I was a bachelor-pastor for four years before marriage. Once my marital status changed, I knew two major shifts in my approach to ministry would also be forthcoming. The first thing to go was an eighty-hour work week I'd grown accustomed to as a single shepherd. Having an attractive reason to retreat from the study at the end of the day made that initial change fairly painless.

The second change did not come as easily. I had a blas‚ attitude toward missions. Our annual missions conference was a necessary, but flat, event on the church calendar. Missions seemed far removed from the immediacy of sermons, funerals, weddings, kids' clubs, and budgets. It was too "out there" to arrest my time or interest. That is, until I got married. You see, my wife is an MK.

My missionary-kid wife's zeal for world evangelization rubbed off on me. She helped me see that missions was much more than potluck dinners, mothball-scented displays, and boring slide shows. But the lasting change in my lackluster attitude ...