Over the course of a few years, Nathan Millican and I worked on a book with several other friends. The book is aimed at pastors and releases in June. Below is an excerpt from the introduction I wrote to the book. Links to pre-order the book, if you’re inclined, are at the end of this post.

From the very beginning of the project, the working title of the book in your hands has been Before We Forget. Nathan and I came up with the idea several years ago while working together at a church in Indiana. We were young (and we still are), learning the ropes of leading a church, and making mistakes along the way. In God’s kindness, he was teaching us valuable lessons about life, theology, and pastoral ministry. Some lessons were harder to learn than others, but everything the Lord was teaching us was a gift of grace.

Today, we continue to learn. But we thought sharing how God was growing us in our walk with Jesus in days gone by was a worthwhile project to undertake. Because we are finite human beings, prone to forget, we wanted to put things on paper in an effort to remember. In addition to the lessons we are learning in terms of pastoral ministry, we invited several friends to share lessons they are learning as they serve in vocational ministry. Given the relative youthfulness of the friends we’ve invited to contribute, we thought it wise to invite seasoned pastors to offer their reflections on the things we are saying. Our hope is the book will serve younger and older pastors as they strive to serve faithfully for the good of Christ’s people and the glory of their God.

The premise of the book is simple. We too often and too quickly forget the lessons God is teaching us. At the very least, we forget the details. This whole book, then, is an exercise in remembrance. We want to remind ourselves of God’s work in our lives as he has conformed us into the image of Jesus and molded us into (hopefully) more faithful followers and more careful and helpful shepherds. As the authors in this book remember (and recount) what God has done for them and in them, perhaps it’ll encourage others as they run their race.

Table of Contents

*Read the rest of the Introduction (and the book!). It is available for pre-order here, here, and here.