I used to think that roller coasters were a lot of fun. I mean who doesn’t like getting strapped into a seat too small for you, while pulse-pounding music is playing in your ears. Only to have the coaster slowly take off (after hearing beaps and buzzes and seeing some official looking guy running out of the engine room with a disturbing look on his face), while with crazy eyes you look to the adolescent “employee” of the theme park (we will call him “Little Timmy”. Why does he look half-bored when your life is on the line anyways?) wondering if he knows that your safety belt seems just a tadd loose for those loops ahead. Then with clever bravado, you put your hands straight out as you travel 1/2 mile an hour up the steep track, showing everyone “I’m not afraid of this beast.” Seconds later, your hands will be firmly grasping the well-placed handles, eyes shut, and screaming so loudly that everyone can hear, “Get me off this thing!” (There is nothing wrong with a strong, well-adjusted man screaming like a little girl when he is plummeting to the ground at 70 miles an hour after being buckled in nonchalantly by “Little Timmy”). And then when it is all over, and you need to take a moment to wipe the tears from your eyes and the puke off your shoes; you look over at your friend, praying with all your might that he will not utter those words. . . But he does, “Let’s do it again!” With a forced smile, you will go wait in line for two more hours for minutes of terror. However, the two hours is timed perfectly to help you forget how you teetered on the edge of eternity for those few minutes. . . “This time, ‘Little Timmy’ had better be a little more alert!”
What in the world am I talking about? Since becoming lead pastor, I have felt like I was on a roller coaster. Willing to wait in line for hours to get on it, and then screaming like a little girl, “Get me off this thing.” Only to come to the end of a day, wipe a tear away, a little puke off the shoes. . . and start the next day all over again. Being a pastor has been the most rewarding and the most difficult experience I have ever had. But on the brighter side, one day this entire ride of a life will be over and I will see the King of kings in all His beauty and glory. I suppose then, Paul was right, “The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.” (Rom. 8:18).
It certainly is a ride from Sunday to Sunday as we seek to die to self, serve the Lord with a pure heart, and love the people we are called to shepherd. Only by the grace of God is it possible!
You are correct, even though there are tears at the end of the ride, for some reason, I want to get back on. I guess that is marvelous gift of God that Paul spoke of to Timothy. That gift that does not give us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.