From Sampler to Sower

The future God has planned for you is far better than any you could ever imagine for yourself.

In 15 and a half years of youth ministry, I’ve told my teens this truth countless times.  It is the thesis statement of my ministry, the one thing I hope they will take away from our time together.

Today, I’m being reminded of that truth myself.

Moments ago I tendered my resignation to the board of the Middletown Church of the Nazarene, my family’s church home for the last eight years. And while there was a little sadness in doing that, there was far more excitement, both for myself, and for our church.

It was exciting for me because, on Sunday, I accepted the call to pastor the Anderson Southdale Church of the Nazarene.  I am excited about the opportunity to lead these people of God in service to their community and world as together we share the good news about Jesus Christ.  I am excited about being able to continue to work closely with my friends and colleagues at the Middletown Church and the others on our zone so together our churches, as part of His Church, can take hold of God’s Kingdom and move it powerfully forward. I am excited because it is always exciting to follow faithfully after the call of God.

And I am excited for the Middletown Church.  Something that has come up frequently in the conversations between my Pastor and I as we moved toward this transition is that if it is God’s will for me to serve the people of Southdale, it’s also God’s will for the Middletown Church to make a transition as well.  His plans are perfect, and His plan for me doesn’t in any way jeopardize His plans for the church.

I can’t tell you how many times in my ministry I have come back to John 14:12. In it Jesus tells his disciples (who were themselves facing a significant transition):

Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

When following God, the future is always brighter. Jesus repeatedly promises “greater things than these” to his people who do his work.  And despite how great these years in Middletown have been, there are greater things than these in store for me.  And there are greater things than these in store for the great people of the Middletown Church.

So to my friends and family who are the Middletown Church of the Nazarene, I want to say thank you.  Thank you for what has been 3213 of the best days of my life so far. Thank you for the opportunity and honor of being able to serve alongside you for these years.  Thank you for the love, encouragement and support you have given us and our ministry. Thank you for letting us become a part of your lives, and thank you for continuing to make room for us even after this transition.  We love you.

And to the people of both the Middletown and Southdale congregations, I can’t wait to see what God has in store for us in the future, because His future is always better.

You may have noticed I suddenly went from a post every week day to a week and a half of nothing.  It was family vacation time.  Our oldest son is in eighth grade, so the Buhro academy took an extended field trip to Niagara Falls and Washington, DC.  I tried to work ahead a cue some posts for while I was gone, but there simply wasn’t enough time, so you got nothing. But we’re back, and I’m ready and eager to start writing again.  In case you’re interested, here’s a video of the photos from our trip.  Individual photos can be viewed on Flickr.  The video itself was made with Animoto, and I continue to strongly recommend it for those in ministry. It’s a great way to showcase photos from your church.

I’ve had a flood of messages coming in from people wanting to know my 2011 bracket picks so they can ride my prescience to victory in their bracket contests…

Actually, no one has asked, and that’s probably a demonstration of wisdom on their part.  However, in the interest of accountability, here’s my picks.

Of course, I should probably warn you, I have a tendency to pick who I want to win, rather than who I think will win.  I’m not willing to root against my favorite teams just for the sake of preserving my bracket.

And in case you were wondering, here’s what I was wearing while I made my picks…

Yesterday I wrote about some of the best years of my life.  But reminiscing about the good years doesn’t quite make up for the fact that 2010-2011 has been one of the hardest years of my life so far.

Don’t get me wrong. My family is blessed in more ways than I can fully count. But for a number of reasons the past 12 months have been some of the most difficult I’ve faced.

I shared just a little over a year ago that due to the ongoing downturn in the economy and its effects on giving at our church, I and the rest of the paid associate staff at Middletown Church of the Nazarene would be facing a 50% reduction in salary. I said at the time that we were hoping it would be a short term adjustment. “Who knows,” I wrote last year “where our church will be financially a year from now?”

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I shared yesterday about our youth group’s favorite travel game, The Top Three.  On our ski trip this weekend, one of my favorite questions came as a surprise: What were your top three favorite years? Like most of the best questions in the top three game, it’s deceptively simple, but calls for some real thought and provides a unique insight into the lives of the players.  After some careful consideration, here are my top three as well as some reflections on what makes the good years so good.

1991

1991 was the best of my high school years, with 1990 a close second.  In October 1990 I finally got up the nerve to ask Michelle to go out with me.  By 1991 we were “going steady.”  The summer of 1991 was my turn to attend Nazarene Youth Congress in Orlando, FL. By the time my senior semester started (fall 1991) I’d found my social niche and loved school. I was on my high school speech team and made the all-conference team in foreign extemp.  In December of 1991 I graduated from high school a semester early and prepared to head off to Olivet Nazarene University in January 1992.

