Jusqu'au bout.
Last night I went with one of the students to a conference on the family, run by one of the Bordeaux churches. It's on all weekend, but I doubt if I'll go along this afternoon. Today will be a Saturday with the family, rather than on the family.
When I got there I found that the speaker for the weekend is an American missionary pastor who we met a few years ago when we were on holiday and considering coming here to work.
However, when he arrived I didn't recognise him. He was on crutches, and really very thin.
I said "What's happened to you?"
"I have cancer of the bones and of the liver"
"And treatment ?"
"Nothing at present. They've just stopped a hormonal treatment and they're going to start chemotherapy."
"But it's the journey home ?"
"Yes. It's the journey home. It's hard to let go of things here, but this is what it's all about."
So he perched on a stool and spoke for a good long while on the family, starting in Genesis 2.
The family life of the French is as chaotic as that of the British. Lads and lasses with no dad. People marry later and later, or not at all. Money and career matter more than kids, after all.
The speaker began by saying that the Christian home images Jesus and his church.
I had a few questions about his approach.
Unity in marriage is not a goal to be achieved, but a reality to be lived out. It's the marriage covenant that makes them one flesh. It would have been nice to have a bigger and deeper foundation in talking about Christ and the church before going to Genesis 2. I don't think an invitation to raise your hand if you wanted to accept Christ was terribly appropriate given the content of the message and the peopel who had gathered ( or indeed, at all ).
But he's keeping on going right to the end. That's the thing to do, isn't it.
I need to be clear. Surely retirement from positions of responsibility is right. It can't be appropriate to wait until one's final remaining marble topples from its lofty perch, or until the elders and deacons come begging you to go, or till the church drifts away or splits in despair.
But retirement isn't the end of service, is it ?
When I got there I found that the speaker for the weekend is an American missionary pastor who we met a few years ago when we were on holiday and considering coming here to work.
However, when he arrived I didn't recognise him. He was on crutches, and really very thin.
I said "What's happened to you?"
"I have cancer of the bones and of the liver"
"And treatment ?"
"Nothing at present. They've just stopped a hormonal treatment and they're going to start chemotherapy."
"But it's the journey home ?"
"Yes. It's the journey home. It's hard to let go of things here, but this is what it's all about."
So he perched on a stool and spoke for a good long while on the family, starting in Genesis 2.
The family life of the French is as chaotic as that of the British. Lads and lasses with no dad. People marry later and later, or not at all. Money and career matter more than kids, after all.
The speaker began by saying that the Christian home images Jesus and his church.
I had a few questions about his approach.
Unity in marriage is not a goal to be achieved, but a reality to be lived out. It's the marriage covenant that makes them one flesh. It would have been nice to have a bigger and deeper foundation in talking about Christ and the church before going to Genesis 2. I don't think an invitation to raise your hand if you wanted to accept Christ was terribly appropriate given the content of the message and the peopel who had gathered ( or indeed, at all ).
But he's keeping on going right to the end. That's the thing to do, isn't it.
I need to be clear. Surely retirement from positions of responsibility is right. It can't be appropriate to wait until one's final remaining marble topples from its lofty perch, or until the elders and deacons come begging you to go, or till the church drifts away or splits in despair.
But retirement isn't the end of service, is it ?
Comments
And sometimes we say we don't have the choice even when we do really.
One of the things I had to deal with in the computer industry was that sometimes it was better that someone else do a job even if they would not do it as well as I would, because that's how they learn, and it is better for the business that way.
But you have to salute a guy who has handed on the pastorate of his church to a successor but who still does a weekend conference when, as he said, "my oncologist says that my bones are like lace".