I really appreciated this part of the book and it resonates with me. I headed off to Moody in 1981 because I felt a lifelong call to be a pastor. I had ignored it for years planning instead to be a sportswriter instead. In my last year at Moody I had a pastoral counseling class and a part of me thought, "this is what I really want to do,…
I really appreciated this part of the book and it resonates with me. I headed off to Moody in 1981 because I felt a lifelong call to be a pastor. I had ignored it for years planning instead to be a sportswriter instead. In my last year at Moody I had a pastoral counseling class and a part of me thought, "this is what I really want to do, this and preaching, but not all the other stuff that goes along with being a pastor." But I was pretty sure I was going to be the next big thing, perhaps the next Chuck Swindoll and I didn't want to limit God by being a counselor. I worked as an assistant pastor at my home church for the next 5 years, and although I loved parts of it, there was so much that didn't go well. The next 8 years were a wilderness and the feeling of wanting to be a pastor never left me, but the idea began to come to me that, in a way, I could "pastor" people by being a counselor. I headed off to CCU in 1997 to study under Larry Crabb, whose teaching my pastoral counseling professor had highlighted many years before, and whose books had come to mean a lot to me. I've now been a counselor in private practice for 22 years and I love it, but the feeling of being a spiritual director/pastor of sorts has never left me. Reading this about Peterson and how his particular work began to be more and more clarified for him was so helpful to me.
I really appreciated this part of the book and it resonates with me. I headed off to Moody in 1981 because I felt a lifelong call to be a pastor. I had ignored it for years planning instead to be a sportswriter instead. In my last year at Moody I had a pastoral counseling class and a part of me thought, "this is what I really want to do, this and preaching, but not all the other stuff that goes along with being a pastor." But I was pretty sure I was going to be the next big thing, perhaps the next Chuck Swindoll and I didn't want to limit God by being a counselor. I worked as an assistant pastor at my home church for the next 5 years, and although I loved parts of it, there was so much that didn't go well. The next 8 years were a wilderness and the feeling of wanting to be a pastor never left me, but the idea began to come to me that, in a way, I could "pastor" people by being a counselor. I headed off to CCU in 1997 to study under Larry Crabb, whose teaching my pastoral counseling professor had highlighted many years before, and whose books had come to mean a lot to me. I've now been a counselor in private practice for 22 years and I love it, but the feeling of being a spiritual director/pastor of sorts has never left me. Reading this about Peterson and how his particular work began to be more and more clarified for him was so helpful to me.