This Talk: Teach the Young Women
Titus 2:4-5
Teach Young Women (Sermon) Video
This Talk: Teach the Young Women
Titus 2:4-5
This Talk: Teach the Young Women
Titus 2:4-5
Bittersweet Farm Journal (Number 30)
January 2018
Last week was an unusual week in our neck of the woods. It was bizarre-cold here on Bittersweet Farm but inside we were safe, warm, cozy and secure. I would like to have accomplished more, but sometimes the Lord just slows the world down and that’s alright.
Projects Up-Coming
I will be working on some videos and podcast episodes. I am also on a number of books all at the same time:
- Red Jeep Journeys
- The Bittersweet Farm Story
- The Village Parson, Stories from 40 Years of Pastoral Ministry
- Between the Fires (52 Ways to Keep the Camp Fire Burning All Your Life).
- God Still Speaks Stories (A Collection of Stories of Unusual Providence).
Speaking this Weekend
I would appreciate your prayers for the Bethel Teens who head to Camp Barakel this weekend. A large group is heading up for a snow-camp. I will be speaking to teens at Camp Selah on Friday night and Saturday. I will be in the Bethel pulpit on the Lord’s Day, Lord willing.
The Home-going of Chuck Perlos
Last week Charles Perlos, who renovated Bittersweet Farm and graciously saved it for us until our home in the Downriver sold, went to be with the Lord. I visited the night before he died and the morning of the day of his death.
The night before he died I found out he had been sent to hospice-care. It was dark and bitter, bitter cold outside. I bundled up and made my way to the facility. I parked as close as I could and hurried against the brutal cold to his room. He was surrounded with loving family members.
When I came into the room he had been unresponsive all day. I took his hand and said; “Charles, it’s Ken Pierpont.”
He immediately opened his eyes and a smile crossed his face. His family slipped out so I could talk with him alone. I talked to him for a bit, read him some Scripture, prayed, and thanked him again for his friendship and his kindness to our family. I promised that I would never forget him and that I would always be grateful for what he did.
In the morning first thing I sat with he and his daughter Lindy for about an hour, read Scripture, prayed and thanked him again for his kindness to us.
Lindy said, “The day you first visited, after you left, Dad said; ‘That was not an accident. That was meant to be.'”
It was. God sent us mercifully down the road that autumn afternoon. God moved Charles to renovate the house and to save it for us and to wait until we were able to buy it. He held our $1,000.00 down payment check until closing. He saved the house for us based on a handshake. He kept his word to us.
When I left his side on the day he slipped into the presence of Jesus, I reached out and touched his shoulder and said; “Goodbye my friend. I will see you soon.”
On an earlier visit Charles gave us a large album of pictures of the renovation of our home. It’s an amazing photojournal of the extensive restoration. Lois, Hope, and I live in a home that was prepared for us by Charles Perlos. As I walked away I realized in my heart that when I next see Charles we will both be enjoying the home the Jesus prepared for us. And I will have stories to tell him about the place we call Bittersweet Farm.
Tuesday afternoon I will preach his funeral. I am only a month and a few days older than he. He was my friend and I will always thank God for him.
Ken Pierpont | Bittersweet Farm | Summit Township, Michigan | February 4, 2019
I will have much more to tell about Charles Perlos and the incredible providence, provision, and blessing of God in The Story of Bittersweet Farm. I let you know when you can get your copy.
A Good Church (Sermon) Audio
A Good Church (Titus 2:3) | Bethel Church, Jackson, Michigan
February 2, 2019 | Pastor Ken Pierpont
A Good Church (Sermon) Video
Bethel Church | Jackson, Michigan
Pastor Ken Pierpont
Larry Whiteford, The Singing Pastor
Our home was filled with music when I was a boy. My mother played the piano and sang continually. I was usually awakened with a bright song early in the morning and most nights my last waking memory as a little boy was of Christian music playing softly in the house.
