Let the Growing Begin!

If you’ve never lived in a town of 1,200 people, it is probably hard to imagine just what it’s like. Everybody knows what everyone is doing. This fact is magnified significantly for the family of the pastor of the largest Protestant church in town (never could compete with those Roman Catholics). It was foreign to each of us who were called upon to make the transition from the relative anonymity of the Omaha megalopolis. Being three times larger than Taylor gave Burwell the privilege of providing the parsonage with all of its attendant perks of having the pastor’s family living right there. This had long been the case, and so the folks at Calvary UMC had grown accustomed to what I viewed as second-class pastoral care. It was about as close as I’ll ever come to experiencing what Albert Schweitzer must have sensed when he took his ministry to deepest, darkest Africa as I was intentional about spending Tuesdays in Taylor in addition to the customary Sunday worship. Mary resumed her teaching career—after five years of maternal leave—with the Loup County school (yes, that’s singular) in Taylor, which further reinforced the perception that we were there to minister to the whole charge. Both churches responded very positively to this personalized attention and made excellent progress toward becoming actualized congregations.