Should we try to be bigger, better, faster, stronger? Always?
From my recent piece over at Christianity Today.
“Why do we have to be something bigger than we were yesterday? Why do we have to be always getting better in every way?” - Medium Build
Recently Christianity Today was kind enough to publish an essay I am really proud of - and I wanted to share a bit with you here. If you are interested, you can read the whole thing here.
From the essay:
Our work is shaped by the tools we adopt. All work would benefit from more patient attention and unrushed presence, but it is essential when you work with people.. And pastoring ‘is’ working with people. Like good farmers, faithful pastors belong to the places they labor. When the apostle Peter exhorts the shepherds in 1 Peter 5, he tells them, “Shepherd the flock of God that is among you.” Pastors are placed people, serving real people in a real place.
I grew up seeing stacks of pink “While You Were Out” notes on my pastor dad’s desk. When he went out to lunch with a deacon to discuss the upcoming community outreach, he couldn’t be contacted at the restaurant. If a church member stopped by the office while he was gone, the secretary would jot down her their name, the time she they dropped by, and her their home phone number on a pink note. If he was in his study, working on and praying for Sunday’s sermon, missed call notes would pile onto his desk awaiting his return.
His tools were slow and personal. Names were written in ink from the living hand of a secretary who had probably asked the person, “Hey, how’s your mother doing?” Recently, I had him pull up his 15fifteen-year-old church email account to see how many emails he has sent. It was just south of five thousand. My email account, active less than seven years since planting our church, has: over twenty thousand sent emails.
Pastoring is slow work, but for young pastors like me, it has accelerated. And everyone loses when the pace of pastoral ministry quickens. Part of this is cultural, but we’ve also eagerly adopted tools of speed, telling ourselves, “We will redeem them.” In truth, they’re better at discipling us than we are at deploying them in faithful ways.
If you are interested in A.I., Wendell Berry, and the work of churches and pastors - check out the whole essay (for free) - by clicking this link here.
Kyle, amazing work. So well done. Once upon a time, I wrote to Wendell Berry to tell him of the impact he had on my life and he wrote me back. And then I got to meet him at the Kentucky arts and letters day. We need more Wendells in the world.
On that note, if you haven’t already, read Nathan Coulter. The first page about the interplay between light and dark is phenomenal.
Anyway, thanks for synthesizing and applying Jayber Crow so beautifully and so faithfully. Even just us church members would do well to use more intentional tools.