Ryan's Rock: A Retired Minister Search for Spiritual Sanity

By David L. Buche

This book was written as a basis for encouragement to those involved in the preaching ministry. It focuses upon the difficulties and blessings in the life of a preachers family, especially when the preacher reaches the age of retirement. Readers will discover the challenges of living ones life as a designated spiritual leader while still dealing with family issues that come as a result of living in a very physical world. Prayer conversations will guide the reader in having a dialogue with God in the midst of the pressures of this fleeting life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 23, 2009
• ISBN: 9781462825943

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Ryan’s Rock

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A Retired Minister’s Search

for Spiritual Sanity

Illustrations by David R. Buche

David L. Buche

Copyright © 2009 by David L. Buche.

Illustrations by David R. Buche

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

56148

Contents

Acknowledgements

Preface

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Acknowledgements

There have been many people and churches in my life that have helped me, guided me and put up with me throughout the course of my ministry. They need to be acknowledged.

I want to thank the Riverton Christian Church in Riverton, Illinois for giving me my first chance to test my ministerial legs. They hired me as youth minister at a time when neither of us had any idea as to what a youth minister was. I cherish those years working with Ron Collins who was the preaching minister. We were both the same age, but he was ahead of me at Lincoln Bible Institute. I had the opportunity to make a lot of mistakes and learn from them without having any severe consequences.

I thank the Southside Christian Church in Ottawa, Illinois for putting up with me for five years as I became the second full-time minister in the history of that congregation. They heard me preach over three-hundred sermons during those years and the congregation grew to a record average attendance, yet to be matched. Those were definitely growing years. The church grew, I grew in maturity and my family grew from one to three children.

I also thank the First Christian Church of Dyer, Indiana and the Chicago District Evangelistic Association for giving me the opportunity to preach and teach in Dyer for twenty-one years. Those were truly formative years for my ministry, providing me with many experiences and relationships that would act like spiritual growth hormones in my role as God’s servant. Even though that ministry did not end as I desired it was a fantastic spiritual journey.

Thanks also go to the Christian Church of DeMotte in DeMotte, Indiana where I spent almost fifteen years preaching and teaching. They took me at a time when both of us were struggling with disappointment and allowed God to work His miracles in the lives of many people. God salvaged both a ministry and a congregation and made His presence known. It seems that there has always been, and continues to be, a group of people in that community who are set on destroying and dividing that congregation, but there is also a group of people who refuse to quit trusting God. They are saints to be sure. Retiring from ministry with that congregation was absolutely one of the hardest and most heart-breaking decisions of my life. The friendships and the bonds of love that were developed during those years are impossible to put a value upon.

Then there is the Southlake Christian Church in Crown Point, Indiana and the Community Christian Church in Hobart, Indiana where I was provided an opportunity to preach after I retired. They have no idea as to the amount of spiritual encouragement that they provided for Karen and me.

Finally, there is the Kouts Christian Church in Kouts, Indiana. They plucked me out of retirement and hired me in spite of my age. They respected my experience and recognized the gifts of ministry that God had put into my life. They welcomed Karen and me with open arms and made us part of their family at a time when we desperately needed to be needed. That story continues to be written.

Father, thank you for putting so many wonderful people in the pathway of my life and ministry. It worked out quite well. I was also putting you in their pathway. "I couldn’t have made it in ministry had there not been so many who were giving me a chance to serve, and they also paid me on top of all that." I was able to use you because you were useable. They were willing to use you because you were a servant. Had they not seen Me in you, you wouldn’t have made it. Lord, I thank you for the Church. It has been my life and my family. It is my Body.

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Preface

I don’t write this book as a theologian, but rather as a preacher of the Gospel. I have always been what I considered to be low profile in ministry. I have never preached for a really large congregation. I have never been outstanding in any particular aspect of ministry. My intent with this book is likewise not intended to raise my profile or to improve my status in society or within the church. This is simply a labor of love, written with the hope that it will be helpful to other preachers who have gone through similar experiences or those who have questioned their viability in ministry. It is also for those who have retired from ministry or those who are considering retirement. Because your perspective on life and ministry is different than mine, we will not always find agreement, but I am confident that many of you will be able to say, that’s me as you work your way through each chapter.

There have been a few times in my life when I have been envious of the high profile leaders in Christianity. It leaves me feeling very inadequate. I feel like a big toe stuck in a shoe while others are high profile body parts receiving all the glory even though they may not be working any harder than I do. I know that God desires for us to win our world for Him, and that very few are going to have a national or a world-wide presence. I also know that God has used me, and many like me, in ways of which I am not even aware, or imagined. Even big toes are important in keeping the body balanced.

I have prayed the prayer of Jabez and asked for God to expand the influence of my ministry beyond what I can imagine. Yet, I need to understand that He already has. We never know how many lives we touch or how many decisions we influence as we simply live daily with the intent of letting Jesus be seen in our lives. God speaks through us and through the lives of those we touch on a daily basis. Jesus told Nicodemus that the wind blows where it will. We don’t know where it comes from or where it goes. He then reminds him that the Spirit works in the same way. I pray that He will use this book for His purpose and to His glory. When that happens, I will have found success.

If I get a little preachy, it’s because that’s what I do. For too many years I looked at everything with the potential of including it in a sermon or two. Once that’s in your blood, you just have to live with it. Like Peter and John, I can’t help but speak of the things which I have seen and heard.

I’ve written this book in short chapters so that it can be taken in small doses, if necessary. We all get so busy with multi-tasking that we seldom sit down and read for long periods. Perhaps this format will lend itself to your schedule.

