JUNE 2008 

Greetings, Brothers and Sisters in Christ and in our hearts,

It seems like only yesterday that my family and I were moving into your parsonage but I will have been your pastor for a year on June 26th. I certainly will not forget my first few days at Mt. Hermon. Being hospitalized from a spider bite has certainly been my most eventful moving time ever! I hope to not repeat that on June 26th of this year!

We are so thankful and so very blessed to be serving Jesus Christ along with the people of Mt. Hermon UMC and we are so thankful and blessed to be living among a precious congregation. We were greeted last year and are still greeted with open arms! We have been on the receiving end of so much support since we’ve been here – during my spider bite ordeal, my grandfather’s death, Anna’s tonsillectomy, Janna’s appendectomy, and so much more! We’ve received special deliveries of delicious vegetables, homemade cookies, candy and jams, special meals, and so much more it’s hard to name! And of course, we have been welcomed with love. For all of this, we thank you and we are looking forward to many Junes passing by without a moving truck around!

Two years ago, the church that I was pasturing at the time constructed a Men’s Club/Activity Building, paved its parking lot and paved the parsonage driveway. I have never been a Clemson fan and therefore not a big fan of the color orange. I always prefer DUKE BLUE! However, that orange color on the flags in the field and parking lot marked where the “growth” was going to be. It gave me great excitement to “see” the future. That is what I symbolically am seeing for Mt. Hermon and I am excited. I have been watching and listening for almost a year now to see where the “orange flags” are that will mark the future growth for this church. Will it be growth in attendance, in offerings, in spiritual maturity of its members, in strengthening small groups, or in Biblical knowledge through Bible studies? Or will the growth be in all areas? As I’ve searched God’s Word, sought His guidance over sermons, served communion to you, and prayed over you all, I’ve looked for the “orange flag” markers that I feel God is showing me and you are responding to the things I have already offered. There will be more on this later, but please know that as I’ve started to get to know you all as individuals, as families, as small group members, as shut-ins, as a community, and as a congregation, I have been and will continue to listen and look for the “orange flags” that are marking our future together! And I am excited over what is ahead just as I was so excited on the day that the paving at my last church started.

What a great day that was 2 years ago – the day the paving started. I was so excited as I saw the transformation that was taking place before my eyes. My children and I watched, from the parsonage windows, as the steaming hot asphalt was being placed on the church property. And then a couple of days later, we watched again as it happened in the parsonage driveway. Luke (then 3) watched intently from my study window as the asphalt covered the rocks. And as I was celebrating the fact that the church parking lot and the driveway were being paved, Luke was grieving. Although he thought all of the machines were “awesome” – the roller especially – he was grieving that “they’re covering up all of our rocks!” He kept saying to Janna, “Mama, we’ll never be able to play with our rocks or dig in the dirt again!” His perspective – a 3-year-old’s perspective – is all he could see. Anna, the “experienced” 9-year-old kept saying, “But Luke, we’ll be able to ride our bikes and our scooters and not fall on the rocks!” Luke just could not “see” it that day. All he knew was what he knew – trying to make rock towers, making rock piles for the ants to navigate, and pouring water on the dirt to make a pond or mud. All Luke knew was that the driveway being covered up was changing the way it had always been.

As I think about this day, Luke’s perspective brings to mind how human nature everywhere seems to work – how we cling to what we know and what is familiar even when something more beneficial to us might lie ahead. May and June are traditionally months of transition for many of us. It is a time when the school year ends and graduations take place. Children are promoted to the next grade – proud of what he or she has accomplished in the past year.  Teachers close the books on the class they just finished and start preparing for the next group. Graduates get ready for the big finish – the graduation – the end of their school journey. However, two years ago, as we watched Crystol walk across the stage at ECU and receive her Master’s degree on the very same weekend that the driveway was paved, I thought of what a beginning this was for my first baby girl.

June is also the month to celebrate Father’s Day. I remember well the love that encompassed my world when I first heard my Crystol cry! It seems like just yesterday that we prayed over her hospital bed when she was so sick with pneumonia when she was just a baby. It seems like just yesterday when she took her first steps and said her first words. It seems like just yesterday that she told me she had asked Jesus Christ into her heart to be her Savior. And now, here she is, 26 years old. And then there was Anna’s birth. I never really knew what fear was until my Anna was born not breathing – I’ve never been so happy to hear a baby whimper in all of my life! Wesley was born around 1:00 am on Good Friday. When Janna went into labor on Maundy Thursday, I was at the church for our presentation of the Last Supper. I was getting to portray Jesus for the first time (I had always portrayed Judas every other year). Janna called the church five minutes before the play was to start. Her words were, “Send Jesus home. I need him!” My Wesley, my first son, was born six hours later with the help of forceps. He was facing the wrong way (up instead of down) and his head just wouldn’t budge. It was a long evening but my first son was healthy! And then there’s Luke! When he wants something he goes after it – even at his birth. He was born exactly 10 minutes after the epidural needle was out of Janna’s back. He shocked everyone. The anesthesiologist and the nurse almost delivered him. The doctor did make it in there but didn’t have time to get into his doctor’s gown! And now these little blessings are 11, 8, and 5. It hardly seems possible! I am so happy and so blessed to be the father of my four blessings!

Thinking of these three events in our lives and the life of our church this month (Father’s Day, graduations of our church members, and the completion of my first year and my future years with you) brings to mind some scripture. Psalms 32:8 says, “I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go…” And Psalms 16:11 says, “God will show me the path of life: in His presence is fullness of joy; at His right hand there are pleasures forevermore.” Our earthly fathers, if they are in God’s will, teach us how to live in Christ and how to grow up to be productive citizens of this world. Our graduates are embarking on a new beginning. And you (the congregation), and I (your servant leader pastor) will look to God and together cherish what our church is and together build our future. As God’s Word says in Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to give you a hope and a future.”

As we celebrate our accomplishments as individuals, as families, and as a church, let us keep going toward the prize of winning souls for Christ. Let us “pave the way” for new souls to come to Christ. Let’s go out and bring new people in to fill our parking spaces and pews and I encourage all church members to fill “your” parking space and “your” pew EACH AND EVERY Sunday! Let us covenant together to support each other in our daily lives and as we reach milestones in our lives!

In His Service, Pastor Rob