Ten years already! It’s been a little more than ten years since my ordination as a Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Presbyterian Church (USA). I was ordained in a lovely service at the Brick Presbyterian Church in New York City, where I had worshiped while I lived and worked in New York, and where I was “under care” while I was at Princeton Seminary.
I have learned much about ministry over the years, almost all outside of classrooms. I have learned that ministry is consuming; it is exhausting, the hours longer than any required of me in vocations I had before I became a pastor. Still, I can laugh at the old joke that pastors have it easy since they work only one hour a week on Sunday morning – or in my case two. I can laugh because I have also learned that ministry is deeply fulfilling, nourishing, joy-filled, and abounding in grace.
It is tempting to try to capture ministry in numbers: a million words written in more than 500 sermons; presiding at the Lord’s Table close to 200 times; celebrating more than 40 baptisms; witnessing to the promise of life eternal in more than 50 funerals; joyfully hearing the marriage vows of some 40 couples; moderating well over one hundred Session meetings.
But ministry isn’t numbers. Ministry is sitting with children on the steps of the chancel on Sunday morning and asking them a question, only to have as a response, “Do you like my new shoes?” Ministry is hearing what 14-year-olds think as they grapple with faith and life in preparation for their public profession of faith. Ministry is talking with a young couple as they anticipate marriage. It is speaking with parents as they plan the baptism of their first child. It is walking with an individual or a family through illness, job loss, death of a loved one or other losses. It is listening to the stories that are written within each person in this unique Body of Christ.
I have learned how to live more completely in faith, trusting God in good times, and even moreso, in difficult times. I have learned how “to let go and let God”. I have learned why Jesus says so often, “be not afraid.” Through ministry I have learned how to be an Easter person: how to live in the hope that is ours in the Resurrection.
Of course, I am not the only one called to ministry – we all are. In fact, it says so in every Sunday worship bulletin: “Ministers…Every Member”! Every one of us is called to ministry in the name of Jesus Christ. And the more you give yourself to ministry, the more you “let go and let God”, the more you trust and walk by faith, the more you let go of anxiety and fear, the more you’ll understand what it means to be born “into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ”.
Lent is the ideal time to give yourself more completely to ministry. And in the process, don’t be surprised if you learn over time what it means, what it really means, to be an Easter person, trusting God, guided by the Spirit, and filled with the hope, grace and peace that is ours in Jesus Christ.
Hosannah in the highest!
Pastor Skip
