 |  Good stewardship of the unending source.
Fall 2002
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Too Transparent
October 1, 2002
Our regular elders meeting was set for that evening, but after two police detectives visited my office in the morning, my news became our agenda.
"My son was charged today," I told the elders. "He was involved in the fire that burned down the children's wing of the church."
The men were as stunned as I was. I told them everything, and I felt from the expressions on their faces, from their tears and consoling gestures, that they supported me. After an hour, I had said all there was to say and left. The meeting, however, continued until midnight.
I took an induced 90-day leave of absence.
On Sunday, my wife, Marie, and I stood before the congregation and told them the news. So much had happened to us in recent years, there wasn't a lot of our tribulation the church didn't know. But the trials, and the pledge I made to myself to be open about them, had taken its toll on my ministry. I wasn't sure—after 22 years as senior pastor of Grace Baptist Church—that I would return from the unexpected time off.
The losing streak
On Valentine's Day five years earlier, I found the first Valentine's card I had ever given Marie. As I embraced her, I told her how grateful I was for our 25 years together, our four children, our parents who were all still living, and a ministry together that had known many blessings and few problems.
What I said next seems, in retrospect, prophetic: "But, we won't arrive at the end of the next 25 years like we have these. Almost everything will change. Our parents will die, our children will leave home, and we will face hardships like we have never known."
The next day Marie and an associate pastor walked into my office. I saw the look in my wife's eyes. "Is it one of the children?"
"No," she said.
"My father?"
She nodded. ...
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