good education. To what end? Well, so that they can get a great job and be very successful in that job. And we’re excited as we watch our adult children excel in their chosen profession and work their way up the corporate ladder and enjoy all the good things that come with that, like a great salary and acknowledgments and awards and recognition, and then with a great salary comes all the stuff you can buy. Big house, cool stuff to put in the house, especially cool stuff to put in the garage.

Have all the latest gadgets, all the latest devices, and someone looks at a life that’s got all that stuff scattered about, and what do we say about that life? They’re living the American church. They got it all. In fact, that’s the great thing. All the people around you will put their stamp of approval on that. And so you’ve really been successful. You earn great numbers for your coming. They’re going to give you a cute little plaque to put up on the wall in your office so you can press all your friends when they come in. All around us put people put their seal of approval on it. We’ve done the stuff that matters, right?

From culture’s lens, that’s how it looks. I don’t know that it looks that way to God. Because I’m thinking about our story back in Luke, chapter 12. And I’m impressed that if the men in this parable were living today, that’s exactly what everybody would have said about him. He was a great success. Do you buy that? Had a business. He had worked his business well. It was a successful business. It was a growing business. It was an expanding business. In fact, he had done so well growing his business and earning money that he was able to retire early. Go sit on the beach somewhere. Kick back and relax. And we would all look at that. And what would we say? Well, that’s a successful guy. What’s he?

That’s not what God said about him. In Luke 12 and verse 20, God said, You’re a fool. Now, please don’t misunderstand that. He was not a fool because of what he had. There’s no evil or wickedness in being successful and earning a great living and having a big house and driving a nice car. The problem with the man was not with what he had, it’s with what he didn’t have. He collected a bunch of stuff that had no value. He did not possess what did. He had no relationship with God. He was not rich toward God, is what the text said. Most people will be just like Carl. They’re not going to know what matters until it’s too late to do anything about it. Can you imagine somebody on judgment day approaching the throne of Jesus and saying something like, Lord, have you looked at my SAT score?

Do you know what school I went to? Do you know that I just didn’t get a degree? I got not just a degree. I got an MBA from this really prestigious school. Have you seen the prophets that I produced for my department last year that gave me this cool plaque? Let me show you my office. Have you seen my car? It talks to me.

We need to be very cautious. That in a materialistic culture like ours, we do not get caught up in pursuing things, giving our life to things that don’t matter.

3. When We Get Our Cues, We Do Not Miss Them

And I think that periodically we get cues about that. And so my last point this evening would be this. And we need to be very sure that when we get our cues, we do not miss them. Carl got a cue. Carl came to realize that he had made a terrible mistake and he had not planned for his exit. And he came to realize it at a point in time at a point in time when he still could have done something about it. I’m thinking about August. I’m thinking about that first moment when he realized, oh. I don’t think I told the pilot to go back for me. Winter wasn’t there yet. He was still in good health. He could have packed up. He could have taken one of those weapons, maybe two.

And he could have started walking 75 miles. Port Yukon. He could have walked out. Wouldn’t have been an easy journey, but listen, he was experienced with this. He couldn’t have done it. Why didn’t he do it? Why didn’t he just walk out in August? Well, that would have required him to change some plans, wouldn’t it? That would have required some sacrifices. I think if you’re going by foot 75 miles through the Alaskan wilderness, you’re going to be carrying things like food, not film. Are you with me on that? Probably would have survived.

There was a moment in the journey when he knew he didn’t have a plan. And he could have done something about it. I think we get cues like that too. I think everybody does. As busy as we are with this life and its stuff, as much as it consumes us, I think everybody has those moments where they realize I don’t have an exit strategy. I don’t have a plan for when I die. How about at a funeral? In Ecclesiastes 7 and verse 2, Solomon said something really strange. Ecclesiastes 7 2, it’s better to go to a house of mourning than to a house of feasting. We would say it is better to go to a funeral than to a party. And I don’t think anybody buys that.

That’s the most absurd notion, isn’t it? You ever notice nobody goes to funerals anymore? Over the 30 years I’ve been preaching, the crowds get smaller and smaller and smaller. But have a party, a good party? Everybody wants to go to that. Nobody wants to go to funerals. Why don’t we like funerals? Someone says, Well, they’re so sad. They are. And they’re painful because we’re feeling the void, the absence of this loved one who’s been lost. And I don’t like going to funerals because they’re just so sad and they’re so tragic. I think that’s part of it. I don’t think that’s all of it. Back to Ecclesiastes 7 and verse 2. Solomon said it’s better to go to a funeral than a party because that is the end of every man and the living takes it to heart.

