First blog

Hello, reader (no reason to be overly optomistic)!

This being my first blog entry, it'll be short. Short is only fitting as the theme of my blog is to celebrate the small. There's probably enough being written these days hailing the wonder of big stuff. Macro-demographic changes. Big cities. Massive governments. Mega-churches. Professional athletes with major muscles. You get the idea.

My world is not all that big. I'm not huge. Five foot ten and (roughly) 165 pounds. I have a smaller family, with three grown children and a wonderful daughter-in-law. My granddaughter, while wonderful, is small (well, she's one year old).

And I pastor a church that is by most definitions, small. I've been pastoring this church since 1982, the year of its inception. We started with about five couples and have never grown to mega-churchdom.

There are some three to four hundred people who would call themselves a part of this church I serve - Northwest Community Church in San Antonio, Texas. Other churches surround our church that are larger and much better known.

To be honest, I thank God for these larger churches! They are filling a vital role in this community. But I'm not in one of those larger churches. I'm serving in a smaller church. And - get this - I don't feel "stuck" here.

I really enjoy serving this congregation. I have learned things serving in a smaller church over nearly three decades that I might not have learned in a larger context. While I know that pastors of larger churches learn tremendous lessons of faith and grow in grace, I'm suspicious that I've learned things - different, not better things - at this church I might not have learned elsewhere.

I intend to write about the beauty, trials, challenges, and opportunities afforded the pastor of a church small enough for him to know most of those in attendance. It is worth celebrating when a community of any size comes together to worship, to learn, to grieve, to rejoice, and to otherwise share life. There are lots of big places where this is happening. It has been my honor to have served for the better part of my adult life in a small place where this happens regularly.

It will be my privilege to introduce you to the glory of the small.