I just celebrated my 5th anniversary as pastor of Fairview Church. I am so thankful to be their pastor, and I am blessed by how well they love our family. It’s been, honestly, a very quick time here. I stopped to reflect over that time and some of the things I have learned. Being 5 years older, I realize even more the foolishness of youth that thinks it has it all figured out. I certainly have much more to learn, and this list is neither authoritative nor exhaustive, but I do pray it will be beneficial.

Last Sunday morning, at around 11:30, an entire family entered heaven together.

Jamison and Kathryne Pals and their small children were driving from Minneapolis to Colorado for final preparations as missionaries to Japan. They planned to leave in October. But in an interstate construction zone in western Nebraska, a semi truck rear-ended the family’s vehicle.

Tragically, the entire family died at the scene, including Jamison and Kathryne, both 29, and their three young children, 3-year-old Ezra, 23-month-old Violet, and 2-month-old Calvin.

I sat down with Dr. Ryken recently to ask him to tell me more about this period of time in his life, and how the president of a Christian college with a PhD in historical theology who seemingly has everything all together can begin to doubt God’s love for him:

It is a simple question. What do you hear from your church members that gives you the greatest encouragement? The responses from the pastors were amazingly similar. In fact, I was able to focus on ten specific areas. Here are summary statements of those areas.