When I saw THIS from Scot McKnight I jumped up and down in giddy excitement. Even my wife was excited and agreed that I should do something like this. And then reality  hit. It’s in Chicago and well, we are not. Not even close. But for those who are in the US this DMin looks FANTASTIC!

“The DMin in New Testament Context will give pastors the opportunity of a lifetime.  In my speaking and conversations with pastors, preachers, and lay folks, one of the most illuminating features we have to bring to the church is clarifying the historical context of Jesus and the apostles. Time and time again flashes of insight come to Bible readers when they grasp a social custom at work, a religious controversy throbbing behind a question put to Jesus, or a historical memory that is shaping precisely what Jesus was teaching or the apostle Paul writing. Because this “background” or “Jewish context” is so important and at the same time much less accessible for pastors, the DMin in the New Testament Context will provide pastors with the opportunity to focus study on Jewish texts and this will enable them to shed light on pressing concerns in the church today.”

-          Dr. Scot McKnight

I like the idea of a focused DMin program as opposed to what I see offered by many colleges and seminaries here in Australia. Should I ever get the chance I’d love to a DMin in the United states. But that is in God’s hands!

2 Samuel 1

I do not believe in reincarnation. But I’ve hedged my bets on this one. I put in a request just in case. 

I’ve asked God to bring me back as a black church choir director.

This is a request from years ago, when I learned so much about HOW to grieve from a couple of funerals at African American churches.

I was new into ministry, just out of college, and had come into a couple of situations that had rocked my very young world. The first one was watching a 15 year old girl literally die in front of my eyes. I followed the ambulance to the hospital and tried to be “pastoral,” as I found the mother in the waiting room. At that point it wasn’t confirmed the girl was dead, so I offered my prayers to mother, but had nothing else to say. I left quickly.

But the pictures in my head haunted me. I learned the next day she had passed away so I found out the time and place of the funeral and went. It was an African American church and it was my first experience at a funeral in a black church. The service went for hours. There was weeping, singing, laughter, joyous worship, loud grieving, all of it. All the emotions were laid out. Nothing was held back. Nothing was scripted. The musicians knew exactly what to do at the exact moment, it seemed, and never with any sheet music. Always on key. Always bringing the right emotion, it seemed.

The funeral helped me with my own shock and grief, even though I did not know the girl at all.

The second time I was at that same church for a funeral, the pastor knew me, as did the congregation. It was a couple of years later, and some friends we had that attended that church had lost their son. It turned out to be someone I knew vaguely from high school. He was only a couple of years older than me!

Again, the shock of mortality hit me. But I was friends with the parents as well, so I shared their grief.

This time when I went to the church, and it was packed out again, the ushers knew me. I was looking for a seat in the back and they said, “No pastor, we have your seat.”

They took me to the platform.

Knowing that African American churches honor their pastors by having them on the platform, I guessed I was simply sitting with the guest pastors. What I didn’t know what that when you sat up there at a funeral, you were expected to speak a few words. Fortunately, they started on the other end of the row. By the time the third man had stood up and gone to the pulpit I realized I was going to have to say something. 

I had nothing. I was 24 or 25. I had nothing. I meet twenty-somethings today who think they have all kinds of things to say. It’ll hit them in about ten years just how little they really had to offer. It’s just a matter of maturity and living some life, that’s all. But right then, in that moment, I knew my place. I had nothing. 

It would be great to say I just bowed my head and asked the Lord and he wondrously gave me the very words to say that spoke so deeply to the church… but I was so shook up I can only say I think I prayed… If I prayed, it was something like, “Dear God, how could you do this to me?” or something spiritual like that.

Mostly, it was, “Think of SOMETHING you idiot!“

Suddenly I remembered a story. A few years before I had watched this documentary on great black gospel singers and they had interviewed Thomas Dorsey. (Not Tommy Dorsey, the big band leader.) Thomas Dorsey was a tremendous force in black gospel music and had written the legendary song, “Precious Lord, Take My Hand.” 

In the documentary they interviewed Dorsey and how that song came to be written. It was out of his own grief. He had lost his wife and baby and out of that grief this song came to him. It was a song of lament.

When it was my turn to stand and address the crowd, I looked at the parents and gave a few condolences, then began to tell Dorsey’s story. As I did, the organist began playing “Precious Lord.” Before long a few people near the organ were singing the verse. It began to crescendo, and I thankfully sat down as the congregation began singing out the entire song.