My parents only had a few albums. Gloria Rowe. Helen Barth. We had all the albums of “The Singing Pastor” Larry Whiteford, founding pastor of Fulkerson Park Baptist Church in Niles, Michigan. Pastor Larry was my grandparents pastor. On Christmas evening for many years pastor and his wife Bonnie and their children would have a Christmas Concert. The church was full. (Only later did I realize that he and his family really had to give up anything like a normal Christmas for their family to present that concert).
When I was a boy I attended VBS at Fulkerson. Those were days of great increase and blessing at Fulkerson and the church became a model in my heart of a flourishing local church.
In 1981 I discovered that Larry Whiteford was looking for an assistant, a youth pastor. I called him and offered my services. Within a few month Lois and I and our little Kyle Pierpont moved to Niles and it was my privilege to serve on the pastoral staff at Fulkerson.
As I look back on it now it still stirs my heart with thankfulness to God that He would allow me the honor to work so closely with a childhood hero.
Pastor Whiteford and Bonnie were very, very good to Lois and I. We were very young. I had much maturing to do. I made mistakes and had much to learn. Pastor and Bonnie believed in us and they were very patient with us. If I had not been treated with understanding and patience by Pastor and Bonnie, that might have been my last place of service, but because of their love for us and their kindness to us we have been able to continue in ministry for now 40 years.
Pastor Whiteford had a rich, beautiful Irish Tenor voice. He was known as The Singing Pastor. Before every message, every week he would sing.
One day he took me to his study and played records by a singer named Ed Lymon, also an Irish Tenor with a beautiful voice and interpretive style. I remember thinking that, though Ed had a beautiful voice, Pastor Whiteford’s voice was even richer.
On occasion Pastor would welcome me to sing with him, big Hale and Wilder or Dick Anthony and Bill Pierce arrangements. A favorite was “Guide Me Oh Thou Great Jehovah.” I would sing baritone and he would, of course sing tenor… we would just thunder together. It was a great honor for me.
Bonnie would play. She had an incredible keyboard style as a soloist and an accompanist. He was at his very best when she played for him.
Pastor trusted me frequently with the Fulkerson pulpit. Many would not have given o many opportunities to a man so young with the formal training I had at the time. He would have me preach the full month of January when he was working with Clyde Narramore in Florida. He once had an extended absence because of an injury playing soccer with his children. I preached every week from January to Easter.
Pastor was very generous with us as a young couple. One Christmas I had presided over an orange sale for Christian schools. There were many boxes of navel oranges left. One weekday before Christmas I asked him what he was planning to do with the oranges that were left over. He said; “Brother Pierpont, do you think you could sell them?”
He gave me the day off and I loaded them in a pickup truck, went home to get my young family and drove around peddling those cases of oranges until they were all gone. There were 60 cases. I gathered over 600.00 that day. I was proud of my work and I was eager to call Pastor Whiteford and tell him of my success for the cause. Standing there at the phone booth I remember his response:
“Well, good job, brother Ken. Merry Christmas. You can keep that money for your family.”
After a few years of service at Fulkerson God led me on to another work. We parted with the greatest love and highest regard for each other. A few years later Pastor Whiteford decided that he would resign the church and begin a full-time ministry of singing. It was about March of 1987. He called me and said; “Brother Pierpont, I am going to resign and I would like you to be the next pastor at Fulkerson.”
He wanted me to follow him in the church that he had founded and poured his life into. I was deeply honored but I had just that day accepted a call to a church in Ohio. We would spend the next ten year sof our ministry in Knox County, Ohio, but the honor of that phone call still warms my heart.
I loved Larry and Bonnie Whiteford and their family. We spoke well of me. He was patient with me. He was understanding with my family. I learned a great deal of good from him.
A couple days ago he slipped quietly into the presence of the Lord. He is with his wife Bonnie and their daughter Judy and many, many others that Larry and Bonnie led or influenced toward Christ.
Working with Pastor Larry and Bonnie was one of the greatest honors of my life.
