For the last 28 years, Bruce Harpel and his wife, Johnye Lynn, have worked on the Univ. of Minnesota campus at Maranatha Christian Church, a church they started.   Bruce is the senior pastor of the non-denominational congregation.  "It's robust, healthy and bearing fruit and spreading the gospel all over the world," he said.

But, the first 16 years of his life after high school were a polar opposite.

Bruce said his very religious parents kept a tight reign on him in high school.   So,  two months after graduation, he bought a '55 blue and white Chevy and moved into an apartment, where he partied hard.

Two years later, he moved to Memphis and attended Memphis State Univ. By then, he was into drugs and four years later when he graduated with a degree in psychology, he was also dealing. 

His met his wife selling drugs, and says after they married, they lived in a hippie commune.  "We were all working class people who did drugs," he explained.

Bruce says the thing that probably saved them was they did not use needles, which means they did not become addicted to the "rush," that happens when drugs are injected into veins as opposed to sniffing. "The amazing thing is I was never arrested," he said.

Bruce enrolled in a master's degree program at Memphis State in social work.  "It was cheap, and it was easy," he said. 

During that time, he says he often visited hospitals as a professional, high on drugs, while counseling others how to get off them.

As low as he had sunk, it occurred to him one day that he wanted to have children.  Johnye would have no part of it and she left.  

During the months she was gone Bruce said, "God entered my life and put Johnye back in it."

Once the two reunited, they felt they were called to go to Minneapolis and work for God.  And they did   Bruce left Memphis, three hours shy of completing his master's degree.

Today the couple have six children (one in heaven,) eight grandchildren and a very happy and ordinary, mainstream life.  Since their conversion and baptism, neither has smoked or drank alcohol or used drugs.

Looking back, Bruce says high school was a good time.  Although he worked many hours and was required to be home when he wasn't working, he still managed to be on the swim and track team.

He was friends with Mike Wood, Dick Grove and Wayne LaMere and fondly recalls watching the World Series games in the auditorium with friends.

His favorite teacher was Mrs. Hall, his biology teacher.  "I never had a teacher I responded to better than her," he said.

Blue Moon and The Lion Sleeps Tonight were two of his favorite songs back in the day.

 Bruce would enjoy hearing from other classmates.  His email address is bruceharpel@mac.com