That is why I want to come back as a black church choir director. It was the ability to know what to do in the moment, unscripted. It was the ability to lead people in lament and rejoicing. It was the ability to lay all the emotions out and leave nothing hidden inside. Grieving is too important to leave it locked up.

That is the teaching of 2 Samuel 1:17-27. When you grieve, get it all out.

Don’t do the “white” thing of go to the funeral in the morning and go back to work in the afternoon. Don’t bottle this stuff up.

Loss hurts and it hurts deeply. It may hurt long.

Let it.

When we suffer deep loss, we suffer deeply. We cannot hide it. David let all his emotions fly. We need to learn this valuable lesson.

It has everything to do with taking the status of a child: as the “least”. As the one under authority. As the vulnerable. As the helpless. This is what it means to be the least and it is as the least and welcoming the least that we encounter Jesus (Matt.18:5). It is in our joining together to agree in reconciliation that we share the burdens of the least and care for those whom God our Father cares for (18:10, 14). It is the Father who cares for widows and orphans. It is the Father who defends the downtrodden, the poor and the oppressed. It is the Father who gives strength to the weak, , who binds the broken-hearted, and who sets the the captives free. These are the least. This is where His children are to be found. This is where the disciples (called the brothers and sisters of our Lord Jesus) live.

So the question for us as pastors must be, Are we numbered among the least? Or has our quest for greatness (however humbly we may be conceiving it) led us away from the surrender, vulnerability, and helplessness of being disciples of Jesus and children of God? May we be numbered among the least. May we be found serving among the least. May we live as God’s children, born of His Spirit, and conformed to the image of His Son, who

though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross. Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Phil.2:6-11 NLT)

For my major assignment, I looked at the issues of ministering to the Elderly in Aged Care. 

Abstract

This essay looks at the subject of divine healing within a pastoral response to the elderly in aged care. I analyse and reflect on the practicalities of ministering within an aged care environment. I explore the cultural traditions of the person and how that may affect our response. And then look at the theological issues which need to be taken into consideration for a healing ministry to those who are in the latter part of their life and the expectation of death is close at hand. I then draw together the practical, cultural and theological discussion into formulating a pastoral response as to how to initiate and practice ministry with a broad exploration of what constitutes healing and how we can minister to those who are dying.

One of the issues that come out of my research was the need for us to reflect more deeply on the fact that our Christian Elderly even if in care, are still to be considered to be a vital part of the church body and therefore our ongoing ministry with them should be a continuation of any other fellowship ministry that is promoted in the church. Another surprising (for me) issue that came up within the divine healing context is that disease and illness is not bound by age and neither is God’s healing power. While its extremely important for us to recognise and acknowledge death and dying and that the elderly in care can be in that transition stage to glory, we can still pray for them that they will still live well despite their frailty.

Let Other Peoples Yes be Yes and No be No

 All through my childhood I constantly would ask my parents for things, or permission to go or do whatever, this is normal. However, a lot of times I wouldn’t really be asking my parents if I could go here or there, have this or that, I was actually telling them what I wanted and when I wanted it. And if my parents didn’t comply with my demand that came under the pretense of a question I would try and manipulate them by throwing a temper tantrum, act sad, etc… And these manipulations that I tried hardly if ever worked at making my parents comply to my demands. Alas it is quite hard to manufacture consent (also a name of a Noam Chomsky book) out of your parents when your nine years old.

 This method though of trying to get people to do what you want them to do under the pretense of a question unfortunately doesn’t end in childhood, in fact as adults we get better at manufacturing consent. We still demand things of people yet subtly hide the demand in the form of a question. I remember at a previous job I had where people would ask for time off from the boss, and if the boss said no, the person would just call in sick those days. You see the person who is asking for the time off wasn’t really asking, they were telling the boss “hey I am not coming into work these days.” But you can’t just tell your boss when your coming into work, and how your holidays are going to work and the boss simply complies with your demands. Rather it is whether or not you request complies with the company.

