From The Pastor’s Pen – By Brian Horrobin
It was Maya Angelou who once coined these powerful words: “People may forget what you said or what you did, but they will never forget how they made you feel.”
Back in the early 1990’s I was leading a youth group in Petrolia and had taken them on an outing to a cottage that had been rented out by some people in our church.
Well, I got the directions all wrong (this was in the days well before GPS) and I got our entire youth group lost.
We never made it to our destination and some of the youth even veered off from our travelling caravan and did, ahem, “other stuff” leaving me to explain to angry parents the next day.
I was an Associate Pastor of this particular church and the pastor was away.
One by one angry parents showed up at my office to give me a piece of their mind about my inexcusable leadership blunder.
Just about at my whit’s end, with a long morning of attempted damage control going badly, I could hear the footsteps of one more person climbing the long flight of stairs to the pastor’s upstairs office where I was sequestered.
It was another mom, and as she entered the office she instructed me to come out from behind my pastor’s big, mahogany desk where I was cowering.
As I did so she leaned forward and said, “Brian, you need this!” and with that she gave me a big ‘ol mother’s hug.
She proceeded to tell me something about how it would all work out and not to worry. Then she left. I cannot remember what happened at the next board meeting, or what response I got from our pastor when he returned from his vacation, but I do remember how I felt that day.
I went from the depths of despair to the heights of Mount Vernon.
I had failed, failed badly, and this mother still believed in me.
Is there someone in your life today who is going through something and needs someone to believe in them?
Think about this one good and hard.
Someone needs you this week.
Pray and ask God to lead you to them.
