June 10, 2025 • 81 mins
Reverend Mark Hester is in his 9th year serving as the Pastor of Loudon Cumberland Presbyterian Church in the Presbytery of East Tennessee. He had a long career as a bi-vocational minister serving often as an Interim, Stated Supply and Pulpit Supply. Before his retirement from full-time secular work in 2021, he was a Registered Investment Advisor and Certified as a Financial Planner. In his 43 years in the financial world, he managed wealth for clients in 27 states and specialized in taking care of ministers and their families. Mark studied Communications at the University of Tennessee, Religion and Arts at Lambuth University (University of Memphis), Finance and Estate planning from Michigan State University and The American College and Theology from Southern Seminary and Memphis Theological Seminary. He is a Program of Alternate Studies graduate and beginning a final year in a Doctor of Ministry in Pastoral Therapy program from Memphis Theological Seminary. He is the Chair of his Presbytery’s Committee on the Ministry – Clergy Care and has served on various boards and agencies at all judicatory levels. He is a former member of the Board of Trustees at Bethel University. He has been an Instructor for Program of Alternate Studies and Memphis Theological Seminary in minister’s finance. Mark is at least a 4th generation Cumberland Presbyterian and a Cumberland Presbyterian “preacher’s kid”. He is a native Tennessean and he and his wife live happily ever after in Farragut, Tennessee.
Mark is working on a doctoral research project on clergy care for Cumberland Presbyterian ministers. The purpose is to better serve ministers involving self-care and continuing education. If you are Cumberland Presbyterian minister, click the link:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/7T3RTYF. The survey is point and click and takes approximately five minutes.
Music is provided by Pierce Murphy, Caldera Blue.
Source: https://www.freemusicarchive.org/music/Pierce_Murphy/through-the-olive-branches/caldera-blue
Comments: http://freemusicarchive.org/
Additional comments: modifications made to shorten and loop song for introduction and closing of podcast.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
T. J. (00:03):
You're listening to the Cumberland Road and I am your
host TJ Malinoski. The followingis a faith conversation with
Mark Hester. He has had a longbi vocational career as an
investment advisor, financialplanner, and a Cumberland
(00:26):
Presbyterian minister, oftenserving in the role as interim
and supply pastor. He iscurrently serving as the senior
minister at the LoudounCumberland Presbyterian Church,
and he's in his final year ofdoctoral studies and pastoral
therapy at Memphis TheologicalSeminary. His doctoral research
(00:51):
is on clergy care for CumberlandPresbyterian ministers involving
their self care and continuingeducation. If you are a
Cumberland Presbyterianminister, click the link in the
show notes and take the survey.I just took it. It takes about
five minutes, and it's justpoint and click. Easy, and
(01:15):
you're done, and it will helpministers now and in the future.
Here is my conversation withMark Hester.
Mark, you are in your final yearin a doctor of ministry and
(01:35):
pastoral therapy. If you don'tmind, what is pastoral therapy
and does it differ from pastoralcare?
Mark (01:47):
Well, you for that question. I believe it does
differ. I believe that everyonein ministry is participating in
pastoral care. And so for all ofmy parts of four or five
decades, I've been in pastoralcare because one of the things
(02:07):
that we do as ministers is wecare. We don't cure, but we
care.
And we look after our flock andour church family. And that's
all part of the caringstructure. The therapy structure
is more intentional that we'relooking at transgenerational
(02:33):
family structures, and we'relooking at order of children,
we're looking at the trianglesthat they have in their life and
it could be that we're trying tode triangle. But we're looking
for how to help somebody move orchange or get more tools to deal
(02:54):
with problems. One of the thingswe learn along the way is many
of the people who might hearthis will already know this, is
that a lot of the problems youcan't cure and you can't fix
everything.
And so it's an opportunity to domore than pastoral care. It's an
opportunity to listen and leadpeople to talk about the things
(03:18):
that maybe bothering them. I'llgive you one example and that
would be the couple that comesto talk about the child that's
creating so many problems andyou get the child in there with
the family and you discover thatthe problem is not the child.
(03:41):
The problem is the couple orsomebody's relationship with
their family. And the good newsis you're able to tell little
Johnny, there's nothing wrongwith you.
