Sky Bridge June 29, 2007
This morning I wanted a special place to spend time with the Lord. I took a drive and a couple hikes in the Daniel Boone National Forest. I hiked to Princess Arch and Chimney Top Rock, then I drove to the Sky Bridge Area. In the first two places the dear flies were bad. In the third place there were only a few. I saw bats over Sky Bridge, maybe that’s why. I heard some cicadas that reminded me of home. I listened to a whippoorwill, a wood thrush and an oriole. Across the valley I could see gray smoke ascending from a camp fire it mixed with the morning fog and left a fragrance in the forest. When I checked the odometer on the Jeep I realized that all three hikes were within eleven miles of Campton in the Mountains.
(photo by Jeff Schaefer)
A Man Called Peter; A Romance Worth Reading June 28, 2007
I am among many, many thousands who love Catherine Marshall’s story of the life of Peter Marshall; A Man Called Peter. In case there are some of you who are not yet among them I would like to tell you some of the reasons I love this book.
Romance First, everyone loves a romance and A Man Called Peter is a beautifully-written romance story between Peter and Catherine Marshall, a Scottish immigrant and a pastor’s daughter from the mountains of Tennessee. It’s not the kind of contrived, one-dimensional romance that is the stuff of popular fiction, but a real romance described in the setting of life.
The Romance of Ministry A Man Called Peter is an inspiring story of the romance of Christian ministry. It is about the pastorate and preaching and being a pastor’s wife. It is a healthy look at what it should look like to shepherd a congregation. It is an honest but positive telling of the trials and triumphs of the pastorate.
The Romance of Living Third, Catherine Marshall is a very gifted writer and a good storyteller and the story of Peter Marshall is a good story. Catherine Marshall had a beautiful way of looking at life and a moving way of describing living and dying.
The Divine Romance Finally, the story–front to back–is a story of the providence and love of God in the life of one Scottish boy who overcame the loss of his father when he was young, his unrequited longing to go to sea, and the hardship of poverty, to become one of the most popular pastors in America and the Chaplain of the United States Senate.
It has one of the most moving endings of any book I have ever read. It is one of the books I read and re-read. I know it has influenced how I look at life and ministry. It is a rich, romance in the highest sense of the word. I like the movie but I love the book. I predict that if you read it you will read other books by Catherine Marshall.
While you are waiting for your copy of A Man Called Peter to come you can read this.
Dairy Queen Diaries
I am drinking coffee among the pleasant locals at the Dairy Queen in Campton in the Mountains, Kentucky. It’s real name is Campton, but I like to call it Campton in the Mountains.
I am preparing my heart to spend the week in Sacramento with the ATI families of the West. I will be speaking on Thursday on the Powerful Prayer of Moses. Good things always happen when you pray the prayer of Moses. I think good will come from it.
For the rest of today there is an amazing sale going on at www.desiringgod.org. WOW.
We found a perfect cabin in a place called Gladie in the Daniel Boone National Forest. Lois took the picture or she would have been in it.
Ugly Houses
Some Amish friends found the house for us. They made hay on the place.
We needed somewhere to stay for a few weeks.
It was an ugly house in a beautiful place, though it had once been pleasant.
The countryside that surrounded it was as beautiful and the house was Spartan.
A silver band of river wound through the valley far below.
Above the house there was a dark green wood of hardwood and pine.
Valleys plunged away in front of the house and behind.
Beside it a road ran along the ridge.
It was a pretty place to place a house.
It was green asbestos-shingled and the timbers were broken beneath the floor.
The floor of the bedroom was wavy as the sea in high wind.
A friend vented the hot-water heater so we would not die in our sleep.
There was a cistern over the hill and the furnace was fueled by natural gas drawn from a well on the property.
For some reason the water and the heat never seemed to work together.
It was free.
It was warm.
It was shelter.
It was private.
It was Christmas.
The children sawed the top out of the pine and propped it in the corner to celebrate—they were hardy souls—the children.
We nearly burned down the barn when the fire of Christmas wrapping got out of hand. We went away and came back to be greeted by a fleet of fire trucks and a blackened valley falling away behind the house. It was sobering. By the hand of God the wind shifted the fire away from the barn.
