Final Chapter

How do you know you are old? I heard someone say that you know you are old when your body starts making the same sounds as your coffee maker. Well, that never happened to me, but in October of 2021 I turned 75 and I realized that I might be old. As I looked at myself in the mirror, I saw that my body was losing its battle with gravity. I was losing hair where I used to have plenty, and I was growing hair where there hadn’t been very much before. Who knew that an old man’s ears and nose could sprout so much hair. But I also noticed my age in other ways. I could still do a lot of the things I had been doing but I now needed longer periods of time to recover. I could still preach, but I was tired for a bit longer. The “R” word began to make an appearance in my thoughts – retirement. Should I retire and if so when.

I had taken a class from Richard Johnson on retirement and one of the things he said was that we needed to retire to something not just from something. Retiring to go fishing or playing golf would soon become rather old. I had to have something meaningful to do, but it had to be without the pressure of having to do it. When Iona retired, she said that the best part for her was that the must was gone. She still volunteers every week at Village Green, but if one Wednesday she didn’t feel like she had the energy, she could just take the day off and stay home. I didn’t like the picture of what I could become if I wasn’t retiring to something. I told Iona that I could end up sitting on my front step, yelling at kids for walking on my sidewalk. Not a pretty picture. I had turned 75 and in September I had been in vocational ministry for 39 years. I described this journey by saying that I had been a “professional” Christian for almost 40 years, that is that I had been paid to be good, now I was going to be good for nothing. I still had my government job. Every month I receive money from the federal government and what did I have to do to earn that money – I just had to keep on breathing.

After a lot of prayer, we decided that I would retire from my position as Pastor to Seniors at Cornerstone effective December 31, 2021. How do you retire? I’d never done that before. I wrote a letter of resignation and asked if I could read my letter at the next board meeting. I knew each of the board members and had been praying for them regularly. After I read my letter, I gave each of the board members a gift from my library. I had specific reasons for each of the gifts. The next day, at our regular staff meeting I announced my retirement to them as well.

I had been on staff for eight and a half years and had become very close to each of them. I felt especially close to the women on staff as they had become daughters to me. I knew there would be major changes in our relationship but even though our status as colleagues was going to end, my relationship as their extra dad wouldn’t. There was a lot of hugging and crying as I gave each of them gifts from my library as well. Now I had to make the announcement to the congregation. No one was surprised by our decision, but there was some pain in formalizing the decision.

On my last Sunday as a pastor, the board organized a sort of farewell. People were invited to write notes to me, and I was given all these notes. Because I referred to the Tim Hortons in front of the Lawson Heights Mall as my office, I was given a number of Tims gift cards so I could continue meeting with people there. I asked for and was given permission to preach one last time on January 2, 2022. I had kept most of the sermons I had preached, and I searched for and found the first message I preached at the Fort Saskatchewan Church of the Nazarene on September 19, 1982. It was based on 1 Corinthians 12, and it was about the gifts of the Holy Spirit. I entitled it “Unity in Diversity”. I read it and I discovered that my understanding of the gifts of the Holy Spirit hadn’t changed a great deal in my 39+ years of ministry. At the end of the message, I quoted a line from Robert Munsch that I changed just a bit. “I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always; as long as I’m living my people you’ll be.” I also told our people that we had decided that Cornerstone would remain our church – we weren’t going anywhere. Our roots were sinking deeply into the soil of this congregation. We also had decided that I wouldn’t take on any leadership responsibilities for a minimum of one year. After a year, we would decide what leadership, if any that I would take on.

We made the decision that we would go and spend the first month of our retirement in Mexico. We returned from Mexico, having found a church that we wanted to be part while living away from Canada. We ceased thinking of Mexico as being on vacation, rather it was just a place where we would live for part of the year.

We have enjoyed serving God through Cornerstone Church. After a year’s hiatus from leadership, I have accepted an appointment to the Spiritual Care Team. My first formal meeting as a member of the team will take place next Monday evening. I’m not sure what the next months and years will look like, but I am looking forward to them. I want to close this chapter with some thoughts from the apostle Paul who wrote to his young apprentice/son in the faith, Timothy. 2 Timothy 4:7-8 (NIV) “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day–and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.” One last word – Keep the Son in Your Eyes.