The Pastor

by Peterson, Eugene H.

• ISBN13: 9780061988219
• ISBN10: 0061988219
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-09-18
• Publisher: Harperone

Summary

In The Pastor, Eugene H. Peterson, the translator of the multimillion-selling The Message and the author of more than thirty books, offers his life story as one answer to the surprisingly neglected question: What does it mean to be a pastor? When Peterson was asked by his denomination to begin a new church in Bel Air, Maryland, he surprised himself by saying yes. And so was born Christ Our King Presbyterian Church. But Peterson quickly learned that he was not exactly sure what a pastor should do. He had met many ministers in his life, from his Pentecostal upbringing in Montana to his seminary days in New York, and he admired only a few. He knew that the job's demands would drown him unless he figured out what the essence of the job really was. Thus began a thirty-year journey into the heart of this uncommon vocation-the pastorate. The Pastor steers away from abstractions, offering instead a beautiful rendering of a life tied to the physical world-the land, the holy space, the people-shaping Peterson's pastoral vocation as well as his faith. He takes on church marketing, mega pastors, and the church's too-cozy relationship to American glitz and consumerism to present a simple, faith-filled job description of what being a pastor means today. In the end, Peterson discovered that being a pastor boiled down to "paying attention and calling attention to 'what is going on right now' between men and women, with each other and with God." The Pastor is destined to become a classic statement on the contemporary trials, joys, and meaning of this ancient vocation.

Author Biography

Eugene H. Peterson, author of The Message, a bestselling translation of the Bible, is professor emeritus of spiritual theology at Regent College, British Columbia, and the author of over thirty books. He and his wife, Jan, live in Montana.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Pastor Pete	p. 1
Topo and Kairos	p. 7
Montana: Sacred Ground and Stories	p. 9
New York: Pastor John of Patmos	p. 15
"Intently Haphazard"	p. 25
My Mother's Songs and Stories	p. 27
My Father's Butcher Shop	p. 35
Garrison Johns	p. 46
The Treeless Christmas of 1939	p. 50
Uncle Sven	p. 56
The Carnegie	p. 61
Cousin Abraham	p. 66
Mennonite Punch	p. 70
Holy Land	p. 72
Augustine Njokuobi and Elijah Odajara	p. 80
Seminary	p. 84
Jan	p. 92
Shekinah	p. 99
Ziklag	p. 103
Catacombs Presbyterian Church	p. 108
Tuesdays	p. 130
Company of Pastors	p. 143
Willi Ossa	p. 161
Bezalel	p. 167
Eucharistic Hospitality	p. 188
Apreciation and Follery	p. 197
Pilgrimage	p. 204
Heather-Scented Theology	p. 209
Presbycostal	p. 213
Emmaus Walks	p. 218
Sister Genevieve	p. 223
Eric Liddell	p. 233
"Write in a Book What you See…"	p. 237
My Ten Secretaries	p. 250
Wayne and Claudia	p. 253
Jackson	p. 259
The Atheist and the Nun	p. 265
Judith	p. 270
"Invisible Six Days a Week, Incomprehensible the Seventh"	p. 273
Good Deaths	p. 289
The Next One	p. 291
Wind Words	p. 295
Fyodor	p. 300
The Photograph	p. 304
Death in the Desert	p. 310
Afterword: Letter to a Young Pastor	p. 314
Acknowledgments	p. 319
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.