The ugly Green House on the beautiful ridge near Walhounding.
We lived there for a few weeks, visiting elsewhere as often as possible
We were all sick the entire time we stayed there.
It was as close to homeless as I ever hope to come.
After the first of the year we found a clean, cozy, temporary apartment and camped out there until the house we leased was available a few miles from the church where we lived for the rest of our ministry in Knox County.
Sometimes beautiful things happen in ugly houses.
Sometimes ugly things happen in beautiful houses.
Jesus, You are my life. You created our Home, thank you for the beautiful house you are allowing us to occupy. Help us make beautiful things happen there.
Ken Pierpont
Daily Queen
Campton in the Mountains of Eastern Kentucky
June 28, 2007
Kyle Kenneth Pierpont June 27, 2007
If I have to explain this post, you would never understand. This is the first of our many grandchildren. Can you see the leadership in his eyes. He is destined to lead many others to honor the One who is Worthy! You wait and see!
I Liked This
Mark Batterson shared his life manifesto on his blog recently:
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Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death. Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention. Keep asking questions. Keep making mistakes. Keep seeking God. Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution. Stop repeating the past and start creating the future. Stop playing it safe and start taking risks. Expand your horizons. Accumulate experiences. Enjoy the journey. Find every excuse you can to celebrate everything you can. Live like today is the first day and last day of your life. Don’t let what’s wrong with you keep you from worshipping what’s right with God. Burn sinful bridges. Blaze a new trail. Criticize by creating. Worry less about what people think and more about what God thinks. Don’t try to be who you’re not. Be yourself. Laugh at yourself. Quit holding out. Quit holding back. Quit running away.
An Easy Target June 25, 2007
Do you ever get the feeling that the enemy is using you for target practice?
Other than my parents who were dutiful, good, Christian folk, people didn’t want to spend time with me while I was growing up. I didn’t have many friends, and the people who paid attention to me did it in such a way that it made me wish they had ignored me. They beat me, mocked me, called me painful names, and said things to intentionally hurt me, things that I would rehearse in my mind in the last few minutes before I went to sleep at night or think about when my mind was unoccupied like when I was mowing the lawn or delivering papers. I mowed lawns and deliver papers a lot. My parents wanted me to learn to work hard and earn money, and I didn’t have any friends with whom to fritter away time or loiter.
In the last few years I have been invited to one particular activity fairly regularly. I’ve been invited regularly to play paintball. The dialog usually goes something like this.
“Hey we would love for you to play paintball with us.”
“Oh, thanks for the invitation but I don’t know how to do that.”
“That’s no problem. It’s easy to learn. We’ll be glad to teach you.”
“Thanks, but I don’t own any equipment.”
“That’s OK. We have some old stuff you could use.”
They just seem so eager. Too eager. It makes me a little uncomfortable.
These are people who have invested hundreds of dollars and obscene amounts of time in sophisticated equipment for this sport. I have never done this but I have thought about it a lot. I would really like to believe that the years since my cruel Jr. High experiences have made me a much more likable guy. I’d like to believe people just love spending time with me now. I would like to believe that I have become socially attractive over the passing years, but I don’t think so.
Here is my theory: I am a pastor so people think I am fairly harmless. They know I do not own or know how to operate paintball equipment. I am well into middle-age now and I’m not as quick on my feet as I used to be. I have a wider-than-average body. I never have nor will I ever own any camouflage clothing. These factors make me a very attractive paintball date. On top of this I have an above-average ability to irritate people, thus the regular invitations to play paintball with people who are only casual acquaintances.
I just don’t see why anyone would think I would enjoy being a human target for their sadistic pleasure. It’s not just a little frightening to know that there are lots of people like this out there on the loose. “Hey, it’s my birthday. Why don’t you bring your in-experienced, old, irritating, slow-moving, wide-as-a-barn carcass over for the afternoon so me and my homicidal friends can chase you around the backyard and shoot you repeatedly? It only leaves a small welt that will go away within two or three days. I have a feeling the fun would be a little one-sided. I have a nagging suspicion that their wide smiles are masking a complex and disturbing cocktail of psychological disorders.
