Living under the Mercy

We are continuing with the Pastor-in-Residence program and Community Evangelical Free Church in Elverson, PA.  It has now been almost five months, and we are getting to the place where we start, however tentatively, to think about what is next.  Recently we both took a vocational test called the PRO-D, and over the next few weeks our PIR group will work through the results of that with Priscilla and me.
What is our PIR group?  It is three couples from CEFC, chosen by CEFC's elders, to walk with us through this time.  We meet on average twice a month to go through a handbook of questions intended to help us process my resignation, to encourage repentance, and to reflect on how we seek God to change us, by his Word and Spirit, with a view toward possible future ministry.  The PRO-D part of the program is to assist us in assessing where our gifts are, so as to find a fit service in Christ's kingdom.
Let me say, our PIR group has been most excellent.  Every pastor, and in fact every Christian, ought to have such a support group.  Pastors (and Christians in general) are usually busy giving themselves out, and it is difficult to find people to whom they can pour out their hearts.  For Priscilla and me, too, it is unfamiliar territory having a group of people so very committed to us; but it is refreshing.  It is very humbling how these three couples are pouring themselves into our lives, with dedication and sacrifice.  God has proven himself faithful and good through these brothers and sisters.  I hope you have a small group at your church that is like this PIR group for us.  We are very blessed by this group--and they insist they also are blessed to be a part of it.  God is truly extravagant in his goodness.
Meanwhile, to provide for our needs, I am working on my electrical business.  It is slowly growing.  Our needs are met, though not in such a way that we forget we depend on our heavenly Father.
If you desire to help us in the PIR program, I'd be glad to do any work for you that you can use, provided you live close enough for that.  If you would like to help beyond that, CEFC is accepting donations for our PIR program.  You can send your contribution to "CEFC", with "PIR program" written in the memo line, to: Community Evangelical Free Church, 52 S Brick Lane, Elverson, PA 19520. All contributions are tax-deductible.
Thanks for your time and your prayers!

Living between Death and Resurrection

This is an appropriate day for us: the day between the death and resurrection of Jesus.  It’s a little bit how we feel these days.  We feel like the disciples, who just witnessed Jesus' death, with all of its sorrow, the seemingly lost hope in the man who they thought was the Messiah, the Savior of the world.  Now he is dead.  He said something about rising from the dead, but they were not quite sure of that, and did not know what to do with it, it appears, until it happened.  

We have great hope of the resurrection (probably more than the original disciples!); the resurrection for us means we look forward to restoration, to recovering a vision and mission for life and even, in God’s mercy, ministry; we know it is coming, our Lord will lead us there.  But we’re not there yet, and it seems very far away.  So this is an appropriate day, in the “already-not yet.”  We feel the death, for the most part, more than we can taste the resurrection.  But we do taste it! 

We continue to be greatly blessed by the Pastor-in-Residence (PIR) program.  The last two weeks our group has been studying many passages about restoration for those who are bowed down.  The Scriptures are full of it.  It is the story of redemption.  But reading so many passages all together, each one God's promise to restore or lift up those who are bowed down or low, was very powerful.  Try this: read Ps. 34:18; Ps. 71:20-21; Ps. 119:50; Ps 145:13-14; Is. 43:1-3; Lamentations 3:31-32; Rom. 5:3-5; 2 Cor. 10:4; and Gal. 6:1-2; all in one sitting.  Add to that Hannah's Song (1 Sam. 2) and Mary's Song (Luke 1:46ff).  God has a future for you and for me, and it will be glorious.  And it is as certain as the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

On the work front, I am getting more electrical work coming my way.  Again, if you live within shouting distance of Reading, PA, and need anything electrical done, please let me know; if you know anyone who does, direct them to me.

PIR is also supported by contributions of those who desire to help us in that way.  Checks written to "CEFC" with "PIR" on the memo line can be sent to Community Evangelical Free Church, 52 S. Brick Lane, Elverson, PA 19520.  Thank you so very, very much for your prayers, and for your support.

  

Something I wrote to our PIR group

We are greatly blessed by the PIR team that the church has put together for us.  We met yesterday afternoon, and this morning one of the team members wrote a very encouraging email.  Here is how I replied, and I thought I would post this here for those of you who want to know more how to pray for us.  It was a typical Monday morning today:

I woke up this morning with the blob of fear/anxiety/discouragement ready to descend upon my heart once again.  Uncharacteristically, I went down and told Priscilla, and we prayed together briefly (Priscilla couldn't pray out loud without coughing, aagh, so her prayer was very brief).  God has kept the blob at bay, PTL.  

