Nurture from Beyond

Recently I have done a fair amount of reading – and also a fair amount of walking. Yes, they go hand in hand, or perhaps more accurately hand in foot.  Here are some recent contributions to new thoughts along with the footsteps: Settler: Identity and Colonialism in 21^st Century Canada, by Adam Barker and Emma Lowman; Sojourners, a Christian social conscience magazine with an admirable critique of American history and American Christianity; and Canadian Mennonite, a periodical serving as news magazine of Mennonites in our modern post-christendom Canada; and also Ministry, a Seventh Day Adventist magazine, self-described as an international journal for pastors. All of these are good reading – definitely better than the political or self-centered populist distractions available these days digitally or otherwise.

Which of these have I found most satisfying? The last one.  The one about ministry published by none other than Seventh Day Adventists!  Why?  Perhaps it is because I do not know the stressors and strains of SDA polity, editorial policies, etc.  I do know, however, about this magazine’s full attention to Bible teaching (yes of the 2 Tim.3:16 type!) including an unabashed naming of those things that distract from solid Christian living and those things that enhance it.

At times it reads like a staid pious tabloid of the over-committed (so my cynical persona might say), but mostly it is the cup of cold water, the crutch, the guidance I need as a Christian (and not even as a SDA).  It feeds me, and ironically it’s the only professional magazine which has arrived in my mailbox 30 years without stumbling even including the 23 years when I was no longer a professional paid pastor. It just appeared in the mail.

Thank you to the S.D.A. who provided nurture to this Mennonite preacher burnt out from working among his own.