The Inside Scoop

Wed 20 Jun 2012 Filed in: My Life | Grief Notes
It wasn't what I was looking for; buried treasure is sometimes like that. I was digging through a mound of papers looking for one document that I needed when I came across the envelope. It contained a letter from Matt written to me from Poland fifteen years ago.

The letter began "Just for you - The Inside Scoop." It was both a letter from a youth pastor to his senior pastor and a letter from a son to his father. For four years I was blessed to be yoked to my son in pastoral ministry, a partnership that benefited both of us, and the congregation as well, more than any of us knew and one for which I will always be grateful. We shared with each other and with the Lord the joys and challenges of ministry, and Matt continued that sharing, this time by mail from the other side of the world where he was leading a youth missions team.

And so this afternoon I read again the letter I had first read fifteen years ago. Matt was discovering that the building they were constructing, while significant, was secondary because God was engaged in a major building project in the lives of his teens. I won't share the details since I don't have the permission of those now-grown teens, but a couple of excerpts will give you the flavor: "It has been an incredibly intense week for me. God has been busy and I am just trying to keep up with him..." And a bit later: "I'm just watching God do what he does - change lives."

"That's the inside scoop, Boss..." Today marked the second anniversary of the life-shattering phone call that brought Suzanne and me the news of Matt's death. Thanks, Matt, for showing up again in a fifteen year old letter and stimulating thankfulness by reminding me again that God is still full of gracious surprises.
Happy
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