My pastor...my hero...my friend

This last Sunday, my pastor announced that he was going to resign from our church next year...and I wasn't sure how to handle that news. So, background:

I grew up in more or less Baptist churches. I don't remember any of the pastors of the churches we attended until we moved to Colorado when I was 8. The first pastor left after a year or so and then ext one that came was my pastor all growing up. In fact, my parents are still at that church and with that pastor.

I left for college when I was 19 and I think I've only been inside the church itself 5-10 times since I left. -- just to clarify, I had a good pastor growing up. I simply wasn't one who wanted help or went to him for it. I was young and dumb, end of story. Anyway, I had the same pastor there for the last 9 years I lived there.

I went to college at the age of 19. Since it was a Bible college and a Baptist college, it was required that we would attend one of the local Baptist churches. Long story short - I visited my current church once and never visited another church.

The place felt....like home. It wasn't terribly small, but the people could still make you feel like family. it turns out, that the pastor was himself pretty new to the church himself. He had come in late 2001 (or early 2002) and I was there in the fall of 2002.

And the next 13.5 years have brought us together time and time again. He counseled Pam and I before we got married...and again afterward when we were struggling as a new married couple. He baptized me in 2002...and again in 2010. When I came to him in 2008 and told him that I didn't think that I believed the Bible was true and that I didn't really feel like I could talk to anyone about it, he took the time to meet with me regularly for several months and counsel me. (He did more listening than talking...but we both did a good deal of both!) Then, two years later, when I told him that I was certain that I had never accepted Christ as my savior until 2008, he didn't question me. He supported me...and he baptized me again. (Baptism for Baptists is a sign of our salvation and not something done as a child. It shows our figurative death, burial and resurrection with Christ.) When my family has not been feeling well, he has often told me to stay home and to put my family first. 

One thing that has most affected me, though, is his honesty about his humanity. He is human just like the rest of us. However, he doesn't allow that to keep him down. He usually admits his weaknesses and he leans on God for strength. He doesn't pretend to be what he isn't and he doesn't act like everything is fine when it isn't. 

I said usually....the last few years have been hard and most of us who are near him know that. And so, a chapter closes so that a new one can start. I have not had to face this in my adult years. Being the one staying behind while a pastor leaves. Then also dealing with interim pastors, candidating pastors, and all of the time inbetween now and calling a new pastor.

I am sad. I have found him to be a man that I can look up to for who I want to be (in many areas). Someone I can turn to when things are hard and I need someone to listen and advise me. He has been there for me through most of the major crises of my young adult life and I would not be who I am today without him and his ministry.

But, I also know what he would say if I ended this post here! He would not be happy. See, another thing he has taught me is how important it is to turn the focus to Christ. He is someone I can look up to, because I see him looking up too as he looks to Christ. His example has many times pointed me back to Scripture and back to Christ. It is not about him, as a pastor, but him as a tool of God's and what God has done through him. 

Thank you Pastor Michaelsen. Thank you for all you have done and for all you have taught us. We will miss you dearly, but we pray that God blesses you and your family as you all go forward and that you continue to be His tool in the years to come! 

To God be the glory!!