Getting Myself on the Right Road

When a person writes a blog, several questions can be raised in the minds of the readers. Perhaps the most frequent is "Does the writer of this face the same kinds of decisions and choices that I face, and if so, how does he handle them?" The truth is that it is easier to write suggestions than to confess my own struggles. However, in the interest of transparency, this posting is the account of my personal journey in choosing the less traveled road that became my vocation.

I was fourteen years old, a young Christian, trying to develop some personal habits of reading the Bible and praying. In the summer of 1961, I attended a Baptist Youth Camp for the first time. The main speaker for the week was a missionary from Brazil. He was easy for me to listen to and give thought to his messages. One night his message seemed to be speaking directly to me. In my mind I sensed God saying that I was to give my life in working in Christian service. I shared that with our group and my pastor and youth leaders. They were supportive and happy for me.

But things and attitudes would change when we returned home. Using my best 14 year old communication skills, I tried to explain to my parents what I believed God was calling me to do. My parents were both raised during the Great Depression. I was going to be the first member of our family to go to college. Their dreams for me were not the same as what I was sharing. Two objections stood out - first, preachers don't make any money, and second, I was too young to know what I wanted to do with my life. Soon it seemed as if others joined my parents' views. One suggestion that was repeated frequently was to go to college, become a doctor, and then teach a Sunday School class or maybe even become a deacon.

Hearing this idea repeated enough times, I soon decided that this must be the road I was to take because everyone else seemed to favor it. In the fall of 1965 I began my first semester at Baylor University. On this broad road i was a pre-med student with a double major of Chemistry and Biology. Everyone seemed happy and supportive.

Before Thanksgiving of that same semester, I was miserable. I read a little in my Bible. Prayed some. Then I sensed that same communication to me that God was reminding me of the calling He had given me four years earlier. When I went home at Thanksgiving, I told my parents that I truly believed that God was calling me to be a preacher, not a doctor. It was a big change from a heavily traveled road to one far less traveled. Maybe because I was older and maybe a little more articulate, my parents accepted my decision and became some of my biggest supporters.

Back at Baylor, I changed my majors from Chemistry and Biology to History, English, and a minor in Religion. After graduation, my wife (married our senior year) and I moved to Arlington, Texas, so that I could attend Southwestern Seminary in Ft. Worth. There I completed a Master of Divinity Degree and later a Doctor of Ministry Degree (so technically, I did become a doctor but not a medical one).

Over the years I pastored 4 different churches, later I served as the Executive Director of a Baptist Association composed of about 85 churches. During my last few years at the Association and in my retirement, I served about eight churches as their interim pastor while they searched for a new fulltime pastor.

Has that road been easy? No, at times it has been very difficult, but I have no doubt that I made the right decision about the vocational path I was called to take. Fifty-eight years have passed since my first semester in college. That semester I made a definite decision to take a road less traveled instead of the road other people had encouraged me to take. And like Robert Frost wrote, "and that has made all the difference."

I would never begin to tell anyone what they should do with his or her life in terms of a vocation, marriage, or any of the other major life decisions. What I would say though is that you better make those decisions on what God is leading you to do rather than what your crowd is pushing you to do.

Praying for you to be strong as you make the hard choices in life.