Sometimes we get the idea that pastors don’t struggle with the same issues we do. We think of them as the ones who help meet our needs—not the ones who have needs. But this is far from true. I want to share the account of a pastor who is very dear to me and how God met her needs.
My sister, Ruth, sat at home alone on the couch one Sunday morning while some one else preached her message at the church where she and her husband were co-pastors. Two weeks earlier, a bad case of flu followed by anxiety attacks had left her so weak she’d needed to sit on a stool to preach. This week their elder chairperson had offered to preach her message because she felt unable to do it. She wondered why God hadn’t healed her so she could do what He’d called her to do.
At least when her husband and two children came home from church, she’d be able to hear secondhand how her message had gone. She glanced out the window just in time to see a motorcycle pull into their driveway and recognized the familiar figure of their friend, Paul, a member of their congregation. Paul had the gift of encouragement and she hurried to the door thinking, Oh good, Paul has come to cheer me up.
“Then I realized Paul was holding a small, white plastic cup of water. I recognized it at once. The theme of my message had been Come to the Water. The cups and water were to be provided so anyone who was thirsty for God could come and get a drink after the sermon.
“Paul greeted me and said, ‘All during Sunday School and Church, I couldn’t get you off my mind. We had a wonderful message about coming to the water, and afterward, a compelling invitation for those who needed a touch from God to come up for a drink. Almost everyone came to receive God’s touch through the symbolic cup of water.’
“Paul studied me with compassionate eyes. ‘Then I realized that the person who should have been there preaching that wonderful sermon, the one who needed God’s healing touch the most, wasn’t there. So I’ve brought you a cup of water so you, too, can receive God’s touch in your life.’
“With tears streaming down my cheeks, I took the cup of water and drank. I felt as though God’s love enveloped me as Paul wrapped his arms around me in a big bear hug. ‘No matter how long it takes for you to get well, the church will wait and stand by you because we love you and need you.’
“I knew then that God hadn’t forgotten me. In His wisdom, He’d known that, more than I’d needed to preach my sermon, I had needed to be a recipient of its message. In His mercy, He’d sent Paul as His messenger so that I, too, could Come to the Water.”
I hope we will be as sensitive as Paul to the needs of our pastors, to be the people who offer them symbolic cups of cold water when they need it most, remembering they are human, too.
Father, thank you for our pastors who serve so faithfully. Help us be more discerning of times when they need a touch from you through our willing hands. Amen.
