So I'm going back to school starting in the middle of September. Ashland Theological Seminary. I know, right? Some of you are probably thinking that it is about time. I completely disagree. Up to this point, I really had no desire to go to seminary. In the time since college, I have contemplated many several career paths. Lawyer, financial planner, teacher, youth pastor, young adult pastor, church planter... Heck, I even thought about taking over my dad's business!
But here I am.
Seminary.
For those of you not familiar, no, I am not going to be a priest. It is simply graduate school for ministers/pastors. But it is certainly a big step in the direction of occupational ministry. I'm not exactly sure what that looks like. I mean, I know what ministry looks like. I just don't know what direction I want to move in.
I was really challenged at the this festival called Breathe down in Columbus. It's put on by Joshua House, the twenty-something community of the Columbus Vineyard. Thirteen of us from our Tues. night Bible study group went down. But while I was there, I went to a breakout session for church planters. In it, I heard Jay Pathak, a pastor of the Vineyard church out in Arvada, Colorado, talk about his experience planting a church. And what type of person it takes to plant a church. And I was so challenged but something deep in my heart really wanted to be like that. To have a consistency to the level that I share Jesus with people. The hope of being restored to God, not on our good deeds, but because Jesus restored our lives by his life and death. To consistently lead people who don't know Jesus to knowing Jesus. And to then disciple them. And then raise them up as leaders, walking in the shape and character and calling that they were created for. This to me sounds like the most exciting of lives. Truly. That is what I want.
I'm not sure if I am going to plant a church. But I am sure that I want this faith of mine, this all encompassing relationship with God that I have to begin to make more of a difference in the world that I call my life. Not necessarily at this point making disciples of all nations. Maybe just living out authentic faith in front of those that call me friend, co-worker, employee, brother, son, and uncle.
So I'm going to Ashland Seminary starting in September. Don't have the job situation figured out yet. I'm going full-time in October. Working part-time. Yet I am sure of this, "that I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living."
Journeying with God has its ways of stretching you. Stretching you in ways that you never would have thought that you could be. But as it begins to happen, at least for me, I come to realize that this is what I have been asking for. This uncomfortable, unfamiliar place is leading me to what I have always wanted. I can say that I feel like I am becoming more of the man that God has shaped me to be. And I am happy with that.
Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. - Lamentations 3:22
