I am a pastor of college students on a university campus.

It’s what God has called me to be — and if you’re reading this — then you have likely experienced a similar call.

And as pastors within this specific context, we often see ourselves as participants in the stories of our students — maybe even shapers of their stories — in some small way.

But if you’re anything like me it can be all too easy, at times, to overlook the ways in which students (and the campus community at large) play a role in the unfolding of our own story.

It’s not just a job that we have been called to, but a place — with people who have stories, just like we do. And as we walk among the members of this unique community, we are formed and developed as our stories come together — especially when we acknowledge all of the stories within God’s Great Story.

It’s not always fun, or easy, or pretty — specially given the unique role we play as pastors within this community.

Consider this passage from Eugene Peterson’s The Pastor:

“… when we get serious about the Christian life, we eventually end up in a place and among people decidedly uncongenial to what we expected… That place and people is often called a church…

I was now well on my way to learning that congregation is a place of stories. The stories of Jesus, to be sure. But also the stories of men and women… It is never just my story; it is a community of stories. I learn my story in company with others. Each story affects and is affected by each of the others. Many of these others are distressed, in debt and discontent — or out of tune, angry , rude, or asleep. This complicates things enormously, but there’s no getting around it. We’re a congregation. We’re looking for meaning to our lives. We catch a thread of the plot and begin to follow it, receiving the good news that God is gracious, receiving the sacraments of God’s actions in our actual lives. And then we bump up against someone else’s story that we don’t even recognize as a story and are thrown off balance. Distracted, we stumble.

This is my workplace.

And every once in a while a shaft of blazing beauty seems to break out of nowhere and illuminates these companies. I see what my sin-dulled eyes had missed: Word of God-shaped, Holy Spirit-created lives of sacrificial humility, incredible courage, heroic virtue, holy praise, joyful suffering, constant prayer, persevering obedience… And sometimes I don’t…”

A story among stories.

Our story is unique, yes… but so is everyone else’s.

So I wonder:

• How do you understand your story as one that is shaped by the campus community you serve?
• How does Peterson’s understanding of story shape your view of the students you serve?
• What strikes you most about this passage from The Pastor?

Take a moment to share your thoughts in the comment section below.

And for more posts reflecting on Peterson’s The Pastor, visit:

• Every Step An Arrival
• Helping Students to Identify a Call to Pastor
• Pastoring in North America
• Local and Personally Present