GRAY, Ga. (BP) — John Albrycht isn’t a mechanic by trade, but he’s aware of how gears work together to put things in motion. He sees value in things that have been discarded. He knows the time spent during the work is just as important — maybe even more so — than the finished product.

He is also a longtime student minister, both bivocationally and full time. Albrycht, a member of First Baptist Church in Gray, is familiar with how the gospel can be compared to a mustard seed. He prefers the analogy of a bug.

It began 18 years ago when Albrycht was the bivocational student minister at Plentitude Baptist Church, also in Jones County, while working with the Georgia Department of Transportation. Jeff Weeks, a youth worker and full-time logger, helped start Bugs4Christ, which started with a focus on mentoring young men and quickly grew into providing transportation for those in need and a platform for sharing Jesus.

It began with a Volkswagen Beetle belt buckle worn by one of his ministry leaders. It gave Albrycht, who just so happened to be in the process of restoring a ’71 Super Beetle for a friend, an idea.

Created in Germany but booming in popularity in the U.S throughout the 1960s, the Volkswagen Beetle was known for its affordability, reliability and excellent fuel mileage. Disney’s 1969 movie “The Love Bug,” about a Beetle named Herbie that went on to bring five sequels and a TV series, solidified its stature as a pop culture phenomenon.

Albrycht will celebrate 37 years with his wife Sandy this month. They didn’t have much money back then, but he found a ’72 Beetle for sale for $500. A new transaxle and some more work, and he had it going. He’s had an affinity for them ever since.

That joined his desire to spend more time with the guys in his youth group outside of the church walls.

“For a country church, we had an extraordinary number of junior and senior guys involved,” he said. “We were trying to figure out a way we could spend time with them outside of church before they got a job or a girlfriend, because then they tend to leave.”

It took 16 months, but a group of four or five teens helped Albrycht one night a week completely restore the Beetle “from top to bottom.”

The ministry has stretched to pretty much any car that has been collecting weeds in someone’s backyard or field. Often, it’s not much more than a blown head gasket or something else Albrycht’s crew can fix. The donated car is then either entered in a show with a gospel-centric display or given to someone in need of transportation.

“God would give us a car and we’d go find someone to give it to or there would be a person needing a car and we would go find one,” Albrycht said. “It was on faith.”

He estimates the ministry has restored up to 45 cars. Time spent in the garage is its own reward, but it’s hard to top the moment someone gets the keys.

One of the first went to a kid named Skylar who had helped build up the first few cars. One day he was late and Albrycht teased him about it the way guys in a garage would. Come to find out the family had one car and he had to drive his dad to work before coming back to the mission project.

“God told me, ‘John, find this boy a car.’ So I started looking,” Albrycht recalled.

He didn’t have to. Not long afterward a woman for whom he had done some property work called out of the blue. She had an ’89 Thunderbird to give him, because God told her to.

It took less than a month to get it ready. After church one day the pastor announced that a keychain in the shape of a thunderbird had been found and the key needed to be returned to its rightful owner.

When no one moved, he flipped it over and read the name on the back.

“Skylar, come get your keys,” he smiled at the surprised teen, who said there must be a mistake because he didn’t have a car. He was told differently and to go outside and look.

Another time involved a gentleman whose cognitive deficiencies deemed him legally incapable of operating a car. So he drove a golf cart the short distance to church, where he served as a greeter and didn’t miss Sunday school for about 20 years.

“One day we noticed his golf cart wasn’t there,” said Albrycht. “The pastor told me the motor had blown up.

“On their own, the kids went and got another golf cart. They restored it and painted it in Georgia Bulldog colors.”

While hosting a Super Bowl party in the gym, Albrycht designated halftime for everyone to tell the man why they loved him.

“Everyone praised Mr. Buddy and told him how incredible he was,” Albrycht said. “Then those kids wheeled the golf cart out to give to him. He was thrilled and watched the entire second half from the cart. He kept that golf cart up to when he died last year.”

Another time, he heard about a pastor who had to sell the family car due to finances. They drove the church van instead. Bugs4Christ fixed up a Cadillac and put it in a car show.

“We invited the pastor and his wife to the show, which was a cruise-in,” he said. “When we got to that car we said, ‘By the way pastor, this one’s yours, and here are the keys.’ We’ve done that so many times and it’s so much fun.”

Work nights in the garage include a devotional. Honest questions about God and life are easily broached in that environment.

“I’ve learned that kids and young men have a transparency and willingness to ask those questions in that setting that they don’t have in church,” said Albrycht. “We have a process to invest relationally, love unconditionally and speak truthfully. Those come straight from Jesus.”

It’s not uncommon for the work to give spiritual applications. One of the guys was looking at buying a ’66 Chevy truck. Albrycht cautioned him on how those trucks tend to rust out, which owners cover with a layer of Bondo. You can’t see it, but the rust is still there and still eating through the Bondo. It became an example of how we can try to cover up sin, but it will continue to eat away.

“We’ve been teaching those types of lessons for 18 years,” he said. “The guys get it. They understand what we’re trying to do. Then we get to see them giving input and applying those lessons. It’s so great to see their growth.”

(EDITOR’S NOTE — Scott Barkley is chief national correspondent for Baptist Press.)