Yesterday’s Ordination - “Charge to the Minister”

As some of you know, yesterday was the official Installation/Ordination hoorah here at First Christian Church. It was great. Some additional friends and family were there. And the Milligan College Concert Choir was there… that was a nice touch!
Anyhoo, especially for some who couldn’t make it due to sickness, work, and weather, here is the [...]

Eugene Peterson Likens Today’s Ministers to “Religious Shopkeepers”

This is good. Really good. It’s an excerpt from the introduction to Eugene Peterson’s book Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity. My comments are [in brackets] along the way.
American pastors are abandoning their posts, left and right, and at an alarming rate. They are not leaving their churches and getting other jobs. Congregations [...]

Good/Funny Post of “Why I Entered Ministry”

Mike Cope, a minister at Highland Church of Christ in Abilene, TX, has a good post likening the difficult position of refereeing to ministry. I’ve reffed a few games here and there and participated in sports all my growing up years (are those over yet?) and am not the least bit surprised we’ve got a [...]

Misc: Finally Back, Will Be Next Sr. Minister, Google Search, and Mission Trip

Well, after a way-too-long hiatus, I’m back to blogging. Have had a crazy busy couple months leading up to our church’s congregational vote regarding whether I become the next Senior Minister… And I will, come February 2008. That’s nice to get past that, I must say. It’s been, uh, trying, in many ways.
Not that very [...]

64 Things I Wish Someone Had Shared With Me 10 Years Ago

Brian Jones’ blog, Speaking Out of Turn, recently had a good post. They are all things about church ministry. Not all of them are practical for those of us from churches of normal size, frankly. In fact, here’s one that would be, um, less than well received:
7. Completely redesign the interior “look” of your church [...]

Ministry Expectations and the Life of the Mind

Just read a nice entry in Brian Jones’ blog about having a Sermon Induced Meltdown. He’s a regular contributor to the Christian Standard. Anyway, I can identify with, as he says, being sick of “writing sermons half asleep” and “not deeply reading the classics.” While I am not (yet) writing adult worship sermons weekly, I [...]