In ministry, one day is always different from the next. Sometimes, there are wonderful and rewarding experiences. Other times, there are difficult experiences.
I’ll never forget the day I was cursed at in church. Samuel L. Jackson style.
I was in my office working on the bulletin for the upcoming Sunday worship service. My office manager was not in so I was alone on the first floor of the church. I heard a commotion outside my office. I heard someone yelling at the top of their lungs. I couldn’t make out what they were saying. I stood up to get a better look through my window to the common area outside of our church offices. There I saw a women who started into a profanity laced speech:
“What the f**k is going on? Who’s in charge here? Someone has to help me with this sh*t”
Ignoring her cursing, I immediately greeted her, told her I was the pastor, and ask how I could be of assistance.
“How you going to fking going to solve my problem. You don’t fking understand!” She said. And directed her anger, misplaced as it was, at me. I was floored. I never met this woman and had no clue what was going on to produce such craziness.
with funeral homes and funeral directors but, one of the first funerals I ever did, as an ordained pastor, was memorable. A well known hometown gentleman died young, and his family contacted me and a retired minister on staff at my church to officiate the service. As the two of us are about to begin the funeral, a wife of a pallbearer came up to me and asked if it would be acceptable for her to sit with her husband during the service. I looked into the sanctuary and saw that all the pallbearers were to sitting on the front row, and I really thought nothing of it for her to sit with her husband (and the other pallbearers) during such an emotional time. Boy I was wrong.
