Meet Paul, the first bi-vocational pastor The first bi-vocational pastor in the history of the church was the Apostle Paul. Famous for his “tent trade,” Paul supported himself with his skill at making tents while doing missionary work throughout Asia Minor, Macedonia and Greece. Paul did this even though it […]
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Watching the news on Hurricane Harvey this week brings back some bad memories. As a pastor, I’ve been through a hurricane in the Houston area: Hurricane Alecia in 1983, a category 3 storm that caused almost 2 billion in damage. And while it didn’t come close to Hurricane Harvey in […]
The congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Hitchcock, Texas, built their Kingdom Hall down the street from my first pastorate in one day. Pretty impressive. But since our family lived in the parsonage next to the church, we subsequently became the target of numerous visits from fervent JWs. That experience gave […]
“Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” Isaiah 1:18 I memorized this wonderful and amazing verse as a child. At the time, I […]
t for me and my cousins, Dr. and Mrs. Mitchell will always be remembered as “Uncle John and Auntie Mary.” Because they had no children of their own, Uncle John and Auntie Mary treated me, my siblings and my cousins like their own sons and daughters.
Kristin Schell’s sojourn as an exchange student in France, with their long, boisterous three-times-a-day family meals, instilled a hunger in her heart to recreate the same kind of experience in her own home here in the States. The problem, however, was that our hectic way of life – and her […]
My medieval history professor at the very secular and anti-Christian UCLA didn’t intend to evangelize his class. But that’s exactly what he did when he made the mistake of assigning us to read some of Martin Luther’s Reformation writings, including The Pagan Servitude of the Church and Preface to the […]
Westchester High School had two basic problems: it had no air conditioning and it was built right next to the runways at Los Angeles International Airport. That meant on warm days, when there was no ocean breeze from the Pacific Ocean a mile away to cool us down, we had […]
A couple of years ago, with the option of retirement looming ever larger, I sat down and asked myself if I really wanted to do that. I had never thought I would want to retire. I love to work and I love my work. But I thought I should at […]
I have been influenced by the Bible throughout my entire life. There has never been a time in my conscious awareness when I did not know about and believe in this amazing book. Paul’s words to Timothy in his second epistle to him apply to myself as well: “From a […]