  There seems to be an understanding within the Bible that people are given free will (to what degree is subject to theological debate, of which this blog won’t settle the issue). Were told by Jesus to ask, seek, and knock in our relationship with God but I believe also with each other (Matt 7:7). When you ask someone a question allow there yes to be yes and their no to be no. But in order for you to allow for a persons free response, you have to go to them with no pretense. You have to be willing to accept the answer they are willing to give you. Sometimes it is not the answer you want to hear, but you would not want somebody to manipulate you into responding the way they want you to respond. You see it is the lesson that doesn’t end in childhood and that is you have to be ok with not getting your way. If Jesus says “let your yes be yes and your no be no” (Matt 5:37) then we have to allow for people to honestly live that out.

 The only way I see this happening in healthy relationships is through honest conversation, where the goal is not to manufacture consent through manipulation. The goal is rather to build trust, honesty, vulnerability, and respect. I for one am a much more agreeable person when someone respects my free will enough to allow my yes to be yes and my no to be no. But I get upset when someone is actually telling me something, but it is under the guise of a question. I would rather people shoot straight with me meaning if you want to tell me something tell me, but allow me to respond without any manipulation. What I have discovered in my life is that when I allow other’s yes’s to be yes’s and their no’s to be no’s, and I let my yes be yes and no be no, I am more free to ask, seek and knock with God and with others. I am a less contentious, and pretentious, when I am doing this right. When I actually practice what I preach here my relationship with God is clear because I have a clearer understanding of him as my heavenly father that loves me enough to say no sometimes.

 Thanks,

Sean

Brief Biography

                 I am happily married to my best friend Jessica Brewster, and father to our soon to be one year old daughter Adia Brewster. I am an Alumni of Eston College Saskatchewan Canada where I earned an undergraduate degree in Biblical Studies, and currently am student at Briercrest Seminary working on an M.Div. (Administration and Leadership). I am ordained with the Apostolic Church of Pentecost Canada, and am a pastor of a small rural church in Grenfell Saskatchewan. In my spare time I like to watch television (sports, sitcoms, dramas), write, fish, play video games, play with my daughter, read, eat, and cook.

                What I love about pastoring is when I see people participating in God’s kingdom together, growing in faith and love, and continuing in hope despite circumstances. I feel honored to be a pastor because I get an opportunity to help disciple people into maturity to do the work of the ministry. I love Jesus and want to be more like him, so I have to be a disciple as well.

Honesty is a paramount practice for pastors and pastors-to-be. Whether it is a matter of sermon presentation, financial management, mileage reporting, etc. But, my takeaway from this is that the greatest need for honesty is toward ourselves.

• Are we being honest about our spiritual life?
• Are we being honest in our prayers for ourselves, our families, our congregations and communities?
• Are we being honest in our study of Scripture to discern just what God is actually saying rather than what we desire to hear and preach?
• Are we being honest in our humility?

Lord, help us to be honest in all things. May the lies we tell ourselves be renounced in full integrity and the Truth of who You are be made known in, to, and through us.

Related articles

• Badlands: Just being honest… (bluechippastor.org)

Would you allow me a moment of honesty and transparency? I’m struggling with the transition. The transition from student to pastor. For the past 6 years alongside my work as a pastor I have been a student. First I completed my Graduate Diploma and then I commenced my Masters degree. Having recently graduated I find myself lost, drifting rudderless. Like a boat without anchor or rudder I have no way to settle and no idea where to go. I don’t know what to do with myself. I stare at my bookshelves endlessly wondering what to read. All of a sudden I have a choice and I’m not sure what I want to read.

I see this kind of discontent from time to time in men who retire. For years they have given themselves to their chosen vocation and then one day it comes to an end. I see them struggle to work out what to do with themselves. Eventually they settle into retirement comfortable and life begins again.

For the past six years I have been a Pastor/Student. My mind has been immersed in the world of education. The world of the gospels, of the New Testament and of the pastoral vocation has filled my heart and mind. It has been a truly romantic time and a wonderfully rewarding journey. In fact this blog has basically followed my journey of discovery. But now I just feel lost. I pray and I ask God to show me the way forward but I get nothing. Melancholy sets in and once again I feel adrift, rudderless.

In his memoir Eugene Peterson describes his own season of barrenness. He calls it the badlands. Of this experience he says, ‘“I had no way of knowing it at the time, but I was entering into a time of my life that I later named the ‘badlands.’ And I had no way of knowing how long I would be there. It was going to last six years.” It was during this experience that Peterson clarified what he considered faithful pastoral vocation.  The badlands gave birth to the pastoral vocation in Peterson. (The Pastor: p. 203).

