Jimmy Dodd has a special ministry to hurting pastors. He writes of one of his encounters:
It was one of the more memorable conversations of my life. I was standing in the lobby of a Christian college with a dear friend who was suffering through one of the most painful experiences of his life. Approximately twenty years my senior, he was smart, wise, and weathered. He had been through many storms in life, and he had withstood them with patience and grace. And for some reason, tonight was the most difficult.
He had recently learned that one of his daughters had suddenly and unexpectedly run away with a much older man. He was grieving the loss of innocence, the loss of relationship, and the loss of control. Because I had long respected the man as well as his parenting abilities, and despite the agony of the moment, I gently asked the question I was longing to ask. “In light of what has transpired today, if you could do it all over again, what would you do differently in life?”
He bowed his head, silent for several minutes, before he looked at me with tear-filled eyes and said, “If I had to do it all over again, I would repent more … in front of my children.
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[Previous illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #5006]