10/05/2010
Author: John Powell
Sometime during the week of our arrival in Las Cruces in March of 1980, I got a call from one of the leaders mentioning that a couple they had been mentoring was in need of help in their marriage. I went to their home and spent time getting to know them and their need. I took a 3x5 card with me and made notes after our session.
Several weeks ago I was going through the drawers in the desk I have used all these years and came upon that card! Now, lest you think I have a card on every informal visit and therefore one with your name on it, I want you to know that I decided soon after that visit that it would be best to keep these things in my head. So when the Lord allows these mental notes to leak out, I know I don’t need to keep them there anymore.
Some of the things that have stuck in my mind include the fact that Mark and Teri sat at our maple dining room table for pre-marital counseling within a couple years of our arrival and a couple years ago Matt and Marissa sat at the same table with Mary Lou and I for the same purpose. And we often look across that old familiar desk in my office as I mentor Matt as youth pastor. And, yes, I remember visiting him in the hospital when his foot was injured.
This kind of long term memory is a gift. It helps a pastor gain perspective, and hopefully wisdom as the whole cycle of life is played out before them in the presence of the Lord. I am privileged to be one of those servants.
Larz will be coming back from SE Asia to perform a wedding here next month. I asked him to include in his Sunday talk on Nov. 21, a description of the stages of discipleship he went through from when he arrived at FEFC as a wound-up 16 year old to his present role on the field in SE Asia. What were the turning points? Who was there to help you make them? What can you pass on to others as insights to discipling other young people?
Recently Mike called me to mention that they would be moving to Eastern Colorado to lead a church after their several years in the Spanish Church plant in Minnesota. I remember when Mike went out as our first summer short term missionary to Mexico. I watched him graduate, then go on to seminary at Trinity and talked with him as he moved through several stages of ministry.
I have seen over seven student generations, as well as several generations of campus ministry workers and am blessed by having walked with them over the years. The lasting relationships we have with the churches in Mexico City we have visited over many years continue to bring blessing.
Working in the community has brought similar memories. Many years ago a family came to FEFC from a church that was going through serious conflict. There has been pain over the years between them. I was involved just recently in the reconciliation of that pastor and family. It was like oil running down the beard of Aaron as the Psalm 133 tells us, as that pastor and I wrote a letters of recommendation for that brother who is now involved in ministry in Central Asia, after moving to Texas several years ago.
Images of interactions with people at the Fire Dept. and with others at Memorial Medical Center and the Evangelical Ministerial Fellowship, as well as KMBN listeners, round out these memories. I am blessed and grateful to be a part of God’s work here these 30 years. Thank you, Lord Jesus for this privilege.
