Peterson: In Between The Man and The Message

oh God, a land and a change of dun dun dun I'm not good at memorizing hymns. I just like to listen to it and sing it, in fact, yes, we were here one summer and we had a visit from Kingfisher, him every morning and every afternoon, and in that tree. I sat there and waited for the fish so I started looking at that Kingfisher and then I started counting and I counted 37 dives before I got the first fish and I know wow he's the King Fisher you know all this grass stuff and where people go for leadership training.

What do you have to do to get a call? Forget it. Just be yourself and not anyone else, I mean just you, so Kingfisher became a bit of an icon for me. It's what shepherds do. It does not work well. How many times have you tried it? 37s in my head when I was oh I guess 10 11 years old every Saturday I would take my bike and go to the hills and spend the day with some food, a frying pan, two eggs and some bacon, but I did it for years . Kind of a loner, the neighborhood kids called me Jesus, so I hid from them for a few hours.

I always wanted to have a beard, but I became a pastor right during the days when hippies and everyone were really creepy. about that, the drugs and the sex and then the beards, so I knew I couldn't, I couldn't wear a beard because it was a new congregation, no one knew me, I was going to be a monk, I mean, in my head, I was on my last anus. In college, my girlfriend said she wanted to go to this thing at her college reunion and this young man was leading the singing, so I saw her. I saw her in the second second row.

I kept looking. I've been thinking that I really like the look of him. She I liked her smile I like the sparkle in her eyes when she smiled and she smiled a lot and I thought I'll have to start going back to InterVarsity I said Bob I met a really nice girl, she said What's her name? I said Janice Janice oh I didn't catch your last name you Christians are so stupid how do you spread it she went to the cashier and said I want dead dollars with the dimes that was a penny a phone call in those days and I pushed me to a phone booth so you could start calling.

Well, there were 67 heels in Baltimore. It started at the top of the list and kept going down in my dance. On the sixth call, the man said: Well, you see that she is next door right now and I ask her who is calling. Suddenly he was no longer a monk at our wedding. Remember this French fry masher? Janice Enslow heels boyfriend Eugene Roland Peterson and I felt silly with all this attention. Yes, I was nervous, remember your parents? Yes, we are a happy couple. She seems too young to get married. In a word, what is the most important thing about shepherding a good relationship?

If you really treat your congregation personally, you don't think about a relationship. them as problems, so humility is a big part of this, but it's not humility just as a word, it's a way of living life in relationship with others without competing and that's why a congregation is so important, this It is a friendly place. of setup to do that, many of us grow up ambitious and the moment the ambition starts to be competitive, that's when it becomes bitter, crown it, Lord, it becomes a little flat, what is it easy to become corrupted by culture? Oh, you can bet it is. to have an incarnation Christ you have a consuming Christ who will give you what you want is the church without Christ there is no Christ so the consuming Church is an antichrist Church I believe that a congregation is still as important as it once was, unfortunately, the shepherds in which we live. in a time when pastors are really more interested in how big it is, how effective it is, on their terms, ah, but this is not going to last, I'm not going back to something healthy and normal, there are a lot of healthy congregations on going. everywhere they just don't get the newspapers.

Did you pray with your children while they were growing up? Oh yeah, what did that look like? Well, we prayed it mostly at bedtime and you realize I was doing this all the time, every night, Eugene. was out Karen let him know that it had been really nice that he hadn't been home and that shook him up a bit, now you can be married to the church so I guess things had to change one Sunday she approached his father before. church and she said dad, I don't want to go to church today and he put his arm around her and said Oh Karen, I feel like that too sometimes.

My son Eric said: You know, my favorite person in the Bible is ah, I said no. it's Jeremiah and here's Jeremiah the weeping prophet and no one likes him he's, you know, he's righteous and I said why Jeremiah and Eric said because he was also the son of a priest and he said that just melted me and I thought I was going to write a book about Jeremiah, but what I miss most after I was no longer a pastor is the intimacy, the type of intimacy that I was experiencing, it seemed unique to the life of Pastor, but I didn't realize it until I left and then I thought. oh that's why i like you a bastard how long did it take you to write the

message

for years? about 20 years, but you know, I wasn't keeping track of things, it was just an ongoing process that I went through, I would say okay. five years learning that they could speak in my congregation and that's what came out.

I didn't really think I was doing something so extraordinary, but I knew I was doing something extraordinary for my congregation. They were listening. this for the first time how many books have you written thirty-five without including the

message

why don't you include the message because it's not really my book it's just that I don't think about it since it's not my book I always felt that I was more than the wife of A pastor. I'm trying to write my story right now and it's going slow because I'm not getting help from anyone close to me. I believe that beauty is almost inherent to reality.

I think we are taking the path. things that God has created and let them shape our lives and that becomes difficult that is the beauty of this quote from Isaiah 53:2 he had no form nor beauty for us to look at him nor beauty so that we should wish him a smell of biga for beauty Olí their Monet decks Van Gogh's sunflowers meditated with devotion The breasts of Maryland I saw the kingfishers lost the sims art is making the invisible visible in the life of faith and that is the most important thing about faith between you and me and God , but you can't see but you can see when when it's not there there's no relationship or there's criticism or there's anger or something like that and I think being in the middle is a really powerful concept to understand the nature of overhead all this time do you Did you like to make communion?

Yes, which part did you like the most? I just like all the Eucharistic symbolism that keeps us in touch with the Incarnation. It's not just ideas that enter your gut the moment we try to spiritualize Jesus we become a fancy word for him as Gnostics it's just again an idea ah just a truth but there's no meat in it you are the flesh I am the flesh Jesus is the flesh will be the characteristics of a saint humility number one unpretentious having no idea they are rehearsed define authenticity by being content with Be yourself, don't be someone else, there has been no one like you since the foundation in the world, face it gray, you're stuck with yourself, now learn about yourself, that's what we're doing and the church, when the Church of this better allows us to be ourselves. encourages us to be ourselves kiss the wound of the leper taste honey touch the blind eye learn Braille watch in the crib change diapers drink tears from the chalice experience the Eucharist Where is your new adventure that takes you next?

I'm leaving, I've never felt more before death doesn't really concern you no, I mean, Jen and I talk about it sometimes we sit here and talk about I don't think so, yeah, what do you hope for in the future? Kevin, we'll hold hands and go inside. heaven together that's what we would like I don't think I regret anything I would know what else to do I'm just grateful I feel grateful that there is the word that I think I would use and that I have been able to live my life feeling like Eugene, not like someone else Yes, what would you like your legacy or your echo in humanity to be?

This may sound very unrealistic, but it is my hope. I hope to be a part of changing the pastoral imagination of American teachers. found things found in sewers found on a cross found under a stone heard in rustling grass heard in a stuttering tongue Sabich Thani found when I wasn't looking heard when I wasn't listening found beauty I treasure the way other people love her except her celebrant, yes, I treasure his spirituality deep within him. I don't appreciate that the boy doesn't talk much. I wish she would talk a little more, what have been the best parts of living for you, uh, my marriage and my kids again, everything else can.

Sorry, I think I'll still make it, yes, my marriage with my children, thank you for sharing your life with us, you're welcome, thank you for listening, affirming it, what are we doing? That's the question in life, right? just action action