We're gonna help your mamathough or we're gonna help your
daddy though. And a lot of timesthat the healing mechanism can
(04:02):
just be jumpstarted by therapy.So in my opinion, the difference
in between pastoral care andpastoral therapy is a lot of
times in pastoral care you mighthave a set number of visits you
might be willing to do with apremarital counseling. And you
might say, I require all of thepeople I married to meet at
(04:25):
least three times. But some ofthose will be just quick hits.
They probably won't explore thefamily makeup. It'll just more
or less touch on somepersonalities. Whereas family
therapy or pastoral therapy willperhaps pick up on the fact that
(04:51):
somebody in the marriage hasbeen married before. And what
happened with that? When didthat happen?
And so it gives a much broaderministry that can help people
and the counseling can be anunlimited thing if the pastor
has time to take that on. So Ithink in my particular
(05:12):
circumstance, I don't intend tobe the pastoral therapist that
hangs a shingle on the cornerand everybody's welcome. I see
it more as a expansion of myministry as a pastor, long term
minister, to help more people ina more in-depth way.
T. J. (05:35):
Why would a person want to receive therapy or seek out
therapy, kind of in the churchinstitution setting? Because
therapy is available in in manydifferent venues and spaces. So
(05:56):
is there a distinction betweenpastoral therapy and then maybe
a therapy that you might get ina clinic or a hospital or a
private practice?
Mark (06:09):
Yes, I think there's a distinct difference in the fact
that if this person is part ofyour church family, you've had
the exposure as the minister tosee their family, to see them
interact with others. You mayknow a lot of history about
them, but the people who come tome or a pastoral therapist,
(06:34):
they're wanting this to be partof their faith journey. They're
wanting to make sense of theirthings that they're concerned
about as part of their faith, aspart of their Christian
(06:55):
heritage. And so I think thatthe minister is at a clear
advantage in the fact that he orshe may be able to have much
more knowledge about this personthat if you went to a private
therapy, it may take a long timejust to get to that point. And
(07:17):
so a lot of times in privatetherapy, for example, what you
share, what's drawn out and youshare, that's your snapshot as
the counselor's looking.
We have this unique placementwhere we see whether they are
(07:38):
active in church or not. We seeif they participate in a variety
of things. We see what some oftheir gifts are and talents, and
we see their family that mightnot ever go with them into a
private setting. So I think theclergy is in a very unique
situation to help people in amuch more personal basis right
off the bat.
T. J. (08:00):
There is that line between seeking therapy from a
professional where we only havea certain allotted amount of
time per week
Mark (08:11):
Mhmm.
T. J. (08:11):
And then be able to step away. And there's some freedom
in there, maybe even some safetythat I'm not gonna run into you,
or the odds of running into you,you know, at the grocery store
or in other settings, aballgame. But in a pastoral
therapy, it sounds like you asthe counselor, you as the
(08:31):
therapist, you you're part ofother realms and circles of my
life. That can be both good andbad.
Mark (08:42):
I agree with that. And so I think the pastoral therapist
has to have a clearunderstanding of what they're
willing to take on and also knowwhen to help somebody with a
referral to someone else. I'vehad that happen in multiple
(09:04):
settings. Of course, being twoyears into this three year
program, a lot of it isaffirmation and new knowledge
academically and from lecturesand whatnot. Things that I've
been practicing for a long time,but not as a doctoral type work.
(09:29):
And what people, academia peoplelike John Patton would say that
ministers should probably put athree to five visit cap on how
many times they would seesomebody in their church. And
the primary purpose for that, hewould say, is that we just don't
(09:53):
have time. We absolutely don'thave time. But then I think
there's also the person thatmight come to me and want to
talk to me about the spouse, butthey don't want the spouse to
come in and they're both membersof your church and then there's
(10:15):
an awkward thing. So what I sayto them in those circumstances,
if I'm not able to get to likethis one does, I've had this
actually happen where this onedoesn't want the other one to
know that they're in counselingor they want them to know it's
in counseling, but I'm notallowed to say what it's about.