Ken Pierpont | Bittersweet Farm | Summit Township, Michigan | February 2, 2019
Bittersweet Farm Journal (Number 29) When “Love” Isn’t Loving.
Here I will keep my most cherished books.
Friday night and Saturday I completed a project that has been on my heart for a year. I assembled bookcases to house my most treasured books from my favorite authors on the stairwell landing on the second floor of the little farmhouse on Bittersweet. Just outside the door to the room where I write I can now have a small library of about 500-600 books. That should be just right for long, cold, quiet winter nights.
Snow fell overnight. A light powdery blanket, about four or five inches of it. It was a beautiful drive to church this morning. The trees arching over the road were outlined in bright white snow. That always has the effect of stimulating worship in me.
It’s now Sunday afternoon as I write. It’s cold–very cold but the days and getting longer and the sun is lingering longer over the woods south of the house. I finished plowing and I’m savoring the warmth and quiet of the house. Actually at the moment I’m enjoying the rare treat of sunlight falling right on my writing desk this afternoon. Hey, I’d love to hang out more, but I need to go fill the bird feeders before dark.
When “Love” is Unloving
I have a friend who is very dear to me. For a number of years he was involved in a practice which the Bible specifically says; “God will judge…” Those who practice this sin, the Scripture says; “The Lord is the avenger of all such…” To persist in this sin, the Scriptures say; “…and such will not inherit the kingdom of God…”
In frequent conversations with my friend I would show him love and personal interest. We would meet and we would talk about things that mattered to us, things we had in common. There was never a time that I would meet with him that I would not gently remind him what God had to say about what would happen if he continued in this sin. I was gentle and kind. I didn’t badger him, but I warned him. I taught him the truth.
Because I loved him, I was faithful to warn him. If I did not tell him what God said, it would not be love—it might be sentimental feeling, but it would not be genuine love.
I once heard Jay Kessler, the head of Youth for Christ say, “Love will never participate in another’s folly.” In other words it is not really love if we endorse things that God forbids.
If I know the bridge is out and I smile and wave and blow you kisses, I am not showing love to you. A failure to warn you of the danger ahead would not be love, it would be immorality worst kind.
This does not mean that every time I spend time with someone who is far from God I need to rebuke them or badger them. This does not mean that I need to shun them. Jesus didn’t do that. Jesus looked beyond the surface matters and showed love and warmth while he asked questions that probed down into the secrets of their hearts. And doing so He often set them free from their sin and the judgment that was sure to follow. (Read John 4)
Last week pastor Leo, former pastor at Bethel, preached while I was at Camp Barakel. He said it this way; “Sometimes it isn’t kind to be nice. Sometimes being nice is unkind.” Sometimes being nice is not being loving. Sometimes to love someone you need to warn them, disagree with them, even sometimes rebuke them.
Paul told Titus that sometimes he would need to rebuke the people sharply. (Titus 1:13) Sometimes he would need to rebuke with all authority and let no-one disregard him. (Titus 1:15) This might not be seen as loving, but sometime loves requires hard things.
Turn At My Reproof
Years ago I had a difficult conversation with a young man about this very thing. I was careful, but I tried to be clear and warn him that the way he had chosen to live was not pleasing to God and it would not end well for him. He listened. We talked for hours over an open Bible. He went on to live a life pleasing to God. He married and raised a beautiful Christian family. He was a leader in his church and business community. He was loved and respected.
He died unexpectedly at the age of 60. I preached his funeral. There were over a thousand people there who loved him and respected him, people whose lives were touched by him and deeply enriched.
The book of Proverbs says “If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you; I will make my words known to you.” (Proverbs 1:23, ESV)
This young man listened humbly to correction, turned to the Lord, God poured out his Spirit and his blessing on him. Everyone who knew him could see it.
Don’t say you really love someone if you will not warn them of danger. That is not love, it’s something else.
Ken Pierpont | Bittersweet Farm | Summit Township—Michigan | January 27, 2109
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