Recent events have made me very much aware of how much I owe to men and women who have influenced my life over the years. The trigger was learning of the passing of Quentin Caswell. When I came to be his youth pastor, I had the degrees and academic training. I knew (or thought I did) how to run a youth program. But I had so much to learn. He taught me, mostly by example, how to listen, how to relate to people, how to love others. He taught me about the Church and its workings and sometimes failures. He gave me opportunity to preach. In short, he taught me how to be a pastor and also how to be a dad. He lifted both my kids to God and dedicated them to God in the company of the church. I owe so much to him!
And there’s Charles Higgins, my pastor when I was called to preach. I still have the book by Watchman Nee that he gave me and that shaped a whole new aspect of my life and ministry. I’ll never forget the Sunday evenings when he’d sit at the organ and play and sing, and we’d worship before church even started. During that same period, I had Harold and Lois Litsey, youth leaders at Honolulu First Church, who were such powerful influences in my life. They literally poured their lives into the youth of our church. I sometimes wonder if I’d have heard the call and become a pastor without them and HFC.
And my college profs. Men like Reed and Rothwell, Sawyer and Staples, who gave their lives to the Church and to the college . . . and to the men and women they taught.
And of course my Mom and Dad, but I’ll write of them later (and often, I suspect.)
Maybe there’s something in all of us that hopes to live on. It’s good to pause and think about whose shoulders we’re standing on . . . and who might be standing on ours.