And it's about the other person.And in those types of settings,
(10:39):
if I'm not able to get everybodytogether on the same page, then
I pray with them and I try togive them a few tools but I
actually find a referral andmake the phone call. I have even
driven people to the firstappointment with someone else
(11:01):
because it's appropriate thatthey get help, but I'm not the
guy. And maybe it's outside myexpertise, but there's also this
risk that you run, that youalienate people in your church.
And that's something you have towatch out for.
So to summarize it, yes, I agreeyou have to be careful, time
(11:22):
restraints you may have to limitit. And another thing I recently
have done at the suggestion ofprofessors and part of the
program is I've transformed mypastoral office, which was more
administrative for half theoffice to be safe sanctuary type
(11:44):
space. If you went to anycounseling office you'd probably
see a couch, two chairs andlamps and coffee table in a very
pleasant setting. I've done thatand transformed the office and
so now people come in and theymake themselves comfortable and
I have to watch the time. Soit's just like preaching, know,
(12:04):
I'm watching the clock if I runover, know, but I'm watching the
counseling time, not because offeasts, because I don't charge
fees to my church family.
I'm watching the clock because Iknow that one hour is like a
church service. It just gets tothe point where you're repeating
(12:25):
and it's not as effective. Andso I don't want somebody to sit
there for two hours when we werejust as effective in an hour and
fifteen minutes. But it it bothsettings, I'm watching the clock
a little bit.
T. J. (12:40):
So the boundaries are really important. Boundaries of
time, boundaries of your ownabilities and limitations.
Boundaries are extremelyimportant in pastoral therapy.
Mark (12:57):
Absolutely. Also in the church setting or any pastoral
setting, I always wanna makesure somebody else is in the
building and hopefully rightacross the hall. You want your
confidentiality, but you alsowant a safe space for the
(13:20):
counselor. And so that'ssomething that's very important.
One thing different in privatetherapy that's probably better
than pastoral therapy is theanonymity perhaps of people that
come to the office.
When it's a church person, thenpeople will know that someone
(13:43):
so's car is sitting outside thechurch door, right? And so there
needs to be an openness with noindication that people are there
to, could be there to do anykind of counseling. And for
(14:06):
people to view it in the churchas something helpful and to be
applauded that people arelooking for good wholeness and
good mental health as opposedto, I wonder what they're in
there for. Right? And so that'ssomething that is necessary to
(14:27):
cultivate.
T. J. (14:27):
Yeah. And I think it's human nature to think both.
Mhmm. Oh, I recognize the car.It's attached to person x.
I want them to be healthybecause I know who that person
is. I want them to heal and havegood relationships. And I wonder
(14:49):
what they're in the church for.I think we can do both. I think
we I think it's human nature todo both.
Mark (14:58):
But when you're seeing the pastor We could be talking about
visitation. I mean, we couldtalk about, you know, anything.
T. J. (15:04):
That's true.
Mark (15:05):
And so I don't put a sign up saying, you know, like Lucy
used to do on peanuts and saythe doctors in, you know, bring
your nickel. And so I make myown appointments and I set the
times. I make it unlike theprivate counselor that's
probably doing it four or fivedays a week, certain time frame
(15:29):
of the day, I do mine more asneeded. Now if somebody calls
and I sense urgency then I tryto make that something that I
can do that day or the next day.But if I am starting a
relationship and I don't hearthe sense of urgency, then I'll
(15:52):
look at the calendar and I'llconveniently book it at times
that are convenient with me.
Because as a pastor, I'm notdoing the counseling full time
because I don't have time,right? And that's different too.
T. J. (16:07):
You're in your final year, usually in a program, an
educational program, there'ssome sort of thesis or project
that you have to complete. So doyou have one of those? And what
is it?
Mark (16:23):
Well, my project is clergy care for Conan Presbyterian
ministers. So having beensomeone that's always cared
about the clergy, my dad was aminister, I've always been in
that ministry family. And Ithink my grandfather was
(16:49):
somewhat of a lay preacherlooking at my great
grandmother's diaries. It sureseemed like he was, but I don't
think he was ever ordained. Buthe taught the men's Bible class
and occasionally filled a pulpitand he was an elder and
different things.
