Legacies of Light: Charles McCoy

Ever chased a good plan that kept slipping away? We explore the ache and the gift of divine redirection through three intertwined journeys: Paul’s long road to Rome and dream of Spain, Jonah’s sprint toward Tarshish, and Dr. Charles McCoy’s stunning decision to sell everything at seventy-two and fly to Bombay on a one-way ticket. What begins as a study in delay turns into a portrait of grace that doesn’t rubber-stamp our maps but reshapes our hearts.

We walk through Paul’s confession in Romans 15—years of longing, constant hindrance, and a vision for the “ends of the earth.” Spain symbolized the horizon of the Great Commission, yet Paul reached Rome in chains, not triumph. Side by side with Jonah, the contrast is sharp: one runs from calling, the other runs to it—and God says no to both. Not to punish, but to redeem and redirect. Along the way, we confront our assumptions about “approved” plans, learning that God doesn’t make last-minute adjustments; he unfolds eternal purposes that invite surrender over certainty.

Then we meet Dr. McCoy, forced into retirement yet unwilling to retire his calling. With lost luggage and a scrap of an address, he knocks on the door of Bombay’s mayor and finds a room full of leaders waiting to hear his story. That moment sparks sixteen years of open doors across India and beyond, proving that age, scarcity, and setback don’t disqualify a life on mission. The thread through it all is simple and searching: when the ship to Spain never sails, will we still sail with the Savior? Listen for perspective that blends Scripture, history, and lived courage—designed to help you hold your plans loosely, your purpose firmly, and your faith steadily. If this resonates, subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a review to help more listeners find the show.

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Transcript

Longing And Hindrance In Paul’s Plans

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Dr. McCoy responded, well, I suppose it's just as close to heaven in India as it is in America. That's great answer. So he's gonna take this step of faith. So when the church celebrated his retirement at age 72, instead of traveling to Florida, he sold his furniture and his automobile, in fact, everything he had left in the trunk, had just enough money to buy a one-way ticket. If you were to interview an elderly apostle Paul and you were to ask him, what do you think God is going to do with you in the last lap, the last chapter, so to speak, of your life? Well, even though Paul was in his 50s, and the average lifespan in the Roman Empire was 60, as you read his biographical statements in his letters, he was always making plans. He had plans. In fact, one of the most touching paragraphs in the Apostle Paul's letters is a paragraph that shows up in his letter to the Roman believers in chapter 15, and he writes with great transparency, and he just sort of bears his heart with them, and he says this. But now, since I no longer have any room for work in these regions, and I have longed for many years to come to you. Stop for a moment. He has a great desire, this longing to visit the believers in Rome. And so far, so far in his journey, he's been hindered. He doesn't give us the details, but he simply writes here in verse 22 I have so often been hindered from coming to you. In other words, I've made plan, but something got in the way. You know, more than likely you could testify to something similar, perhaps in your own life, no matter how sincere your desire, no matter how clear the impression was from the word, you believe from the Spirit of God, no matter how carefully you planned everything out, no matter how right it was, no matter how good and godly it was, no matter how wonderful it would be if it happened. And it just wouldn't happen. It doesn't happen. Something hinders it. Something gets in the way. You know, we tend to think that whatever gets in the way has nothing to do with God. Because we would expect that he would, you know, take his royal insignia and stamp his sovereign signature on our plans. But God doesn't allow often things to occur. And for Paul, if you are older in the faith, you know it included hardship and beatings and imprisonment and a couple of shipwrecks. I mean, those are hindrances, aren't they? But I don't want you to miss the language here. He's languishing here in this appeal. He's not trying to be dramatic. He's simply unveiling his heart. He says in verse 23, I have longed for many years to come to you. Get that many years. Maybe you've longed for something. Six months, a year, maybe longer than that. It might feel like years. Maybe that job promotion coming through or that addition of a child to your family, finding a cure, maybe some relief. Seeing that closed door finally open and you're ready to celebrate, it just doesn't open. Maybe watching justice finally being handed down because you've been wronged. Maybe it's financial relief. The truth is, we all have items on our list, don't we? We all have plans like that. Maybe you've waited for years and it has yet to happen. Think about this. The Apostle Paul has just told us that he has been longing for most of his Christian life to visit Rome. Paul, if you've studied his life, you know he wasn't just a small town guy. He was