When The Lord Says “Not Yet” — A Reflection on 2023

Well, if you are a familiar face around the Reformed and Confessional blog site you know that I have not written here for at least 7 months or more at this point. This hiatus was not due to a lack of desire for writing or an impulse to leave the site and the good work the Lord is doing here. No, far from it. The past 7 - 20 months have been full of frowning providences, eager anticipation, frustrating academics, exciting revelations, travel, difficulties in discernment, and many more descriptors that I will spare you at the moment. But these things demanded my attention and the rest of the R&C team was merciful toward me. At any rate, the Lord has been at work in my life and has been teaching me many things, of which I hope to share a small bit with you here. God is always at work, really, even when we aren’t aware of it. Over the last bit of my life, however, I have been afforded the kindness of being more conscious of it than normal. It has been refreshing, and also a bit frightening. I pray that I will be less dense and more keen on the Lord’s work in and through me in the future.

Calling Confirmed

In the Spring of last year (2023) I interviewed for a Pastoral Counselor position at a local Christian drug and rehab facility, in the Pittsburgh area. This place boasted in its emphasis on Christian discipleship and faithfulness to the Bible. If given the position I was going to be able to teach the Bible every day to dozens of men struggling with addiction and counsel them as I have been trained—nouthetically. In God’s kindness, I was offered the position and I gladly accepted. 

However, after a short time, and through a series of unfortunate events, the organization began to slip into a slough of unbiblical thoughts and desires. The need for money from the state became an ever-increasing necessity, and with the state’s money came strings. These strings would no longer allow explicit Christian discipleship as the method by which the men received the help they required. The counseling would now be “evidence-based” and the teaching would be from a curriculum other than the Bible, and my title would go from “pastoral counselor” to “clinician.” These changes may seem slight to some, but in my opinion, they were enormous and unthinkable.  

Despite having been there for merely a few months I felt the weight of these changes, and I saw firsthand the devastation they produced for all involved—seasoned pastors, some of whom had been teaching there for years, saw no other way forward but to resign, and disillusioned participants in the program saw the hypocrisy of it all, and left. I too, was fired for my inability to ascend to the new standard and methodology of treatment. But this event was but a providence of God, albeit a frowning one.

Through my new friendships, however, I was invited to preach at churches and asked to teach in Chapel, all of which I gladly agreed to. And from these occasions, and my years of counseling experience at this point, my inward sense of calling to the pastorate was outwardly confirmed by several pastors both outside as well as inside my local church. This was a great delight to me. 

Doctrinal Differences

At this same time, I had, over the previous two years of study, come to differing convictions than those held by my denomination. For instance, my church sings the Psalms for worship exclusively, and acapella. While this conviction is beautiful, and convincingly argued from scripture, I had fallen out of it for several reasons that won’t find their place here, just yet. Nevertheless, this makes me ineligible to be a pastor within my denomination. That being the case, an elder of mine suggested that perhaps I should look for a denomination that may be a better fit, one in which I may be able to pastor and call home. 

I did as he suggested, and found a Reformed and Presbyterian church looking for a “pastor of counseling” and thought that this would be a great fit. I applied and began conversations with the pastor and session of the church. 

The process took a little over six months and involved no less than 4 different “Zoom” interviews, two visits flying to the church, once alone to go attend the denomination’s general assembly, and once with my family to teach Sunday school, meet the church, and engage in two different sets of Q&A’s. This was all very exhausting, but also very exciting and well worth the time. The people at this church were wonderful brothers and sisters in the Lord and received my family and me with warmth and genuine love. 

After this was all said and done, and I had undergone all that was asked of me I returned home and awaited an answer as to whether I would receive a call to that church or not. About a month or so later, I did receive a call. They wanted me to serve alongside them as a minister of the Gospel and counsel their people. It was a fantastic compliment and an even more humbling request, and I was thankful to God for this continued confirmation of his call upon my life. However, as the Lord would have it, I had to decline the offer. The cost of living for a family the size of mine was far above the salary offered. By no means was the church being skimpy or unbearably frugal. The numbers just simply made taking the position an unwise move on my part. This, too, was the Lord’s providence, despite it being a frowning one. 

2024

As I write this time I am still in Pittsburgh, and also still unemployed. After being fired I hoped to receive a call to a church and begin the next 40 years of my life ministering to God’s people, and my vocational life would - at long last - be in that warm and fuzzy place I have wanted it to be for years. But this was not the Lord’s will. The Lord’s will was for me to wait a little more. And in this providence, two choices exist: bitterness or joy. 

I could be bitter and grumble over the fact that I can’t have what I want. I could grow discouraged and angry because I don’t have what I feel I deserve. Or I can trust that the Lord is wiser than I am, and has a plan for my life that I am not quite privy to. I can choose to rejoice despite not having what I desire, knowing that God will not ultimately withhold good things from his children. But joy ultimately comes from being indwelled by the Holy Spirit. So I am thankful for Him indwelling me, otherwise I would be bitter and complain, but as it is, I trust the plan of God.

Encouragement

I am confident that everyone reading this has stories of their own. If you sat down and wrote it out you would see the hand of God from start to finish and you would be able to see, in hindsight, many of the reasons the Lord did this or that in your life. This is a good spiritual practice and discipline to undertake from time to time, and I would encourage you to do so. 

But lastly, remember Peter when Jesus said that Satan had demanded to sift him like wheat. Peter said, “Lord I am ready to go with you both to prison and to death” (Luke 22:33). But this was not true, Peter was not ready although he believed he was. Jesus told him this in so many words when he said, “The rooster will not crow this day, until you deny three times that you know me” (Luke 22:34). Many of us believe we are ready for things in our lives, be it that next vocational rise, or the next significant relational step, or a new spiritually journey, but the Lord knows best, and knows when we are kidding ourselves. And this is why Jesus says to Peter that He prayed for him — to encourage him in his endurance of faith. And Jesus’ prayer and encouragement for Peter is for the cheering of our hearts as well. Remember that the Lord prays for you and, will cause to you turn back to Him — like he did with Peter, even after failure and sin — so that you may strengthen your brothers and love the Lord all the more. And when the day comes that you are ready, the Lord will lead you in the way.

S.D.G.