So I think that there's just alot of care that I've always
had. And even in my businesslife, I looked to the care of
(17:11):
ministers. So one of the thingsI wanted to do was enhance one
particular area. And in thedoctorate ministry program, it's
a project rather than a thesis.And with that project, what I'm
wanting to do is I'm wanting tosurvey our church and find out
(17:34):
why or how they can be moreeffectively taking care of their
mental health.
For example, we have in thedenomination a program that
people can utilize to receive upto eight visits per year by
(17:55):
phone or FaceTime or in personfor counseling services. And
that's eight times per year perissue per household. Or so if
there's two in your household,then you get twice that. If
there's three in your household,you get three times that. And
(18:15):
last year, for example, out ofthe hundreds of CPs plus their
families, hundreds more thatcould have utilized the program,
I believe last year withouthaving the notes in front of me,
there were 21 families that usedthem.
21 times when there could havebeen a thousand, for example. So
(18:39):
my surveys and material that I'mputting together would be why
are you not using it? How wouldwe get people to use it? And
hopefully bring people to anunderstanding that we will use
it. And so I am seeking the helpof our pastoral development
(19:01):
ministry team and PamPhillipsburg, using Jen Newell
and asking if I can be of helpas they can be of help and
putting things together in jointwork with the purpose being of
how can we come to a bettersense of caring for the common
(19:23):
Presbyterian clergy for mentalhealth.
And that's a long way of sayingit. And all this is heating up
right now because of the timingof the general assembly that's
meeting in Knoxville, is myhometown for now. I grew up in
Memphis, but I've been here mostof my adult life. And because
(19:47):
they're coming to town, I'mhoping that it will stimulate
opportunities to encourage ourministers to complete surveys.
There's one going out into themarketplace today.
They'll see it on the Six Roadstill Sunday, the link. And I
(20:07):
sent you the link in an email,you've got it there if there's a
way to include that link in thispodcast. But basically that's
our starting point is getting CPministers to complete the survey
and then there'll be more tofollow-up after that.
T. J. (20:25):
Yeah, I'd be interested to know what are the barriers
that ministers throw uppreventing from accessing, you
know, care, mental health care,you know, is it can't be
(20:47):
financial with the particularprogram and what you're
mentioning. Right. Is itembarrassment? Is it trust? I'll
be interested to see the resultsof the of the survey of what
what those barriers are, whatthe stigmas are.
Because then once we label them,once we name them, then we're
(21:09):
able to kinda either break thosebarriers down or find
workarounds.
Mark (21:16):
If we can name the silences, I think that as
Stanley Nawain wrote a bookabout that, if we can name the
silences, I believe that it's astarting point for us to receive
help or at least recommend help.But I don't wanna say too much
(21:39):
about what I think becausesomebody may be looking at this
or hearing this and hasn't donethe survey yet. I would
encourage that if you haven'tdone the survey, it's like
voting. We can't do anything ifyou don't vote. Everybody needs
to vote.
Everybody needs to do thesurvey. And there's a certain
(22:02):
number of people that have torespond for it to be, it raises
the accountability of accuracy.So if we have only 15% response,
then the information we receiveis not as accurate as if we
receive a 60% response. And soit is important that everybody
(22:28):
answer that survey and thenhopefully it will help us decide
how to make those improvements.
T. J. (22:37):
On average, how long does it take to complete the survey?
Mark (22:40):
Ten minutes.
T. J. (22:42):
Okay.
Mark (22:43):
Yeah, it's a quick survey. It's I think a dozen questions.
There's could be 15 questions.So I did this in conjunction
with the Eliza WoolseyFoundation or preaching
initiative that Jen Newell isdoing. She's looking for
(23:08):
information very similar to whatI'm looking for, for different
reasons.
And where one of her focus isgonna be is clergy care for the
next bit. And I'm lookingspecifically for clergy care
mental health benefits. And sowe've combined the questions and
(23:31):
some of us, the two of us havesome joint questions that we
both agree on. And then there'sa few in there that are just
really for her and a few inthere just for me. And, but that
will come out today and beavailable through, I believe a
few days after general assembly.
I think the cutoff might be thefollowing week. And so that's
(23:57):
the time frame, but it won'ttake ten minutes to complete it.
T. J. (24:02):
Alright. Alright. Mark, you mentioned earlier that you
come from a line of CumberlandPresbyterians and churchgoers.
