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LEBANON - Cary Bybee believes that his scientific training gave him a unique perspective as he wrote a series of three books about the end times.

Bybee, 41, is a materials research scientist and mechanical engineer at Hewlett-Packard in Corvallis. He is also a guitarist and worship leader at the Lebanon First Assembly of God.

In his books "The Last Gentile," "Deacon's Horn," and "The Final Witness," Bybee takes Scriptural stories and visions of the Apocalypse and fleshes them out with his scientific understanding.

"I really feel I was being told what to say," Bybee said. "I was interpreting what I was reading from a scientific standpoint."

As an example, he took literally what would happen to the earth if it were struck by an asteroid. He ran calculations on the effect a two-mile wide asteroid would have if it hit at 40,000 miles an hour.

"A good portion of my research, years worth of research, is to make sure that I understood everything I was putting in," Bybee said. "You get the full flavor. It is frightening."

Putting together these two worlds - scriptural and technical - is "my destiny," he said.

Bybee spent his early years in California and moved to Lebanon with his family at age 10. After graduating from high school in Lebanon, he joined the Air Force and was stationed in Alaska, where he completed a degree at the University of Alaska.

When his first tour of duty was completed, he came back to the Willamette Valley and worked for a year, but soon had the itch to rejoin the service. This time, he was stationed in Texas, where he completed a second undergraduate degree at Texas A&M.

He served as a nuclear engineer in the Air Force and designed air launch cruise missiles. His research contributed to some of the missiles which were used in the war in Iraq. The original nuclear warheads were replaced by conventional weapons, he said.

He moved on to the Air Force Reserves in 1988, moved back to Lebanon and took a job at Hewlett-Packard, where he has worked since, primarily in the design of printer cartridges.

His job requires a lot of travel and it was on one of his many trips that he first had the idea of writing an end-time novel.

"I was on a flight, and I had this thought that down there, there's one last person that's going to accept Jesus Christ as his or her savior before his return," Bybee said.

Eventually, he had 30 or 40 fragments of a story written on different pieces of paper. He assembled these pieces into an outline and then proceeded to write "The Last Gentile." He finished the book about six years ago.

He went on to complete the trilogy, which is being published by 1stBooks Library. It is available online through all the standard booksellers, and is also being featured in the bookstore at Bybee's home church, the Lebanon First Assembly of God.

"Cary is extremely talented. They are very good books," said Frankie Williams, the manager of the Assembly of God bookstore. "He writes like a scientist."

Bybee avoided reading the popular Left Behind series as he focused on his own treatment of the end of the world. Now that he has started writing, he is overflowing with ideas for more books.

"I am working on other books, mysteries, dramas and adventures. A couple are really close to completion," Bybee said.

As he has written his first books, he has distributed them to friends and church leaders for a critique. He will soon find out what the wider world thinks of his efforts.

He said that reviews are forthcoming in a May edition of USA Today, and in June editions of the New York and L.A. Times book reviews.

Bybee will sign copies of his books on May 18 at the First Assembly of God, following the morning worship service.