Update: And though I didn’t know it then, that was also the year @Bekkalynn was born.

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All I can say is I am still reveling in last night’s Packers victory, so I thought I’d take a minute to gloat here.  It feels awfully good, especially since things looked so shaky in the middle of the season.

Here’s photographic proof that @aaronscottallen has perhaps the coolest family in Middletown.  I walked out of the church Sunday morning to find this cupcake creation sitting in the front seat of my van with a nice note from a family of die-hard Colts fans who wished us a happy Super Bowl party. And it was happy.

Brett, my #2 son, is my only true Packers comrade in the family.  The rest are all Colts fans.  So it’s fun sharing the joy with him. I’m hoping he realizes how special this is.

(A bitter?) Pastor Phil tweeted last night:

I suppose @pastorbuhro actually thinks we enjoy his incessant packer tweets Phil Rogers

In honor of him, I’m posting them all here, because, honestly, I make myself laugh.  And that’s all that matters.

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Sunday afternoon the Green Bay Packers strode confidently into the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome.  It wouldn’t be long however before they looked less certain.  Early turnovers resulted in an early lead for the Vikings.  Things began to look up when the Pack forced a turnover and ran it back for a score to make up the deficit.  But the victory just wasn’t to be.  They made a good run at a comeback late in the fourth quarter, but in the end fell short.

A key factor in the loss was the Vikings pass rush which hounded the Packers quarterback, created havoc in the backfield and led to some costly turnovers.  The other key difference was time of possession, which Minnesota dominated, especially in the second half.

It proved a tough loss.  But it wasn’t the end of the season.  Favre and the Packers went on to lose only two more games, and gave Minnesota a 38-10 drubbing in week 17 when the Vikings had to report to Lambeau Field for the rematch.  It was an exciting end to the regular season and a good transition into the post-season which Green Bay capped off by defeating Drew Bledsoe and the Patriots in Superbowl XXXI.  But they did lose to the Vikings in Minnesota on Sept. 22, 1996.

Given the lessons learned from history, despite last night’s lost, Packer Nation isn’t worried.  The deciding factor isn’t what happened last night.  It’s what happens the rest of the season.

Christ Bearing the Cross, from the Workshop of El Greco and part of the IMA's Clowes collection.

Granted, this is a bit of a diversion from my normal subject matter for this blog, but I’m too excited about this not to share.

One of my favorite things about living in Middletown is the combined joys of living in a small town (population 2,500), the convenience of being 10 minutes from the retail and restaurant options of Anderson, and the culture of being 45 minutes from Indianapolis.  And one of my favorite things about being close to Indy is the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

Simply put, I love the IMA

It’s free.  (That doesn’t keep me from paying for an annual membership though – it’s a museum worthy of support.)

It really is a world class institution.  They have a very eclectic collection from Chinese Jade, to the Eitlejorg African/Egyptian collection, to old masters, to modern design.  They have one of the best collections of Neo-Impressionism in the Western Hemisphere, and their collection of works from the Pont-Aven School (including Paul Gauguin) is perhaps the best in the world.  I can’t summarize their collection without mentioning their extensive collection of works from J.M.W. Turner in their Pantzer collection.  And, for me, the icing on the cake: their Clowes collection features five works from the workshop of El Greco – my favorite artist of all time.

And it’s 45 minutes away!

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Anyone who’s on Facebook has probably seen the 25 things meme that’s been spreading like wildfire over there.  I myself was recently tagged, as was friend and fellow blogger Todd.  Not to be outdone, I succomed.  Here are my 25 things, reposted for your enjoyment.

Photo courtesy of annamon on flickr

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Wow . . .

It’s hard to believe 2008 is over and 2009 has begun.

But here I am at the Dunkin’ Donuts on Coldwater Blvd in Fort Wayne writing my first blog post of the new year.  (By the way, as Dunkin’ Dounuts go, this one is swank.  Plus free wi-fi.  A great place for some blogging on the run.)

I find myself marveling this morning.  I’ve been out in public on the major “days after” this year.  The morning after Thanksgiving was a madhouse.  The morning after Christmas, likewise.  Maybe even worse.  But the morning after New Year’s Eve might as well be the morning after the Apocalypse.  It’s like I have the whole world to myself.  Well, me and the hosts of Fox & Friends on Dunkin’s big screen.  Apparently they didn’t make the rapture either.

This New Year’s morning, I’m thinking about resolutions.  I’ve never been much of a New Year’s resolutions kind of guy.  In fact, I can’t remember ever making any in the first 34 years of my life.  But this year I’ve spent a good amount of my Christmas break re-thinking my life and ministry, evaluating what is and trying to envision what can be.  And so it is that I’m ready to do some goal setting for 2009.

So, without further ado, here they are . . .

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