A New Journey for All of Us

This morning I shared this announcement with our congregation. Knowing many of you are out of town at this time of year and many of you live away and read this blog, I wanted you all to know:

It is with greatly mixed emotions that I tell you today that my time as pastor here at Northside is drawing to a close.  For the past two months, Judith and I have been praying, discussing, consulting and at times struggling with the opportunity to join the staff of South Texas Children's Home Ministries.  That opportunity has turned into a calling from God to go there as strong, as clear and as consistent as His calling was to come here.  I will be serving as the Director of Church Relations working in the existing ministries of STCHM but also working directly with churches, pastors and their families to form new ministries.

I will be sharing with you in next Sunday's message how all this came about.  I will also walk you  through the process that Northside formed long ago to guide you through the selection process for a new pastor.  I will do my best over the next three Sundays to help us all in this journey.  I will be with you through Sunday, August 23, which is Round Up Sunday.

Let me say now, and very clearly, that my leaving does not come because of a problem, or a conflict or some underlying issue.  We simply sense the call of God on our lives to go be involved in something that He is preparing for us.  We love this church, we love the great staff we have here and we love you, that is much of what I mean when I say we have struggled.  God has given us so many blessings here and there are so many good things happening but this new call on our lives keeps coming and we must go. 

Something unusual about this is that we will not be moving from Victoria for the foreseeable future.  The plan is for me to work in this area and beyond it, but for the sake of your pastor search process and for the sake of the new pastor, we must step away from this church.  We do not intend to step away from the many friendships and relationships we have built here.

I know there are many questions and many emotions that we are all facing.  I wish we could have told you all one by one to address those things.  We regret that we were not able to do that but over the next three weeks we will attempt to help you in this journey you now embark upon.  I will have a few more blog posts before I am done.  We appreciate your prayers.

for the journey...

Tim

No Mistakes

Have you ever wondered if God had not somehow made a mistake?  Have you ever been in a place where you did not understand what God was doing?  It is comforting to me to see that even in the New Testament, the church and the apostles did not always understand what was going on but they faithfully followed.  We will look at a story on Sunday from Acts 12 that surely had the church baffled but in the end, they saw the power of God revealed.

In my wife's family history, there is a time that Judith's grandfather, Rev. A. M. Overton, faced a challenging place in his life and faith, he penned this poem.

   He Maketh No Mistake

My Father's way may twist and turn,
   My heart may throb and ache,
But in my soul I'm glad I know,
   He maketh no mistake.

My cherished plans may go astray,
   My hopes may fade away,
But still I'll trust my Lord to lead,
   For He doth know the way.

Tho' night be dark and it may seem
   That day will never break;
I'll pin my faith, my all in Him,
   He maketh no mistake.

There's so much now I cannot see,
   My eyesight's far too dim;
But come what may, I'll simply trust
   And leave it all to Him.

For by and by the mist will lift
   And plain it all He'll make.
Through all the way, tho' dark to me,
   He made not one mistake.

This Sunday, I will share the story behind this statement of faith and how we too can trust God beyond the place where we understand his will.

For the journey...

Tim