That’s why we don’t like funerals. Who can sit through a funeral? Without being forced to consider that this isn’t some special awful fate that befell this person. But in truth, every person passes this way. And my turn is coming. One day it will be my time. And my friends will gather. And someone will stand and talk about my life. And it will be my empty shell lying in my box. And when you have to sit and think about those things, suddenly you’re first to ponder, well, what then? I don’t have a plan for good night. We’re reminded that we need an exit strategy. That I need to turn to God. I need I need to serve God. It’s time, it’s time to get that relationship right.

Well, let me ask you. If that’s what happens at funerals, and everybody ultimately has to go to a funeral, then why didn’t everybody get straightened out on this? Why doesn’t everybody, after watching the service for the passing of a loved one, come away and say, I need to get my life right with God? Some people do that. Most people don’t. And I think they don’t for exactly the same reason Carl didn’t pack up in August and start walking to Fort Yukon. Change is hard. Sacrifices have to be made. Maybe you’ve been hanging on to some wicked, sinful habit. Maybe you like clubbing on the weekend and hanging out with the bars, and you just are not ready to choose Jesus over that. Or maybe coming back to God will mean you’ve got to do this awful thing and admit that your parents were right, and you’re just not ready to swallow your pride and do that.

And so you go to funerals, and that’s really hard. And for the next week or two, it really tweaks your mind and your conscience, and then you get over it. And you will. And you miss your cue.

And most people will never get it right until it’s too late. The question is, am I one of those people? Several years back when I was working in Beaumont, we decided that we would intensify our effort to reach out to folks we had lost along the way. We’d had some people over the years who had been walking with Jesus and then got pulled back into sin, and we’ve had to withdraw from them. And we wanted to be true to the Bible imperative, not to count them as enemies, but regard them as brothers. And so we decided that since around the first of the year, people are often taking inventory of their life, that might be a good time to reach out to folks like that. So we planned a special series of sermons that would be especially for those kinds of folks.

And we made a list.

And so in November and December, there was a team of disciples who had agreed to take on the work of reaching out to these folks, and they began writing letters. We miss you. We want you to come back. And sending cards, making some phone calls. And when it seemed like the door was open to go and visit. We did that for two months heading into the first of the next year. And then January came and we did our sermons over four weeks designed to appeal to these people to come back to God. Some of them came and visited during January, some of the people that we had been working on, some of the people on our list. But we went all the way through January and nobody was restored.

And so we were kind of disappointed, feeling like our efforts had failed. We weren’t patient. Because in February there were two, and in March, three more. And by the time we get to end of April, almost 20% of the people we had worked on had been restored. One of our families had lost all three of their girls. And by the end of April, all three had come back. And we were celebrating. I am sad to tell you that Howard Green was not in the 20%. He was on our first list. We had lost Howard. I remember the day that Howard was born again. If I have the story straight in my mind, I was working in my office and I got a knock on my door.

This was not an uncommon occurrence where I was working at that time. And it was one of our elders who had been studying with Howard, and he said, We’re about to have a new birth, and I know you’ll want to see it. And I did. And so I went into the auditorium, and there were just a handful of us there at the office that day, and we watched Howard be born again. And he and I got to be friends. I visited with him at services, and we interacted a little bit, and he was with us for a year or two, but then the devil got after him. And he began to be pulled back into some old sinful ways of life. And he gave in to the devil, and ultimately Howard fell away, drifted back into the world, and we’d had to withdraw from him.

And so in November and December, he was on our list, and we began making some calls and reaching out to Howard.

The folks who were calling and writing.

With Howard came in one Sunday night and said, Look, I talked to Howard this week. And he made very clear that he wanted to hear from any of us. He said, Tell those people, I am not coming back. And I don’t want any more calls. And I don’t know any more letters. Well, we were disappointed. But frankly, when someone says, I don’t want you to call or write, we felt like we really needed to honor his request. And so on that Sunday night, we agreed that we would honor Howard’s request and we wouldn’t send any more letters.

We met again the next week to see how we had progressed. And one of the members of our team toward the end of the meeting spoke up and said, Listen, I need to share something terrible with y’all. And between those two meetings in that week, Howard had gone in for a routine medical procedure. But there were complications. And Howard died. And I can’t help but believe that all of those efforts were the providential work of God trying to give Howard Green his cue. The end of coming. You better know what matters. You better get your life right.

Conclusion

Maybe this lesson is exactly that moment for you. As we talked about, the end is coming and what matters and people getting cues. Maybe that’s tweaking all over your heart. Maybe it’s hard for you to hear this because you know things aren’t right with him. You are giving a cue now. Do something about it. Do it right now while we stand, while we sing together.