The Pastoral Call

My SHAPE: Pulling It All Together

2 Comments / Lung Cancer, PCUSA, Personal, SHAPE for Ministry, The Pastoral Call / By /

Now begins the process of synthesizing the various discoveries of my SHAPE. To review: S—Spiritual Gifts. Teaching is dominant among my gifts, with Leadership and Prophecy right behind. You could probably account for the results of and response to my singing and writing abilities as a God-thing, too; so add Creative Communication to the list. H—Heart. I am particularly drawn to people who have questions, who are making big decisions, who are trying to align their lives with God as revealed in the Scriptures. A—Abilities. I can express myself clearly through speaking, singing, and writing; I am an accomplished cook. […]

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My SHAPE: E—Experience in Ministry

1 Comment / Leadership and Spirituality, Lung Cancer, PCUSA, Personal, SHAPE for Ministry, Teaching, The Pastoral Call / By /

It’s an interesting thing about experience and ministry. Experience is not required to do something or to be someone useful to the Kingdom of God. There are many entry-level positions in God’s economy. But if one has had experience in ministry settings, one has some clues as to one’s gifts and calling. I remember my very first mission trip, a month-long excursion to Guatemala after its 1976 catastrophic earthquake. Based on that experience—riding a school bus from the Bay Area the entire length of Mexico into Guatemala, mixing cement and setting reinforced concrete brick, cleaning bathrooms, and speaking with the

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My SHAPE: P—Personality

2 Comments / Leadership and Spirituality, Personal, SHAPE for Ministry, The Pastoral Call / By /

When our second daughter was born, I was blown away by how different she was from her older sister, on the first day! I guess I had held the view that “a baby is a baby,” until Darling Daughter A exhibited her own response to the world in contrast to Darling Daughter 1. It’s a good thing I could see the difference between them, because I was enabled to receive each girl on her own terms and enjoy her uniqueness. Such an appreciation releases a mom from the temptation to treat her children exactly alike, which I think was a

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What Is My SHAPE: H—Heart and A—Abilities

2 Comments / Leadership and Spirituality, Personal, SHAPE for Ministry, The Pastoral Call / By /

As a way of discerning God’s call upon my life after sitting on the bench through a bout of lung cancer, I am continuing an assessment of my SHAPE for ministry. In my last post I listed my S—spiritual gifts. Many assessments stop there, but God provides pointers to his call in other aspects of our lives, too. Two people with the same spiritual gift(s) can express their Christian discipleship in very different ways, because of how they are wired emotionally, in their personality, or through the experiences that have shaped them and developed their abilities. The Saddleback SHAPE model

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Getting in SHAPE

1 Comment / Leadership and Spirituality, Lung Cancer, Personal, Spiritual Disciplines, Teaching, The Pastoral Call / By /

This morning I will be meeting my personal trainer at the gym for the first time in over six months. Not with a little fear and trepidation, I will submit to thirty minutes of exercises, addressing each muscle group and testing my capabilities. What I know is this: I am out of shape. Cancer-drug-related weight gain has plagued me since the first of the year, my overall strength has diminished, and stamina is completely redefined by pulmonary limitations at the moment. Yes, it sounds pretty pitiful for one who used to be able to run the paces and maintain a

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Choices, Choices, Choices

Leave a Comment / Leadership and Spirituality, Personal, The Pastoral Call / By /

A week has gone by without a blog-post . . . I know that causes some of my readers to worry; but no need to be concerned! I have been feeling so good this week that I have concentrated on getting errands and chores done, probably overdoing it once or twice. Life is truly getting back to normal and I can see real, measurable progress in my abilities. It is a wonderful thing to wake up every single morning, happy to be alive and grateful to God for energy and purpose. I am circulating among friends again, some of whom

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The Dynamic of Reassigned Duty

2 Comments / Leadership and Spirituality, Lung Cancer, PCUSA, Personal, The Pastoral Call / By /

In lieu of baseball this winter, my TV pastime while navigating the cancer waters has been Netflix episodes of The West Wing. This exploration of life in the White House’s administrative center is, most of the time, nothing short of riveting for me. I am in the middle of Season 6, which is well into the second term for President Bartlet. His Chief of Staff Leo McGarry has had a massive heart-attack and is out for the count. White House Press Secretary C.J. Cregg has replaced him as Chief. The current plot line has CJ making the transition from one

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The Third Mansion: Following Jesus

1 Comment / Leadership and Spirituality, Lent, Personal, Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Progress through the Interior Castle, The Pastoral Call / By /

We continue our study of the stages of spiritual growth, as first pondered by sixteenth century Christian mystic Teresa of Avila (The Interior Castle) and more recently unpacked by Thomas Ashbrook (Mansions of the Heart). So far, we have appreciated the fresh new life that comes with conversion and the inner struggle this life introduces as we feel the tension of forsaking the old life. In the Christian life, moving successfully through the tug-of-war stage of the Second Mansion means the question of whether I will fully commit myself to this life with this Savior is settled. Or mostly. The

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Come in Weakness

3 Comments / Leadership and Spirituality, Lung Cancer, Personal, The Pastoral Call / By /

One last blog on the subject of fatigue: The present circumstances have caused me to experience fatigue in a much different way than I have the past sixty years. In decades past, tiredness of the usual kind was remedied by sleep, because the cause was hard work, long days, or stress. When a pastor, for instance, is denied sleep because of ministry’s demands, a sleep deficit is created. The only way to pay it back is to get the sleep one lost. [On this subject, I highly recommend William C. Dement’s book The Promise of Sleep, in which he identifies

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The “Come to Jesus” Moment

6 Comments / It All Started in the Garden, Leadership and Spirituality, Lung Cancer, Personal, Spiritual Disciplines, The Pastoral Call / By /

I wonder sometimes if the slow-motion Christian discipleship I am undergoing as a cancer patient is giving me the opportunity to revisit issues, temptations, and misdirections of my past life as a pastor. Today the theme is fatigue, felt persistently now for weeks. It seems the effects of chemo and radiation sneak up on a person well after the treatment period is over. For me, what I had imagined would be almost six weeks of steady strengthening has turned out instead to be a disappointing holding pattern. Last week I had a short-term set back in the form of “the

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