What is the earliest memory thatyou have, that is faith based,
whether it's about God orchurch, what would be the
(24:29):
earliest memory that you canrecall?
Mark (24:34):
Well, we grew up in the church at a time where church
was everything. We were in acommunity. We lived in a manse
across the street from thechurch. We were at the church
(24:56):
literally every time the doorsopened, and back in that day
there was church on Sundaymorning, Sunday night, Wednesday
nights. You had breakfastsduring Lent.
Your baseball, basketball,everything you did, Boy Scouts,
(25:18):
was through the church. And sowe were on church teams and
church leagues and parentsbowled in a church league. We
were, everything we did live andbreathe in church. And so I was
connected to CumberlandPresbyterian by birth and never
(25:45):
questioned God, never questionedfaith, going to church, all that
felt very good to me. I canremember going to revivals with
my dad, and there were fourchildren, the youngest two were
(26:07):
six, seven years younger thanme.
But I can remember going torevivals that were popular when
I was a boy when the rest of myfamily wouldn't go. And so I
always wanted to go. And it wasduring a revival when I was nine
that we had a evangelist at thechurch speaking and on a Friday
(26:34):
night and I remember hearingHave Thine On Way, Lord song and
I'm trembling all over and Iexcused myself and got stepped
over all the other eight, nine,10 year olds that were all
together on the pew. And I wentup and gave my life to Christ.
(26:55):
So it's been a journey of faiththat I had no major crossing to
do.
I was, I felt early on that Iwould be a minister. In fact, I
(27:19):
remember telling my grandmotherthat I was gonna be a minister
when I was only about 12. And Idon't know if she told my
parents or not, but my parentsnever talked to me about that.
They kind of let me do my ownthing. As we became 15, 16 years
(27:40):
old, my dad moved from Memphisto Knoxville.
And I wasn't quite sure whereKnoxville was. And I don't think
I had Tennessee history yet, youknow, I just knew it was
somewhere way away. And so itwas a time before cell phones.
It was a time before longdistance calls were expensive. I
(28:04):
was, you know, and no internet.
And so when we moved, it wasvery hurtful leaving a youth
group of 50 people and going toa church that the youth group
was my sister and me and a fewother people, but not very many
and not active at that, goingfrom a suburban church to a
(28:30):
downtown church. And everythingwas different, it was as
different as walking to school,as having to ride a bus. So it
was day and night different andI thought at that time, I never
wanna be a preacher, if I'mgonna have to do that to my
(28:51):
family. And it was actuallyabout twelve years later, was 28
when I finally yielded to thecall to go into the ministry.
And I always knew that that waswhat I wanted to do.
I emulated my dad, he was themost influential of me and my
(29:11):
faith journey. I just soaked upeverything, I remembered
sermons, I was probably the mostoutspoken in Sunday school,
except for Janet, if you're outthere. Janet, you talked a lot,
but I liked everything you said.But church was always normal and
(29:33):
I never have gotten away fromthe church. Even the time that I
wasn't living at home, my wifeand I both have always gone to
church and been active in ourfaith journey.
T. J. (29:49):
When you were growing up and then both your your father
and your mother were very active
Mark (29:56):
Right.
T. J. (29:57):
In the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. What were
those conversations like aroundthe kitchen table? Because I've
noticed in in my own life, wehave faith conversations, you
know, may even be aboutscriptures and what it means to
be a disciple. But there's alsoconversations about the life of
(30:19):
the church, you know, almost theadministrative side or the the
people side. So what was thatenvironment like, for you?
Were were there faithconversations in the home, or
was the church life separatedfrom the home life?
Mark (30:39):
Separated to some degree. You're right, my mother was
certainly involved as well. Andshe would say, if I was talking
about priorities of I've got todo this for school, I've got to
do this for church, here'ssomething happening at the
(31:02):
church, but I've got this schoolconflict. Unless we were on
deathbed, we were expected to goto church. And if we had to stay
up late to do our schoolproject, we did.
