90. Thankful For The Last 10 Years

I came to Mokmin Church as a youth pastor in 2008 on the 1st week of June. So this June marks my 10th year in church ministry. I’m so grateful to have met the best mentor in Pastor Kwack and many wonderful people in the church. I vividly remember nervously preaching for the first time to a group of 10 youths whom I barely knew. But as nervous as I was (and of course sermon wasn’t that good!), I do remember feeling fulfilled and excited. It confirmed that I was on the right path. But the journey wasn’t without many challenges.

The challenge, in the beginning, was to simply get better. Prior to coming here, I had zero experience in leading a ministry (other than praise teams), so just getting better in preaching, teaching and building relationship was my primary challenge. Then, as we begin to have adults in our ministry, providing leadership and planning things ahead became challenging as well. Transitioning into house church ministry also was challenging because I did not have much experience nor skills on how to communicate God’s truth effectively and authentically to unchurched people.

However, I’m very grateful for these challenges. Normally people move jobs for more challenges (assuming there are no relationship issues). Though I’ve stayed in one church for 10 years, I feel like I’ve always had a healthy dose of challenges that kept me motivated and propelled me to be better at what I do. Sometimes it feels like a never-ending job but at the same time, I’m grateful for the tension of where we are now and where we could be in the future. For any leader, this is an exciting challenge because it allows us to dream.

Since our church is not focused on “keeping” people but “leading” people, there is a continuous challenge of helping people to take next steps in their journey of following Christ. This is the challenge that feels impossible to me many times but it humbles me, leads me to prayer, and forces me to trust in God.

I was told by many pastors that it is a blessing to be able to stay in one church for a long time. I think it is true. It generates natural trust and allows long-term thinking and decisions. I’m deeply grateful for people in The Seed for always supporting and encouraging incomplete pastor like me 🙂