really kind of a big cities guy. He he loved to go to the major crossroads. I love the fact that he he says here earlier that you know there's nothing left for me here in this region. I love that statement. I'm done. I've got to go somewhere new, somewhere fresh. And he's in this last lap now of his life. He wants to go to Rome. And when he finally arrives, and he does get there, but when he arrives, it isn't like he planned. He doesn't arrive as a pioneer, he arrives as a prisoner in chains. The ministry he envisioned that he would one day have if I could ever get to Rome is not going to take place. Like he planned. There's something else that's easy to miss. Paul doesn't just want to go to Rome, he wants to stop over in Rome. Maybe a long weekend or two. Then he wants to repack his bags and take off on the most important leg of his journey. I'll follow this. Paul writes in the latter part of verse 23 I have longed for many years to come to you. I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain and to be helped on my journey there by you once I have enjoyed your company for a while. He wants to go to Rome, and let me tell you, he really wants to go on to Spain. Rome was a stopover. Rome was a pit stop. Rome was Bucky's on the way to Texas. Got a new illustration now. Some barbecues, some banana pudding. He says perfectly clean bathrooms. I'm on my way. Now, if you fill in the blanks, Paul is heading to Jerusalem. He's got a special benevolence offering for the hard-pressed, famine-stricken believers there in that city. And then after that, he's going to drop that off at Rome. So Paul explains here in verse 28, when therefore I've completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected, that special benevolent offering, I will leave for Spain. I will, note that. I got plans. I will leave for Spain. By way of you. Now, why Spain? Why Spain? The only other person in the entire Bible who ever references wanting to go to Spain is Jonah. That's because God told Jonah to go to Nineveh and deliver a warning. You don't want to go to Nineveh. Nineveh was the capital city of Assyria. It was a demon-worshipping, brutal nation that would impale the severed heads of their enemies on stakes and parade them. They would impale people on stakes and light them on fire. Nero will resurrect that horrible practice 800 years later in Paul's day and do that to Christians. Nineveh was feared, it was hated by the Israelites. I mean, the last revival Jonah ever wanted to be involved in was a revival in Nineveh. So he runs, the text tells us, from the presence of God. Now Jonah doesn't think he's going to run away from an omnipresent God. I think the Jerusalem translation, New Jerusalem translation, clarifies it by telling us he's running from the service of the Lord. In other words, Jonah then and there says, I resign. You're asking too much of me. Now he was already a famous prophet in Israel. He had predicted the word of God earlier recorded for us, and it had come true. He's not going to deliver the word of God now because he didn't want to do it to the Ninevehites. So he's effectively turning in his prophet's badge. He's quitting the ministry rather than fulfilling the ministry. The plans of God are not his plans, and he's not going to go along with God's plans. So he heads 20 miles south to Joppa to catch a boat. Any boat's going to do, as far as we can imagine. And wouldn't you know it? There's a boat heading for Tarshish. That's a town on the western coast of what we know of as Spain. It is considered the edge of the known world. He's going to the edge of the world. That's the boat for me. I'm going to travel as far away from Nineveh as possible. I'm going to go to the very edge of the world. He's done. This is where Paul wants to go. The edge of the world. Jonah wants to go to Spain to get out of the ministry. Paul wants to go to Spain to start a new ministry. Jonah's running from God. Paul wants to run for God. Jonah wants to go there out of the will of God. Paul wants to go there in the will of God for good and godly reason. Neither man, of course, makes it to Spain. Do they? God had surprising plans. Jonah ends up inside a whale. And Paul ends up inside a jail. Makes me wonder, in my life and in yours, are you heading to Spain today? Like Jonah? Or like Paul? Do you want to serve God or avoid God? You know, it's possible to make plans to serve God, and it's possible to make plans to sin against God. For Jonah, Spain was personal rebellion. For Paul, Spain was a ministry vision. But why Spain? You haven't answered me yet. Why Spain? Well, I think Paul simply wanted to go to the ends of the earth, just as Jesus had commanded. You remember before Jesus ascended? He said, Go and make disciples. Where are you going to go? Well, don't sit around here on your hands. That's my translation. Get moving, take it into Jerusalem, and then Judea, and then Samaria, and go to the ends of the earth. Paul said, I want to do that. I want to go to the ends of the earth. And make some new disciples there. But God wouldn't allow it. As I've compared these men in my study for both Jonah and Paul, one of them is running in sin, the other one is running to serve, and God says no to both of them. It's the grace of God in their lives and in your life and mine. Because we sin against it. And we serve. It's