And here I sit wondering if my own badlands season has arrived. Here I sit wondering what it means for me to be “just a pastor”. Gone are my student days. It is tempting to take on the next thing but I don’t feel the Lord calling me to that…despite my pleas. So I am left wondering and wandering. I wonder what’s  next and what should I be investing my time in.

I used to think I wanted to be a pastor/theologian. I still do but I lack the one thing necessary – the skills to give my mind to study. I once thought of myself as a teacher /pastor and then I realised I couldn’t even learn Greek. I know I am not what they call missional and I don’t enjoy leadership. Pastor/barista has appeal but hardly a vocational calling. So what is it Lord that you have called me to be and do? Oh why, oh why are you silent?

Maybe God wants me to be a pastor, a lowly shepherd of God’s flock; unknown and obscure. Maybe my struggle is not the transition but my own ego. Maybe I struggle to let go of study because what it achieves is able to define me. Maybe now it’s about learning. Perhaps it is about faith and trusting not in the things I can do but in the one whom I am called to follow.  Maybe I am just a pastor.

Here’s the rub, pastoral work is not glamorous, it is not sexy, and it takes place away from the spotlight. Out of this badlands experience Peterson developed a framework within which he defined the pastoral vocation. This framework is repeated in many of his writings about the pastoral vocation but is best described as his “trigonometry of ministry.”^[1] In his book, Under the Unpredictable Plant^[2] he explains it this way:

I want to study God’s word long and carefully so that when I stand before you and preach and teach I will be accurate. I want to pray, slowly and lovingly, so that my relationship with God will be inward and honest. And I want to be with you, often and leisurely, so that we can recognise each other as close companions on the way of the cross and available for counsel and encouragement to one another.^[3]

These three acts of prayer, Scripture and what he calls spiritual direction are the foundation of the pastoral ascetic. I wonder what being a pastor would look like if I was a pastor who prayed, a pastor who studied God’s word and who gave attention to God at work in the person opposite me?

Who knows what lies ahead. In the mean time I will seek to discharge my duties and endure the badlands knowing that eventually exile and wilderness wanderings will come to an end and God will have brought me to a place of repentance and restoration. Thank you for listening…

I am taking my church on a journey through the Old Testament this summer and this week we are on 1 Samuel. This is a tough book to read straight through because just about every chapter has about 5 sermons in it for me!

The story of David and Goliath is classic and I don’t know a Pentecostal preacher who doesn’t have at least 5 good sermons out of this chapter.

The thought this time through comes from David trying to be fitted with Saul’s armor. He knows that is not the right equipment, so he leaves it behind and uses what he is familiar with as he heads into battle. He knows how to use the sling so off he goes to battle the armored tank division known as Goliath.

Pastoring is a constant tension, especially when you go to a conference on pastoring or leadership. You get inundated with tools you don’t have… and can’t possibly afford. I hear about all the latest tech and lighting… the latest study software… the latest iPhone apps… and on and on.

Pastoring is a tension between what you HAVE and what you WISHED you had in resources to get the job done.

My church building is a constant challenge. It’s not the building I want. It’s the building I have.

I can think of so many other things. When we brought on a youth pastor and then a worship pastor, they learned quickly about the things they THOUGHT they would have (because that was what was modeled to them in college) and the reality of a small urban church. And they adapted.

It’s not just the physical resources. It’s the people. You learn to develop the people you have, not the people you “wished” you had.

Use the tools you have. Work with the people you have.

Another great lesson in leadership that will come later in 1 Samuel is the kinds of people David had around him when he was running from Saul. Not the cream of the crop by any means. You won’t find THAT passage in any leadership books! Leadership books tell us to go find the best, top notch people you can find and pay them what they’re worth.

David took what he had and molded them into passionate fighting men. THAT is the mark of great leadership.

Years ago we went through the typical cycle in our church of lacking workers. I challenged them to realize, “What we need is RIGHT HERE… RIGHT NOW…”

God has gifted you with the tools you have in your hands. Try using them instead of wishing for another set of tools.

