Embracing the Past

Oh, save your people and bless your heritage! 

Be their shepherd and carry them forever. (Psa 28:9 ESV)

 Harry Reeder, in his book Embers to a Flame says that the paradigm for church revitalization comes from Revelation 2:5. Jesus says, in his letter to the Ephesian church that they had lost their first love, and he tells them that they must, "Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first." I think Reeder is right. This is the pattern that any church that is to be revitalized must follow. We must remember the past--not in a nostalgic way of trying to get back to the glory days, but celebrating God's faithfulness in the past. We must repent of things we've done wrong. If there are ways that a church has wronged past members, or if there are current practices that are unbiblical, the church must repent of those things and take steps to make amends to those who have been wronged. We must restore the first things--that is, there needs to a return to making the glory of God and the gospel the consuming passion of the church.

The man in the picture above was Fred Edmund (Ed) Brown. He was the pastor of Woburn Baptist Church from September 1924 through 1925. It appears his pastorate was interrupted from January through March of 1926 because the records show another pastor during that three month period. He returned as pastor during March 1926 and stayed as pastor until August 1928. The same pastor who interrupted his tenure is the one who followed him from 1928 until 1935. The church tried to get him to return in 1935, but the records indicate that they could not afford it, and there were four more pastors between his leaving in 1928 and when he returned as their pastor in 1939 through 1940. During those years Woburn Baptist Church had services only twice a month. Ed Brown was my great-great-grandfather on my mother's mother's mother's side, and there are a few current members of the church who knew him. 

Why is this relevant? Am I writing this merely to point out a historical curiosity? No. I think this is relevant to my sense of calling as the pastor of Woburn Baptist Church. Reeder says that the first step in the revitalization paradigm is to remember the past. As I have been serving as the pastor of Woburn Baptist Church I have been encouraged in my sense of call because I believe I'm uniquely situated to embrace our past. I don't want to "toot my own horn" here. There's really nothing special about me, and there is no virtue is pastoring the same church that my great-great-grandfather pastored, but it has helped my sense of motivation and commitment to the church. I feel a sense of connection to the church that goes beyond myself. When I preach there, I'm building on the labor of a man I never met but whose influence affected me in inestimable ways. 

This fact helps me to embrace the past of Woburn Baptist Church. I am optimistic about our future because I can see the faithful hand of God preserving the church through the years. God has worked through many other men who have pastored Woburn Baptist Church, and Lord willing the church will out live me by generations as well. My time of calling to Woburn Baptist Church is a link in a chain that ultimately goes back to a movement that started on Pentecost Sunday 2000 years ago and which extends on to the return of Christ. My calling at Woburn Baptist Church is to be faithful with what God has given me to do right now. And for those reasons, I'm incredibly excited about being at Woburn Baptist Church at this time in her history, and look forward to what God will do in our future.