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In the 1950s, one of the churches I was serving held a picnic at an Oregon state park. For a brief time, I found myself in conversation with another group in the same park. On learning that I was a pastor, one person in that group said, "Oh, you poor man!" As the conversation went on, it became evident that the remark was not based on a perception of my economic condition, but on some previous experience of a church's demands on a pastor's time. I did not share such a negative view of a pastor's life then, nor have I done so since. Serving as a pastor of a parish is not always easy, but it is a fulfilling learning experience, learning with, and from, parishioners. Over the years, I have had the opportunity to see God at work in the lives of individuals, marriages, families: To see how the Holy Spirit led a man who "wanted nothing to do with things Christian" become an elder and a leader in evangelistic outreach; to watch young people who were given opportunity to serve in the local church decide to go to seminary and become pastors themselves; and to receiving, during a worship service, a phone call from a dear lady, calling from her hospital bed to say she was praying for the church gathered.Central in the Bible is the message of the love of God in Jesus Christ. I am writing in the hope and prayer that this life-changing, redeeming love of Christ may occupy the center, not the periphery, of our lives and be the main motivator of all we think and do.
9781645695004 | BIB001050 | book-has-featured-image
