From Hall To Gothard

I could have a bit of fun with the title, but no,it has little if anything to do with sports or a law firm  or politics. It refers to pastors, from my first to my current. You can learn quite a lot about my current pastor who is listed on my blogroll. And  I would invite you to do do. As for the others, that will take  a little time and space.

I have only referred briefly to my various pastors but thought it might be  interesting to do so in more depth. First, some general info and guidelines. The term pastor refers to men who led a church that we attended or I attended as members. As  has been the case in recent years we have not officially joined the churches we have regularly attended but these pastors still make the grade.

I was interested to note that there are 11 names but 12 people on my list, on e being there twice, like Grover Cleveland. With the exception of the last 2, all were older than I when I was under their ministry. Several came from Tennessee(don’t know what that says) and  a couple  from South Carolina. One played minor league baseball and one has an inexplicable attachment to the Detroit Tigers. Two were independent Baptists, two were Assembly of God,  six were Southern Baptist and one was non-denominational.

I have learned and grown spiritually under most of them, some more than others. I counted two of them as very dear friends, each of which was  a minister to me in a difficult time of life.

• Rev. Odell Hall – Bethel Baptist Church- Eden, NC
• Rev Eugene Wood           “                                       “
• Rev. Harry Wood-  First  Baptist Church – Eden, NC
• Dr     Ken     Altom                 “                                       “
• Dr     Harry  Smith                “                                        “
• Rev.   Bob Potts                     “                                      Columbus, GA
• Dr       Harry  Smith              “                                        Eden, NC
• Dr       Cris Cannon                “                                                 “
• Dr       Phil  Cooley                “                                         Salisbury, NC
• Rev    Glynn  Dickens         Rowan Christian Assembly- Salisbury, NC
• Rev  Clay Manos                  New Life Assembly of God- Elizabeth City, NC
• Rev   Mike Gothard            New Community Church- Elizabeth City, NC

I owe a spiritual debt to each of these individuals . Having said that, I will attempt to explore in the coming days  what I  have gleaned from these men and what I think one should realistically expect from ones pastor.

Shalom!

Happy and Shunny ( uh Sunny )

The above title came from a phrase that I was ” reliably ” quoted as using often as a young child . It says a couple of things , I guess . First, that I had a small problem with words ( here’s another – Esso spelled Pepsi -Cola ) and that I was a happy child which reportedly I was . As we age , it seems to become harder to be happy and even harder , nigh impossible to stay happy for any length of time . I am gradually and too slowly coming to grips with the idea that happiness is not the end all that some ( even preachers ) would have us believe but rather we should seek joy and/or contentment whichever speaks more to you . In church , we just finished a four week series on Habakkuk , who learned that happiness aint where its at , so to speak . Read through those three chapters sometime and specially focus on the last three verses in Chapter 3 . When we arrived at them today, I noticed numerous notes in my Bible that I had from a well done sermon from about 6 years ago from my then pastor, Dr Glynn Dickens . He and my current pastor , Mike Gothard approached the topic from different angles but with similar and well put conclusions . As Mike said , scripture abounds with lessons on contentment and joy but not so much happiness – see Hebrews 11 and Philippians 4:13 . So , I seek , not always successfully , to focus not the circumstances that change but on the realities that do not – Hebrews 13:8 .
Shalom .