Maybe I’m just a little paranoid but don’t bother to invite me to play paintball with you and your friends. It just doesn’t sound like it would be much fun—for me. It is at times like this that I take comfort in the knowledge of God’s unconditional love and constant protection for me—even when the enemy wants to use me for target practice.
Ken Pierpont
Northwoods Conference Center
Watersmeet, Michigan
June 24, 2007
Journey to the Heart Site June 14, 2007
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Fatherless Children and Childless Fathers June 11, 2007
Playing baseball with your sons on an early spring evening is one of the great underrated pleasures of life. One such evening I was standing on the margin of the field watching my sons warm up for a game and making friendly conversation with one of the other dads. I asked him the usual polite questions about his work and his family.
He told me he had two sons.
“Are they out there,” I said, nodding toward the field. “O, no. They are grown. I’m a “Big Brother. I’m here watching my little brother.”
“Do your sons live nearby?” I asked.
“No they are both in the Chicago area.”
“Really. What kind of work do they do?”
There was a long, uncomfortable pause and then he said, “O, really I don’t know. I haven’t seen them for years. I was divorced from their mother years ago. She’s turned them against me. They really aren’t interested in keeping in touch. I’m not sure what they do.”
We stood silently looking out on the field choking back the sadness of it. In a distant city he has sons and perhaps grandsons and granddaughters. They don’t know him and he doesn’t know them, and on a perfect spring evening he doesn’t even know what they are doing. They don’t know what he is doing. He volunteers to be a significant other in the life of a child who has been sucked into the vortex of fatherless America.
How sweet to be alive when the world is alive with spring. How sweet to watch the sun go down on the baseball field, munching a hot dog, smelling the popcorn, knowing that in a few hours you will tuck your sons into bed in the next room. You will lie in bed with your wife, her face on your chest going to sleep with the beat of your heart.
And in the darkness you listen to her breathe and you breathe a prayer of thanks that comes from deep within your soul for all the family still gathered under one roof.
Ken Pierpont
Brook Place
Hinsdale, Illinois
June 11, 2007
A Shocking Contrast June 7, 2007
We were in Nashville last week for our homeschool conference. Every year the conference is like a family revival for us. It is a holy time. Families converge from all around the country for a week of inspiration and encouragement. The week is filled with anointed preaching, rich fellowship, spirited singing, genuine testimonies, and prayer. When the conference is over we are deeply stirred to live for God as a family and to resist the downward pull of the world around us. Jesus is all the focus of every message, every song and every conversation.
On Friday night the conference ends with all the young people singing in a huge choir. After the conference we drove to downtown Nashville to see the sights and get something to eat. That was a mistake. In one short loop of the downtown area we were shocked with the brazen display of immorality, perversions, lewd dress, and drunkenness. Nashville is famous for its music and there was a lot of music but it was not wholesome music about God, family and love of country. It was loud, pounding, blaring, godless, music. The contrast was shocking and sad.
The difference was especially obvious in the faces of the people. Friday night in downtown Nashville the streets were crowded with pleasure seekers at leisure. You would think some of them would look happy, but I don’t remember seeing a single joyful face. There was revelry and foolishness, but not the kind of radiant joy we had experienced all week. Through the week we had gotten used to bright eyes and joyful smiles. All week long we had been spending our time with joyful, purposeful people talking and singing about things that matter. They were praying with each other, sharing with each other, and exhorting one another to live for God, to love God and to build strong families.
This passage from 2 Peter came to my mind: “… His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. (2 Peter 1:3-4 NKJV)
On the way home one of my daughters pointed out the contrast to us. Two strong impressions remain in my heart this morning as I reflect on the contrast. One is thanksgiving for the grace of God which enlightened us to our need of Jesus and tugged our hearts to salvation. The other is a desire to see other people with the light of God on their eyes and a smile on their face. That kind of joy can spring from the life of God within them. By the grace of God we share in the Divine nature and we have escaped the corruptions of the world. Beginning with our own family we are determined to help other do the same. That is why we sing and preach and tell stories and send these little essays every week.
Ken Pierpont
Brook Place
Hinsdale, Illinois
June 7, 2007
Ken's new book - Sunset On Summer, now available for order, $13.95 each.