Paying Attention to God's People

"I knew what I wanted to do: I knew that being a pastor meant being a man of God. I knew that worship was the most important thing I was helping these people learn to do, and I knew that I had to pay attention to them and honor them with dignity, as people with souls made in the image of God. "

"But a pastor is somebody who is context-or place-intensive with a congregation whom he knows by name. There is so much depersonalization and functionalization in our culture. These people deserve to have their name known. They deserve to have somebody who is a spiritual guide and a preacher and a pastor to them who has had a cup of coffee in their kitchen. There is so much alienation, so much loneliness around us. Classically, that’s what a pastor does. We’ve lost that."

"This is a dangerous thing to say, but this is why —all other things being equal —the longer you can stay in one place, the better. You are countering the mobility of our country just by staying. The other thing —not being in a hurry, not rushing —is that people need somebody who shows them that it can be done. You can live this way. The pastor who keeps a Sabbath, who is leisurely about what he does, who has space in his day for people to interrupt him… If you stay in one place long enough, people start noticing. "

Thoughts on ‘The Un-Busy Pastor’ by Eugene Peterson (Cutting Edge-2002)

Lord, help me take time for your people!