I remember around 1999 when I sat in a church leadership meeting and shared about some issues and experiences I was going through at the time. While I can’t remember what they were 14 years later, I do remember the responses given to me and my feelings about what just happened.

Two people opened their Bibles and quoted a couple of passages of Scripture and nodded their heads at each other and to me. Feeling that they had provided the needed pastoral care, they shut their Bibles and glowed with the warm satisfaction of doing their Christian duty. Now I have to admit, up til that time, it too had been my own pastoral response to others when they shared life with me. Now granted, those responses of mine and the ones given me were not as bad as a recent case I heard where a certain pastor tweeted  the following in the wake of the Oaklahoma Cyclone disaster.

Job 1:19  ”when suddenly a mighty wind swept in from the desert and struck the four corners of the house. It collapsed on them and they are dead, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”

But nevertheless I was a disappointed at the time with that response and it started me to think through the process and practices of what was good pastoral care and response is and the use of Scripture to go along with it. Over the years I was to be confronted with a number of crisis involving suicide. One of those times I came face to face with a man holding a shotgun to his head and suddenly I was thrust into the area of suicide prevention and awareness and eventually I was involved in setting up a suicide and awareness network across my local shire.

Over this time I was confronted with the pain of others. Divorce, death of a loved one – including children, miscarriage, loss of a home, unemployment, addictions, homelessness, accidents and injury as well as chronic sickness leading to disability and those who were seriously hurting from the inflicted pain from their experience of Church. A topic perhaps for another time.

In 2009 I was suddenly confronted with the reality of my own painful situation which led me to becoming separated homeless and eventually divorced. During this time I did some training and voluntary work as a telephone counsellor, which though was for a quasi Christian organisation, we were forbidden to initiate prayer or quote / discuss scripture with those who called us. This experience was to become a real eye opener for me. – I was taught how to listen to people and to actually respond in a new way to what was being said and that most of the time, I didn’t actually have to say a thing, except to continue to respond back what they were saying to me. And in the doing of this, the practice of Scripture become alive for me. You might be thinking Craig, what do you mean, the practice of Scripture become alive to me… Well I”m glad you asked. I’m going to use an extreme example here,  Scripture tells us to laugh with those who are laughing and cry with those who are crying. It tells us to be empathetic with people. – but if we are faced with someone crying or laughing, would we just quote this passage to them – no, it means that we will either laugh or cry with those we are with.

Towards the end of 2009 I started a Cert 1V in Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care. While I did this through the Australian Christian Churches movement (AOG / Pentecostals) the course was the one the Salvation Army do when training their chaplains and pastoral care teams. And once again, we were confronted with the methodology of how to care for those in times of crisis and pain, and one of the biggest no no’s was that of quoting Scripture or preaching at / to those going through such crisis and pain. During my period of training, I was to meet a pastor who had been actively pastoring churches and planting churches for the last 30 years and who was well known in his denominational movement as a stirrer and shaker and skilled pastor – he said till he done that course and started implementing what he had learnt, he had till that time done very little pastoring or pastoral care of people. He organised a team from his church to do the course, they become active in pastoral care within their community and suddenly it was as if they become part of the community in which they lived and they were being asked to come to a wide variety of public and sporting events across the town in which they lived.

Within a pastoral care situation, there may be times when praying with others is warranted and accepted. But, the very core of pastoral care of people is living out the truth of Scripture to those you are ministering to. By all means pray for all. I certainly do. As a chaplain and pastoral carer, there are times when I pray with those I meet in my day to day activities. There are times I will let the person know that I am praying for them and how I have been praying for them. And within that regard, I have been praying the following every morning for all in this group

I pray for your health to improve, that you will be strengthened in doing what you need to do, that you will be delivered from fears and anxiety, that you will be provided for – what ever those needs may be. And I also pray that you will know the love of God.

Within a pastoral care situation, there may be times when the discussion of Scripture is warranted. Often that discussion is around the encouragement that there is a God who cares for and loves you. And again, if the context allows for it, further discussion about that can take place. But context is the key.

But the essence of real pastoral care is that of the ministry of presence. The ministry of being there. Its not the ministry of having all the answers. And while the ministry of presence can be harder to practice then it is to implement, its benefits are immeasurable. And just as Scripture tells us that God is for us and not against us – we live that out in the ways we interact with the hurting, through showing and proving that we too are for them and not against them.