In my prayer time I read Psalm 81, which says at one point: "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt.  Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it."  God has delivered us from slavery to sin, through the cross.  He promises to fill us.  Thought of the hymn: "Thou art coming to a King, large petitions with thee bring."  (The psalm goes on to bemoan that "my people did not listen to my voice."  Alas.)
 I do not think I have ever been in a place where daily, even moment by moment, I experience my need for Christ.  It is not a comfortable place.  My Valley of Vision prayer went like this:
 When thou wouldst guide me I control myself
When thou wouldst be sovereign I rule myself
When thou wouldst take care of me I suffice myself
When I should depend on thy providings I supply myself
When I should submit to thy providence I follow my will
When I should study, love, honor, trust thee, I serve myself;
I fault and correct thy laws to suit myself...
Convince me that I cannot be my own God, to make myself happy,
Nor my own Christ, to restore my joy
Nor my own Spirit to teach, guide, rule me.

Thanks for engaging, and do pray for us, as we will for you.  God is good, and he is sovereign, and he is wise.  O for grace to trust him more.

PIR Update

It is now more than four months since my resignation.  In that time Priscilla and I have spent countless hours talking with people, all kinds of people; we have received a lot of compassion, sound counsel, as well as reprimand (not a bad thing) along the way.  A lot of wise people have spoken into our lives to our good benefit.

And now the PIR program has kicked in, the program we are engaged in at our “refuge church.”  Presently the center of that is meeting with three couples from the church who walk through and process with us the last few months, as well as consider what is wise going forward. 

Already Priscilla and I are very grateful we took this step.  As painful as it was and still is to leave behind friends at the church I served, we have been blessed to move to our refuge church (our children do not yet feel that blessing to the same degree, but we trust they will in time).  At the first PIR meeting the three couples told us their stories; at our second meeting this past Sunday Priscilla and I began to tell our respective stories.  At our next meeting we get down to a difficult part: the events surrounding my resignation.  Our meetings have been bathed in the “grace that is greater than all our sin.”  We need that, both for ourselves and to extend to others.  By the way, the material that PIR Ministries put together is excellent.

On another front, after considering many options, it seemed the best way to make a living going forward was through electrical work.  So I am in the process (and with the state bureaucracy, it is a process!) of setting up an electrical business.  That is a skill I learned during college vacations, and have kept up with over the years.  We are praying for enough contacts to keep busy.  Of course, I am always open to other jobs that utilize my other skills (I’m on LinkedIn; you can find me there).  Priscilla is also considering working outside the home, which has other decisions (especially schooling) attached to it.

How can you help?  If you live within shouting distance of Reading, PA, and need something electrical done, or know someone who does, give me a call.  You can also contribute directly to our PIR program by sending a contribution designated “PIR” to Community Evangelical Free Church, 52 S. Brick Lane, Elverson, PA 19520; all donations are tax-deductible.

Above all, please pray for us.  We continue to have a lot of decisions to make, and need wisdom.  Pray for us beginning with Ephesians 1:17ff., wisdom to know the immeasurable greatness of God in the gospel; and the (more situational) wisdom of James 1:5, which God gives generously and without reproach to those who ask (isn’t that a powerful verse!).

Thanks for caring enough to read this.  Drop a line and let us know how we can pray for you, too.

O Lord, All My Longing Is before You; My Sighing Is Not Hidden from You.

How is that to pull you into a psalm?  That is Psalm 38:9, and through a friend's pointing me to that verse God drew me into Psalm 38.
Psalm 38 is 22 verses long.  The first eight verses are about the crushing weight of sin.  God's hand has come down because of my sin (v. 2); there is no soundness in my flesh  because of my sin; it has gone over my head (vv. 3, 7), it is too heavy a burden to bear (v. 4); I groan because of the tumult of my heart, v. 8 ends.
On top of that, in vv. 12-20, I have enemies. They seek my life, seek my hurt, and meditate treachery against me (v. 12).  They are very powerful (v. 19), they render evil for good (v. 20).  This is a psalm by one who is crushed by sin within, and by enemies without.
It is also a psalm for those who feel crushed by sin within and enemies without.  For it tells us where to turn.  Six times comes the refrain: "O Lord."  The psalm begins, "O Lord..."  After pouring out his heart over sin in vv. 1-8 comes the "O Lord" of v. 9.  Twice in v. 15: "for you, O Lord, do I wait," and, "it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer."  And in the last two verses the plea: O Lord... O my God... O Lord." Help.
Eugene Petersen, in his book on the psalms (see sidebar) points out that we tend to look at the psalms through the lens of the psychology of the psalmist.  He remarks (p. 14):

"The Psalms were not prayed by people trying to understand themselves.  They are not the record of people searching for the meaning of life.  They were prayed by people who understood that God had everything to do with them. God, not their feelings, was the center. God, not their souls, was the issue.  God, not the meaning of life, was critical."

