"Well done, good and FAITHFUL servant"

It's been about three months since I moved to St. Louis. These days, my life consists of classes at Covenant Theological Seminary, ministry at KPC St. Louis, and going to the gym. Not gonna lie, it's a pretty lonely life. The only thing I really look forward to is spending time with the youth group at KPC.

Besides my lack of social life, other events have taken place and I had to learn to adjust my person to these new circumstances. But one thing I've learned, or rather experienced, in St. Louis is the heart of a pastor.

If I were completely honest, I never expected ministry to be easy. I didn't underestimate it. But reality is so much more real than anticipation. Working with the youth group hurts my heart like I've never felt before. It's not that these kids are bad and causing me trouble (though that's not completely untrue either...). But hearing the struggles and pains that these students go through in their lives, no matter how illegitimate or ridiculous, makes me long for healing in their lives. I wish I could just grab them by their shoulders and shake the nonsense out of their lives while drilling a hole inside their heads to hammer in JESUS JESUS JESUS JESUS.

Don't get me wrong: I LOVE working with the youth. It's my greatest pleasure to guide these students and what I believe I was created to do. I can't picture myself doing anything else.

But it's still frustrating. It's partly frustrating because I'm powerless to directly change their lives. I know that the answer to any problem (especially the worries of middle- and high-school students) is a better understanding of Jesus and his gospel. But it's not like the gospel is some tangible object that I can show them in my hands as a panacea for their problems. I can't go inside their minds and change what they think or how they behave about certain things. Really, the limits of what I can do is to faithfully preach the gospel through my words and actions and pray for fruit in their hearts. I think the most frustrating thing for a minister of the gospel is to invest and put in all this work into a person/people, and see little or even no fruit. But I guess this is where faith comes in. I guess this is why Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:31, "Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord."

C.S. Lewis once said that the weight of glory were to hear the words, "Well done, good and faithful servant." I'm learning that there is a difference between those words, and "Well done, good and fruitful servant."

"For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on the Day..." 2 Timothy 4:6-8

In Christ
Peter