applicable to you and me. He reminds them, I have plans for you. In other words, these are my plans, not yours. My plans are better. Now we should never assume that unmet expectations or plans that never work out, some disappointment in life, means that God's grace has been canceled in our lives, or we didn't deserve his blessings anyway. Well, that's the enemy speaking to you, not the spirit. But he says that, doesn't he? But that's grace. We don't deserve anything. But he's at work on our lives with plans. And he often leaves unexpected plans, unexplained, doesn't he? So we have that running list. Perhaps you came in with one or two things that you expect God to do in your life. You'd like him to do. Maybe one or two things you don't expect that he would do in your life, and he's doing it. It might be something you expect in a career path, or maybe some financial investment. It might be something you're expecting in marriage or with children and grandchildren. Maybe it's an expectation of where you'd be living at the age of 30, the age of 50, the age of 80. We have plans that we write out and we use a big thick magic marker. Big letters. And the Lord transfers what we have marked out into his ledger and he transforms it into pencil, and then he reaches for a big eraser. Life is not what we have written down. Life is what God is rolling out. Now, theologically speaking, let's make sure we understand that God does not make plans. He doesn't respond with, oh, wait, Jonah's running away. I wasn't expecting that. Where's that fish? Or Paul really wants to go to Spain and ought to let him. Okay, I'll change my plans. I like him. He's a nice guy. That's how we think God thinks. Somehow we'll earn it. We'll deserve the plans we have if he likes us enough. God's grace and love cannot be exceeded in our lives. We have it to the utmost. He doesn't make plans, he's always had plans. They stretch back into eternity past. The question is, what are we going to do when what we've planned is different than what he planned? When we discover, and if you're old enough in the faith, you've learned that the Christian life didn't mean all your plans not come true. You discover it often that God is developing in you something deeper. And you didn't volunteer for it. He is equipping you for something different. Maybe today you're resisting. Therein lies the matter of surrender and trust. We get up for a new day and we say, Lord, what do you have for me next? Let me introduce you to a legacy of light in an older man's life who never expected God to roll things out the way he did. In fact, it was birthed out of great disappointment. But he was willing to take the step of faith, even though he was in his 70s. 70, nearing 72. Now, for many years during the 1900s, when he served as a pastor, he pastored faithfully at church in Oyster Bay, New York. How many people here are from New York? Two people, good. That's our quota. I'm from Minnesota, so no offense. Okay. While pastoring, he uses he used his spare time to um earn some doctoral degrees. He was single his entire life. One of his PhDs was from Dartmouth, and one was from Columbia University. He faithfully served his congregation. Finally, as he approached the age of 72, the bylaws of his denomination required that he retire from pastoring. Our bylaws do not require that here at this church. I just want you to know. He was healthy, involved, invested. Frankly, he didn't want to stop preaching, pastoring, serving. So he he planned on staying on their oyster, New York, uh until he passed away. But then his uh denomination wouldn't budge. He would have to retire in a few months after all. He told his biographer, and I quote, I would lie on my bed at night thinking, my life is over. But I haven't really finished. I haven't done everything I want to do for the Lord. But evidently, God was finished with me. It was time to retire. Well, shortly before his retirement, he invited an Indian pastor from Bombay to preach for him one Sunday, and they struck up a friendship. And the pastor from India invited Dr. McCoy to return the favor and come preach in his church and his mission station associated with his church there in Bombay. Well, McCoy kind of laughed it off. He'd never traveled far from New York. In fact, he'd never been on an airplane before, wasn't about to fly to India. Besides, he said plans had already been made to move to a retirement village in Florida for missionaries and former pastors and their families. Well, the Indian pastor insisted that he change his mind. He told him, with your head of white hair, you'll be immediately gaining respect. You ought to reconsider. Well, over the next few months, as his 72nd birthday drew closer, he began praying. He couldn't get that invitation off his mind. It was the last thing in the world he'd ever planned to do. Well, finally, he sensed the Spirit of God insisting that he take this invitation. And he made up his mind he'd travel to Bombay. Now, his congregation in Oyster, New York thought he'd lost his mind. The chairman of the deacon board pulled him aside and said, What happens if you die in India? What happens if you get sick over there and die? Dr. McCoy responded, Well, I suppose it's just as close to heaven in India as it is in America. That's great answer. So he's going to take this step of faith. So when