I make no attempt to usurp the authority of God’s Word. It is a very dangerous thing to interpret the Word based upon one’s experiences. It is rather essential that we interpret our experiences by God’s Word. Each chapter concludes with a prayer-conversation. It is not an attempt to put words in God’s mouth, but rather to share some of God’s responses that He has put within my heart. This is not an attempt to speak for God, but rather to allow Him to speak through me.

Lord, I want this book to be a source of inspiration to other ministers who are retired or retiring. I also want it to be used to prepare those who anticipate retiring one day. I’m not too sure ‘retiring is the best word. When you eventually retire, you will be with me in eternity." I know you are right, but I’m not talking about retiring from life, just the full-time ministry. Every ministry with me is full-time, even if you don’t get a weekly paycheck. I just want to slow down a bit and take on a change-of-pace. I can accept that, but I’ll probably still ask you to run periodically, and when I do, I will give you the strength to do it.

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Chapter One

The Stroller

It seemed like a good idea at the time. My daughter, Kathy, and I were going to take a walk around our subdivision with her two boys, Ryan and Seth. In order for that to happen, we would have to take two strollers. She had one that she brought with her for their visit, and I had one that had been stored in the attic above the garage. Unfortunately, the stroller that I was to use was stored disassembled.

A couple of months earlier, we had the old stroller out, but it was dirty, stained and polluted. Anticipating that we might want to use it down the road, I took it completely apart and cleaned it up. I took all of the fabric parts and put them in the washer (they were marked washable) and once they were clean I stored them in plastic bags. I cleaned and polished all of the metal parts and cleaned off the tires so that it looked like new—at least in parts.

When the day came for us to take our walk, I reasoned that all I would have to do is put the old stroller together and we would be all set. Then I looked at all of the parts—the fabric pieces, the screws & bolts, the snaps and the straps. It appeared that the parts had doubled in the two months since I had disassembled it! The most significant thing that was missing was the instruction sheet. Have you ever tried to put something as complicated as a stroller together without instructions? Have you ever tried to do that with instructions? I had a vague idea of what it looked like, but that mental picture was two-months old. I’m sixty-seven years old and there are so many mental pictures stuffed into my brain that they have a tendency to overlap. The night before our walk, I worked on it for about an hour. I had it spread out on the garage floor and fought off the mosquitoes as I attempted to reassemble the monster. An hour was all I could take and when that time was up, I still had an unassembled stroller.

The next morning, I got at it bright and early. To my own amazement, I was able to get the frame all put together and it actually looked like a stroller—folded up! It took me another twenty minutes to figure out how to unfold it and get it to where it would roll on all four wheels. Now all I had to do was to attach the fabric. How hard could that be? I discovered that such a question should never be posed to one who is working without instructions. It was very much like trying to put a puzzle together without having any idea of what the completed picture would look like! I have seen many strollers over the years, but I have never really looked at them with the idea of assembling them or even using them. I thought about calling in the reserves and asking my wife and daughter to have some input into the project, but the more I thought about it, the more determined I was to work alone. I’m the one who is mechanically inclined. Besides—it became a matter of pride.

I won’t tell you how long it took for me to install the fabric. Like Edison and his light bulb, I found hundreds of ways not to do it. All I can remember is that by the time I was finished, I was ready for a shower and the idea of going for a walk was very low on my list of priorities for the day. But who can refuse the call of a two-year old grandson—"Papa: walk?

Off we went. A walk around our subdivision is right at three miles on asphalt roads. I had been walking half that distance each morning and felt really good about it. I had gone through by-pass surgery a little more than a year earlier, so this was part of my routine. I opted out of the last couple of months of cardiac rehab, promising the cardiologist that I would faithfully walk each morning and do my exercises. Kathy inspired me to go for the three-mile walk, pushing two strollers. How hard can it be? she questioned. I push a double stroller for over a mile on a gravel road each day! I remembered asking myself the question how hard could that be with regard to the stroller, but the memory of the pain had passed. So, being shamed into it, I said, alright, let’s go for the three miles. Ever since that day, I have continued to walk for three miles every morning!

I ended up pushing Kathy’s newer stroller with eight-month old Seth as my passenger. Kathy pushed the re-constructed stroller with two-year old Ryan on board. It was a wonderful walk and we all enjoyed the time making discoveries. Kathy was very good at teaching Ryan about God’s presence and His creative powers as she pointed out God’s fingerprints in the panorama that unfolded before us. She does so well with those teachable moments.

At one point, Ryan discovered a rock lying in the road. Kathy said that he really likes rocks, so she picked it up and gave it to him. A short while later, it was back in the road, so I picked it up and gave it back to him. This action was repeated many times until Kathy told him that if he was going to continue to throw it out of the stroller we would just leave it on the road. He did and she kept her word. He expressed his disappointment with some squeals and whimpers and we moved on.

It wasn’t until we were down the road quite a distance when we discovered what Ryan was trying to do, and why he was so frustrated. The old stroller—the one that Seth was occupying—was the one that Ryan was used to riding in before Seth came along. In that stroller, there was a pocket behind the back where he could store stuff. He could simply reach back over his head and put it into the pocket, saving it for later. Ryan had been trying to do the same thing with the rock, thinking that he was in the other stroller! The problem came when the rock simply slipped through the fabric and fell to the ground. He wasn’t being disobedient, he just didn’t understand, and it frustrated him. Rather than receiving compassion, he was reprimanded. Kathy did what she felt was right at the time. Had she known, she would have allowed it to be a teachable moment.

The next day, Kathy and the boys returned to their home near Decatur, Illinois and I returned to my routine of walking each morning. In the course of my walk, I came across the rock that Ryan had dropped on the pavement. I picked it up and cherished the fact that he had held it in his little hands. Then I returned it to the ground. Every time I passed by it over the next few days, I stopped, picked it up and remembered Ryan. Eventually, I put it up on a