Oversight of Souls

‘Bedtime With My Boys’One of my favorite times is bedtime with my boys,When we turn aside from the day’s busyness and noise.We linger then together to read, talk and ponderOver the Bible, stories, the day and wherever our minds might wander.In this time more than any other of the dayLittle hearts and minds open up, [...]

One of my favorite books on pastoral ministry is Eugene Peterson’s The Contemplative Pastor: Returning to the Art of Spiritual Direction. I differ from Peterson on a number of topics, but he is particularly good on discussing pastoral ministry. This quote is a gem. I encourage you to read it all carefully. He is describing [...]

African Adventures , Dick Anderson(Christian Focus Publications, 2003), pb. 96 pp.ISBN 1-85792-807-5 This is a book of missionary stories written for children. Rather than a collection of stories from different people, as I had assumed, it is a group of stories drawn (with some modification) from the experiences of one missionary doctor and his friends [...]

Tirzah, Lucille Travis(Herald Press, 1991), 159 pp. This is the story of a young Israelite girl, Tirzah, as she and her family follow Moses out of Egypt to Sinai and toward the Promised Land. We read this book about a year and a half ago and my boys (about 8 and 6 years old) enjoyed [...]

One temptation in the pastorate is to become too concerned in the institutional life around you- church programs, denominational positions, etc. Of course we need to interact with the broader world but we must beware of the entanglements and allurements of position and prestige. It is too easy to get to the point where we [...]

Nehemiah is downright fiery and aggressive when dealing with the enemies of the people of God. He prays that they be juedged and their sin not be forgiven (4:4-5). He beat some and pulled out their hair (13:25), and he chased away a false priest (13:28). Much can be said about this, but Packer makes [...]

I have just finished reading J. I Packer’s A Passion for Faithfulness: Wisdom from the Book of Nehemiah . The book wanders a bit, but as would be expected there is much wisdom here. Packer properly points out that the book is about not simply ‘leadership lessons’ but about the renewing of the people of [...]

This is not actually a book to read to your children, but it is a great book about reading The Book to your children. Family worship, so common in previous days (indeed lack of it was often considered grounds for discipline!), has fallen on hard times. Terry Johnson’s The Family Worship Book: A Resource Book [...]

This post is just a clarification one. Occasionally I hear people almost apologetic about reading this blog since they are not pastors. I have mentioned this in some comments, but I want to put it here just for clarity, my focus in writing is on pastoral ministry, but I hope that pastors as well as [...]

When the new semester begins here at Union in about a week and a half I will be teaching a course on Pastoral Ministry. I am hoping this will also help me to write some things here that I have been wanitng to get to. Anyone interested can see the syllabus here. This syllabus is [...]