I had a youth pastor growing up.  He didn’t mind breaking things, or pushing the limit as a youth pastor to reach out to us kids.  He connected with every single kid in one way or another that was involved in the youth group.  He somehow managed to merge the weird druggie kids and the kids that grew up in church in games of broom hockey or mission trips to Mexico.  He blew me away as a youth pastor.

Eventually we all grew up, and just before I left “youth group” age, he left.  He took a job as the senior pastor of our church and all of the sudden the games stopped.  The older ladies in the church weren’t as much into lock-ins or packing twenty people into a van and driving to a baseball game as we were, and he needed to recognize that.  He needed to take his vision beyond our youth group and attack what was placed in front of him without hurting those around him.  Now it’s been probably fifteen years since that change.  I have moved across the country.  Even his kids have passed through their own “youth group” age, and he’s still attacking what was placed in front of him without hurting those around him.  He blew me away as a pastor. 

Recently the announcement to build a community center near the church with a baseball field, an amphitheater and a bunch of other stuff, in a community that really needs it was made, and I know for a fact that it’s been a dream of my pastors for a long time.  Something that he has envisioned for a long time is now becoming a reality.  Never in my life have I seen the heart of a man so genuine, and I don’t know a single person that would disagree with me.  

We’ve been talking a lot at our church out here in Tennessee about people that have influenced us in ways that we continue to look back on.  Every time we start to talk about that, I think of this youth pastor turned pastor.  This past week was his birthday and I tease him about being old, though I think he’s only forty-five.  There are times when I realize that I live across the country in an industry where people should have each other’s backs but don’t, and I go to a church with great teaching and great people, but there is no doubt in my mind who my pastor is.  He’s one of the few people in my life that has taught me to attack what’s in front of me without hurting those around me.  He blows me away as a man.

You guys know what to do. Have a great Tuesday.