Let's apply that to Psalm 38 so we hear what this psalm says to us.  We might say: "This psalm was written by someone in very dire circumstances.  I am not in very dire circumstances.  It does not speak to me."  That is taking the psychology of the psalmist as the starting point of the psalm.  And possibly missing the point.
The psalm, however, says, reveals, at least one very profound thing about God.  It is in vv. 9-11.  It is what distinguishes God from everyone else.  It matters supremely when you and I are in deep distress; but it matters all the time.  In v. 10, my strength has failed.  In v. 11, even loved ones--friends, companions, nearest kin--stand aloof, far off.  But God never--NEVER--stands aloof, or far off.  No matter how great the sin (and it is most always more hideous than we ourselves know--think of Isaiah in Isaiah 6).  No matter how beset by enemies--literal or spiritual (remember Psalm 2 where nations, peoples, kings, rulers, all oppose God, try to be rid of him!).  "O Lord my God"--he is never far, never distant, never hides from us because of the hideousness of our sin, or our weakness in the face of the powerful.  "All my longing is before you; my sighing is not hidden from your sight."  He is the One who "put my tears in [his] bottle" (Ps. 56:8).
In fact, God drew near to us at our very worst point.  He sent Jesus "when we were his enemies" (Romans 5).  He did not stand aloof, but came in Emmanuel, God with Us.
In my and my family's present circumstances, this is powerful.  In my sin, this is powerful.  In my, in our, in the church's, apparent weakness in the face of powerful enemies, this is powerful.  My longing is before the Lord, the great I am, God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth.  My sighing is not hidden from him.  Hallelujah.

What is PIR? What Am I Doing Next?

Recently I resigned as pastor at Covenant Church in Sinking Spring, PA, and have signed up with a ministry called PIR Ministries.  What is PIR Ministries?
Each month in the United States around 1,500 pastors leave the ministry (you can read more about that in research done by the Scheaffer Institute).  There are a variety of reasons for this, but it is a staggering number.  Since I have resigned, I have been amazed at how many pastors I have come across who are on their way out of ministry--or, like me, are unsure what to do after they have been "exited" from pastoral ministry.   If you google, for instance, "exited pastor" you will find some interesting material, much of which comes from PIR Ministries.
PIR Ministries is an attempt to stem the flow of exiting pastors.  It connects "exited pastors" with "refuge churches" where the pastor (and his wife) can re-tool, re-focus, evaluate his/their ministry and himself/themselves in ministry, and, in many cases, take steps to return to ministry.  In our case, Community Evangelical Free Church in Elverson, PA, has graciously become our "refuge church."  In the coming months, Lord-willing, we will go through a series of conversations with a group of church members designed to challenge and encourage us, with a view to evaluating whether it is wise for me to return to ministry, in what capacity, etc.  I hope to keep a running commentary of our progress on this blog, so stay tuned.
Our time in the PIR program is supported by prayer--so if you are reading this, please, please, add us to your prayer list.  Pray Ephesians 3:14-19; Colossians 1:9-14; or another favorite Bible prayer for us.
It is also supported by contributions by people who love us.  If you would like to contribute, please send a gift with a note for "Stoltzfus PIR program" to Community Evangelical Free Church, 52 South Brick Lane, Elverson, PA 19520.  Your gift is 100% tax-deductible.  Please note: If you are a member of either Covenant Church or CEFC, you are already contributing through your giving to your church, and therefore I encourage you to give elsewhere.
Thanks for reading this.  Please feel free to drop me a line, and do pray for us.

The Balance between Retreat and Compromise

In the sermon on Sunday we talked about the two poles of separation and conformity, as the church relates to the world.  The Gospel Coalition web site recently had the following article that reinforces what we saw on Sunday, and is well worth a read.  You can find it here.

Economic Segregation

In a recent Newshour broadcast, there was a report on the growing segregation in America culture--but not on racial lines, but on economic lines.  You can see the report by following this link, then going to the bottom of the page to the video.
This got me to thinking about the church.  The New Testament says over and over again that in the church people from all backgrounds, all races, all classes, all _____ (fill in the blanks) come together with one thing that binds us together that is greater than whatever separates us--and that one thing is that we belong to Christ.  So watch the video--and think about that.  And pray for our church, and churches around the world, on that point.