It was Easter Sunday 2011, and I stood in front of the sanctuary delivering my first sermon as a lead pastor; I was 24 years old. I had been out of college for nearly two years, I had moved to Michigan and served as a youth and young adult pastor, and had spent six months working for my cousin cleaning out foreclosed homes. I had been looking for a full time ministry for a while, and when I heard for the umpteenth time that I didn't have the experience that pastors were looking for in a youth pastor candidate I began to look at taking on the role of a lead pastor. I hadn't seen myself stepping into this role at this point in my life, but this is where God had led me.
I was excited. I had done well in school, had a great mentor, and had been given an incredible encouraging compliment from one of my professors. I went into this church not knowing what to expect, but I had big dreams. There was a solid couple who were dependable workers, and people seemed to be excited and ready for the next chapter of the church's life.
I was ministering to the people as best I could. They were an older congregation, most of them were my grandparent's age, so I spent a lot of time in hospitals. I would visit those who couldn't come, and even made breakfast for a couple families (this is something that I told people they didn't want because it meant someone was dead or dying). I ministered to a man dying of ALS, walking through the last months of his life with him, and performed his funeral. I was involved in the community, building a relationship with local business owners, the school superintendent, the local funeral home director, and I was a volunteer wrestling coach and a member of the Chamber of Commerce.
I started to reach out to the community. I worked to plan different outreach events, that would focus on serving the young families in the condo development across the street. I did the best I could to give an excellent event on a limited budget, and personally went door to door (something totally out of my introvert comfort zone) and invited everyone to the different things we had planned.
I was preaching well, started a prayer meeting, and it really felt like things were about to turn around. I remember the Sunday morning so well. The service had gone great, my relationships in the community were continuing to grow, and the people in the church were beginning to serve. Then everything began to fall apart. After the service my key volunteer came up to me, and said, "There's no easy way to say this" and then gave me a scrap of paper with a date on it as he told me, "That's going to be my last Sunday." Even thinking about it now really discourages me. He was my biggest supporter, the one I could count on all the time for anything, and now that support was leaving.
That was when the wound was first struck..
Fight the lion, 1 Peter 5.1-11
TO GOD ALONE BE THE GLORY!
No comments:
Post a Comment