I learned something tonight again from the guy.

I have nothing to complain about.  

I Learned a new way to preach from Randy tonight.

“Do not tell people how to live their lives. Just tell them stories. And they will figure out how those stories apply to them.”

I pray that I can be half the husband, father, and man he was.  

Today my family and I went to worship with some wonderful friends at a church that we truly love. There were two individuals that I got to see that I haven’t seen for a long time. Clark and Dorothy. Clark is what I refer to many folks around our home church as a surrogate parent. I had the privilege of being with Clark this past Friday for a whole day. Clark is around 83 years old. It seems like yesterday that Clark was running around town, driving a church bus picking up kids around the neighborhood to take them to church.

Clark and I spent a whole lot of time talking about old times at our home church. He asked me questions about my family as a kid. He was out of the loop for a while and there were things he had known and things he hadn’t known. we also got to see Dorothy and her family. Dorothy and I joked for years that I was her little brother. That’s awesome as a kid to hear when the family you have is holding on by a thread. Today, it means so much more when you think of what both Clark and his daughter actually did for me and so many other kids in the church. Clark later on when I “unofficially” finished high school invited me to come and live in a spare room he had, so that I could go to community college. Although, it took me around eleven years to finally finish, Clark knew that he’d be planting some seeds of faith, hoping that I might go as far as I could. If it weren’t for that opportunity and Clark and his hospitality, I would not have finsihed my undergraduate degree and I would not complete my seminary education at Princeton Seminary to become an ordained Presbyterian minister. Clark along with his family had a huge impact on my life for merely one reason. They understood the concept of loving people as Jesus loved people.

I’m convinced that when one looks at ministry in the context of a city like I was raised in, that loving the people of God as Jesus loved the people of God is how ministry is accomplished in the smallest of churches and the largest of churches. Whether you’re stuck in the desert or in the middle of the city, Jesus calls us to love one another first and foremost. In loving the people of God, the words of Jesus promised gift of rest, “Come to me all who are tired, for I will give you rest”  are magnified loudest in the way one is received into the church via the relationships that are built at the ground level. For me it was through the way Clark and so many others who loved me as a kid that I take these words of hope and apply them in the context of how I live and model Christ’ love within the church I pastor.

Who needs church growth models, large programs with large church budgets that are way understaffed and are doomed for the filing cabinet when you can take a simple model of loving others as Jesus loved and apply it to the way you do ministry in whatever context you serve? As I sat in the place I worshipped for so many years it hit me that this invitation of rest via the people of God is what the kingdom of God here on earth should look like given the current state of the larger church today. The success of the larger churches stuck in the city and the smaller churches stuck in the middle of Joshua trees will be; when those within the church rise up and testify to those who were influential to their finding Jesus promised gift of rest for their souls through the mere fact that they were loved, accepted, prayed for, and confronted with the one who comforts.

As I write this with sleepy eyes, I’ve turned forty. Today, I’m grateful for the gift of rest given to me so many years ago by people like Clark and Dorothy. My prayer today is that the people of God will rise up and proclaim God’s gift of rest as many are faced with their “stuff.”

More birthday reflections later on. Praise God for forty years of rest and praising God for the next forty years to come.

This post is unique.

A very long time ago I wondered upon the campus of a church that I’ve come to love very much. It’s my home away from home. I’ve always loved this church. It’s composed of people who’ve become some of our dearest friends.

There are people in this church who have no clue and don’t even realize how much of an impact they’ve made on my life for Christ. I am a follower of Jesus, husband, father, and pastor because of how some of these people were used in my life by Christ.

When I was a Jr. High kid there were two places I could be found.

The boulevard or at church.

This past Wednesday I had an experience that was so surreal that I felt I was in a scene out of the matrix. It happened again on Friday and even on Saturday morning.

I dropped my kids off with some friends of theirs at this church for a youth group function.  At this church there is a room where the youth function took place. This room always takes me back to my life as a kiddoe.

This room was where I learned from folks that I was loved and valued by Christ.

It was a room where I learned how to play guitar and lead worship. It was a room where I earned a Holy Land coin from my 7th grade Sunday school teacher if I memorized scripture. It was a room where I heard good news as a youth that Jesus loved me and would be faithful in the midst of the joys and struggles of life. It was even the room where I served with my wife in ministry prior to us getting married, helping her run an after school children’s program for the neighborhood.

This week our two boys got introduced to this room. They were introduced to people who continue the vision of loving kids and giving Jesus to them by showing them simple acts of kindness. Seeds of faith planted into their hearts.

As I drove off after dropping them off, I couldn’t help but remember the emptiness I had as a kid not having parents who were available and who showed up as parents. As I drove off I was overwhelmed with God’s blessing that although I didn’t have my parents, that I had the church, the kingdom of God here on earth filing that hole in my heart. As I drove off I was tickled pink that my wife and I get to be parents of some awesome gifts from upon high. As I drove off, I felt grateful that the Lord of the universe, through the work of the church, saved my life. And as I drove off I was overwhelmed with joy that the seeds of faith that were planted in my heart as a youth, were being planted and rooted in the hearts of our kids. Seeds of faith that I took from people who loved me and that we gave and still give and will give to our kids as parents.

And it all began in that room in 1982.

Surreal.

The movie reminded me of my experience serving as a chaplain while in seminary. I served in an oncology unit in Langhorne, PA. Candidates for ministry are required to complete a unit of clinical pastoral education as part of the ordination process within the PCUSA. It was six weeks of intense ministry, training, and supervision in pastoral care not just for those I ministered alongside with and to in a hospital setting, but it was training for my soul in the way I encounter, confront, and handle everyday issues within the church and in our world. 

I learned more about pastoral care and the role of the pastor in walking alongside someone in their pain and suffering for those six weeks than I ever did while in seminary for 3 years in my pastoral care classes.

I know this much. If I’m ever confronted with a life threatening illness that my bucket list is huge. Huge. Huge.

Did I say huge?

A cool ad idea that our friend Pastor Jim had at Cornerstone. Now we pray it helps attract some kiddoes for VBS.

Promotion complete. High School here we come.

Still running with my eyes to the sky! It’s just one of those days.

What’s on my mind tonight?

• My wife is eagerly waiting for a phone call from any school district within a 60 mile radius to find a teaching position for the fall school year. If you’re up to date with Southern California stuff, you know that my wife along with hundreds of other teachers are part of some educational budget cuts.
• Our kids are “promoting.” One is going to high school and the other is going into jr. high. I’m not ready. I’ve blinked and they’re longer in pre-school. I miss the days of pre-school and happy meals. I also praise God for our kids. They’re awesome students and have made us proud! 4.0’s baby! What a way to begin Jr. High and High School. They get their smart stuff from mommy way cool.
• Like every other pastor I worry about church stuff. I worry about budget stuff. Our leaders are trying to figure out how to do ministry with an awesome church in the midst of a struggling economy. We’re wondering what our “thing” is supposed to be in the 21st century.
• I’m worried about a paper I have to start writing for school.

There you have it! As honest as I can be and still growing and being transformed. Trusting in God and trying to be still.

Something hard to do in the midst of life’s journey as a follower of Jesus.