the church celebrated his retirement at age 72, instead of traveling to Florida, he sold his furniture and his automobile, had just enough money to buy a one-way ticket to Bombay. Packed everything he had left in a trunk. He was not interested in retirement, he decided he was interested in a reassignment. Folks in church, around town, started praying for him. They thought he was troubled. Well, when he arrived in Bombay, he discovered his trunk had not come along with him. He've traveled enough, right? He never saw it again. All he had was the suit of clothes he was wearing and the address of this pastor's mission station, which he had torn off a missionary newsletter. Now I've landed in Bombay. I've traveled there. I can imagine leaving that airport with a little piece of paper and an address, hoping I'd make it. He did. Love this guy. Well, he made it to the mission station, only to find out that the pastor was out of the country. And he'd never told these missionaries about them. So they weren't quite sure what to do with this 72-year-old man. Well, they settled him in a little guest room, kind of worried about him. They described him as a gentle giant, six feet plus, 250 pounds, dignified bearing, with a full head of white hair. They asked him about his plans. He said he didn't have any. After a few days, though, he announced to that, I'm going to go meet the mayor of Bombay. And they laughed and they said, We've been trying to get in there for years. He won't let you in. He's way too busy. You'll never get in. He said, quote, God brought me here for something, I don't know what, but I'm going to the mayor's office unannounced. So with that, he took off. When he presented his business card to the receptionist, she saw all those PhDs and assumed he was an important dignitary from America. She asked him to wait. She hurried off to tell the mayor, he assumed the same thing and decided to delay meeting him until he could plan a reception for this guest of honor who'd come to see him. Later that afternoon, he was invited back to the reception. When Dr. McCoy returned, he found that many of the political VIPs and military leaders had been assembled by the mayor. He was given the floor, and he simply shared his testimony and presented the gospel. Now, among the guests was the commanding officer of the National Defense Academy. That's our version of West Point. He was so moved when he heard what Dr. McCoy had to say, he invited him to come and preach at the Academy the following week. And that just kind of started it all. From that reception, invitations began arriving from all over India. From churches, political leaders, military officers, business CEOs, missions agencies, universities, and for the next 16 years, he traveled throughout India preaching. He was even invited to other countries. Today, beloved, there are churches in Hong Kong, Egypt, and North Africa because of his preaching. One biographer said this, I found this intriguing. Charles never had enough money other than to get him to the next place where he was invited to preach. It was one step of faith after another. Finally, at the age of 88, he was in Calcutta resting in his room for a worship service. He was to preach that evening. And while he was asleep, he discovered the truth. That heaven was just as close to India as it was in America. Do you think he came to the end of his life thinking, I wish I'd gone to Florida? I wish I wasn't forced into retirement. I wish my plans in Oyster, New York had come true. Do you think the Apostle Paul came to the end of his life and would say to close friends, you know, I I never did have that ministry in Rome I wanted. I never did get to sail to Spain. I wanted to. I longed for it. For years. No. In his final letter to young Timothy, he writes, I have finished my course. It was different than what he planned. I've run the race. Oh, as God unfolded it, it was different. And along the way I've kept the faith. There's one step of faith after another. Sounds like someone surrendering to God to equip him for something different. To allow God to develop in him something deeper. I was reading the other day from an author who's been gone now for many years. I'll close with this. He quoted a Dr. Watkinson who had faithfully served the Lord for decades. Dr. Watkinson was walking along the beach with his grandson one evening, and they met an old minister who was also taking a walk, and that older minister recognized Dr. Watkinson and stopped to talk to him. And while he's talking, he begins complaining to him about his church and about the people and about the world. And he was distrantled with everything. And then he also complained that while he was walking on the beach that day, that he was now suffering from sunstroke. Well, the little boy had been listening all along, and when they finally parted, he looked up at his grandfather and he said, Grandpa, I hope you never suffer from a sunset. We're not heading toward a sunset, are we? We're heading toward a new dawn. And what matters along the journey, really, in our own hearts and minds, is how we view Spain. And that ship that doesn't sail. Those plans that never come to pass. Discovering along the way, by the grace of God, that it isn't so much about sailing into Spain. It's about sailing with the Savior. Our captain. So let's sail back.