by the  Rev. Michael Scudder, Admission Counselor

When asked to write the lead article for this issue of Pilgrimage I was reminded that this is a theological publication and not a church newsletter. Yes, those do have their purpose and they serve them well, but after 5 1/2 years of parish ministry, it may take a while for this author to change his style of writing.

It is exactly parish ministry that I wish to address. Also, the fact that each and every parish pastor is, whether he wants to admit to it or not, a theologian. You may ask, "What's the difference?" And this author's response would be, "You tell me!" There is no difference. A pastor by nature IS a theologian. He is the one who, along with being the shepherd of the flock over which God has made him overseer, is also the professor-in-residence to the students of God's Holy Word in that place.

Yet, some pastors seem to insist that they are pastors, not theologians. There are things in life that cannot be separated. Just as you cannot separate justification and sanctification, neither can pastor and theologian be separated. And the need for pastors, those aspiring to the Holy Office, and the laity to understand this has never been greater. It really hit home with this author when he read the opening paragraphs of Dr. Gene Edward Veith, Jr.'s new book, The Spirituality of the Cross. Dr. Veith writes in the introduction: "Churches would seem to be custodians of spiritual reality, but they often do not seem particularly spiritual. They often seem mundane, too. The whole round of preachers, sitting in the pew, going to fellowship dinners can seem so ordinary. One would think that spirituality would be rather more spectacular.

"At least that has been my experience. At different times in my life I have embraced liberal theology, accepting whatever is progressive and crusading for social justice, and I have been a raving, miracle-expecting fundamentalist. My liberalism proved spiritually vacuous, while my fundamentalism proved shallow. I have sat zazen, until I found the most that Buddhism promises, namely, emptiness. Mysticism and activism were both bitter disappointments.

"What I needed was a spiritual framework big enough to embrace the whole range of human existence, a realistic spirituality. I needed a spirituality that is not a negation of the physical world or ordinary life, but one that transfigures them."

That is what the office of the Holy Ministry is all about: standing in the stead of and by the command of Jesus Christ, dispensing His gifts of Word and Sacrament; not to negate the physical or ordinary life, but to transfigure them. The oral and written Word, the waters of Holy Baptism, the words of Holy Absolution and the body and blood of Christ that come to us in, with and under the bread and wine of the Sacrament of the Altar- these are the "spiritual framework that is big enough to embrace the whole range of human existence."

What a joy it is to stand before God's people every Sunday and present to them these gifts of God. What a joy it is to bring this transfiguring Gospel to the 80-year-old man in the nursing home, who has lost his eyesight but still finds joy in being able to pray the liturgy from memory (including confessing the Creed). What a joy it is to sit by the hospital bed of a little 7-year-old girl, about to undergo the second open-heart surgery of her short life, pray Psalm 121 with her and have her say, "It's going to be all right, pastor! God is watching over me." What a joy it is to sit at the bedside of a young father, dying of cancer, to commend him into the Lord's arms, and watch as with his last ounce of strength, he makes the sign of the cross, thus leaving this life as he began, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit!

This is what the pastor-theologian does. He brings this to the people over whom God has placed him as overseer. Not only in the home, nursing home or hospital, but also in Divine Service, Bible class confirmation class, and every opportunity he is afforded to "do" catechesis.

When asked why he left all this behind to take a job "out of the pulpit," (if he found such joy and excitement in it) this author simply replied, "You tell me!" He simply wanted to encourage young men (and old) to find the same joy that he had in tending the flock that God had placed in his charge.

+ Soli Deo Gloria +

From Volume 3, Issue 5, Winter 1999