10 Pastoral Care Teachers in honor of Herb Hoff's Birthday: Father Brown

The last two weeks I had the honor of teaching a short course on Pastoral Care for the School of Ministry, Leadership track at Peñasquitos Lutheran in San Diego, CA. I have had the blessing of receiving compassionate pastoral care and working alongside and learning from great caregivers.

No one has shaped my understanding of pastoral care more than my dad. I have watched Herb Hoff care for the congregations under his charge. He is a good shepherd. Not THE Good Shepherd, but a good shepherd. If I could sum up his pastor care philosophy it would be, “Show up.” He is there. So often the pastor asks, “Should I go.” Herb always does. And Herb listens like God listens, and says what God says: the Gospel!

So in honor of 65 years of Herb Hoff (his birthday is January 26), over the next few days, I want to mention the 10 teachers who have shaped my practice of pastoral care. Happy birthday dad, and thanks for modeling pastoral care so well for so long.

10 Teachers:

1st Teacher: Father Brown (G.K. Chesterton)

Father Brown is teaching me how to be a Curate. BBC has an updated version of the Father Brown Mysteries, and I was leary about how they would “update” this faithful shepherd. I have not been disappointed. Father Brown is a good priest and a great detective. He gets to the bottom of many crimes (always before Inspector Valentine), but his goal seems to be to detect movements of the Holy Spirit in the souls of the people he serves. He is a detective of souls. He takes his time in counsel, unhurried to offer the easy answer. He takes his time in the confessional booth, unhurried to offer easy absolution. He can live with people in their mess. God is at work in their suffering.

Paul to the Ephesians (3.13) and Colossians (1.24) and Romans (5.1-5), shows in his doctrine and deeds that suffering could have a warning sign that reads, “Excuse the mess, God at work.”

"Among other things pastoral work is a decision to deal, on the most personal and intimate terms, with suffering. It does not try to find ways to minimize suffering or ways to avoid it. It is not particularly interested in finding explanations for it. It is not a search after the cure for suffering. Pastoral work engages suffering. It is a conscious, deliberate plunge into the experience of suffering...The biblical revelation neither explains nor eliminates suffering. It shows, rather, God entering into the life of suffering humanity, accepting and sharing suffering. (Isaiah 53.4), (Eugene Peterson, Five Smooth Stones, Eerdmans, 1980, Chapter 3).

Kenneth C. Haugk, founder of Stephen Ministry differentiates between cure-giving (God's work) and care-giving (our work). "When you as caregiver realize that God is Curegiver, you are freed from worry and false-expectations" (Kenneth Haugk, Christian Caregiving: a way of life, Augsburg, 1984, page 21).

"We are not the healers, we are not the reconcilers, we are not the givers of life. We are sinful, broken, vulnerable people who need as much care as anyone we care for. The mystery of ministry is that we have been chosen to make our own limited and very conditional love the gateway for the unlimited and unconditional love of God" (Henri Nouwen, In the Name of Jesus, Crossroad, 1989, pages 61-62).

What happens when we look for results or success from yourself?

What happens when we look for results or success from the care-receiver?

What happens when we look for results or success from God?

When we have a secure vision of our limitations and God's limitless love, we are free to be with people in their suffering to bring care, and trust God to bring what only he can bring.