So she was adamant about that.It's interesting around the
table, a lot of times growingup, we were quite, we always ate
(31:30):
together, dinner, I rememberdinner just every night you
didn't go out that much, thereweren't that many places to go
early on and I doubt my dadcould afford to take us many
places, but it took a lot oftime and effort to take out six
people and money. And mother wasa great cook and we sat down and
(31:53):
dad would, many years, pull outan upper room and read a
devotional. And then he'd letthe older children, me and my
sister, take turns or motherreading the devotional, he'd
pass it on and we readeverything including the prayer.
But the funny thing was, as Ilooked back that mother was
(32:18):
frustrated.
In fact, I'm this way now when Icook, which not very often, but
I do cook some and when I haveit ready, I wanna sit down and
eat right then. It's all ready,it's hot, it's ready, it's right
now. And you know my wife mightthink of three things she has to
(32:39):
do real quick, right? And I'mtrying to count to 10, know, I
don't wanna get upset, but Ithink it dates back to my mother
because we would sit down at thetable and everything's piping
hot and we serve the food on thetable and it would be in front
of us family style to pass bowlsaround. And then we'd have this
(33:00):
devotional that took fiveminutes and mother sometimes
would look awfully exasperatedlike I worked so hard to get
this on the table.
As far as conversations,especially Sunday afternoon
conversations, usually a roastwas in the oven or something and
we have a fun Sunday afternoonlunch. But the conversation was
(33:22):
primarily between my mother anddad who would talk about the
people that were there or notthere. And I still remember one
of the greatest in-depthdiscussions was about the first
time a woman wore pants tochurch. And my mother was just
thought that was the worst thingthat she'd ever seen in her
(33:45):
life. And who was that?
Yeah, did you see her? And Ican't believe that they did
that. And so those were some ofthe conversations of just kind
of deprogramming of whathappened. Well, I didn't see so
and so that day. And I noticedsomeone so was there and that's
(34:06):
bled over to me a lot of timeson Sundays.
I'm processing stuff like thatto myself, not so much over a
dinner table. We typically goout to lunch on Sunday and
probably as a way to kinda do abreak from one thing to the
next. But, so a lot of theconversation was not so much
(34:32):
family order, it was just afamily way of doing things of
dad would give a monologue,mother would give a monologue,
not much dialogue and talkingabout what had happened that
day. And it could be as simpleas, well, we thought that the
anthem went well, the music wentwell. All my family sang, My dad
(34:57):
sang, mother sang and played thepiano in Oregon.
My siblings all sang, we're allstill in choirs. And it was
always a big deal. And there wasmore gathering around it. For
me, I don't remember my siblingsas much, but they could have
done that without me there. Butthere was a lot going on when my
(35:19):
mother played the piano.
I would go and stand at thepiano and sing anything she'd
play. And so there was a lot ofmusic in the home and that was
one of my early memories ofdoing all that.
T. J. (35:32):
Are you the eldest of the siblings?
Mark (35:36):
No, oldest son, but I have a sister that's twenty one
months ahead of me, one yearahead of me in school. Okay. And
so I wasn't the oldest. Right.
T. J. (35:46):
Alright. Why the ministry? Because you've had
that opportunity. You had thosekitchen table and living room
discussions of the wonderfulfamily that is found in the
community of faith. Butsometimes it's that family that
also can hurt the minister, theminister's family.
(36:12):
And I know it's hit and miss ofthe people that I know. Some
have been attracted, and and itseems to be sort of in the blood
in terms of calling intoministry, some type of vocation.
And then others are justcompletely repelled and may not
even be active in any faithcommunity or any church. What
(36:34):
was it for you, Mark, thatattracted you and initiated your
call and kept that fire burninginto your late twenties?
Mark (36:45):
Well, as I said, we were quite active in church. My
company that I worked for movedme to Huntsville, Alabama. And
that was a pleasant move. Wewere in still Tennessee Valley.
(37:08):
Going to the CumberlandPresbyterian Church there, I was
known as David and not Mark.
And it didn't take very long forus to join and become active in
a church that was going to be aPCUSA church that was going to
(37:29):
be part of the church to start atri union church back then the
Presbyterian still had northernand southern Presbyterians. I
hadn't joined yet and they weregoing to have a tri union church
with the Cumberland Church nearour house. And we thought, we'll
start here in the PCUSA and thenwe'll move to this union church,
(37:50):
tri union church. We ended upbeing just a union church by the
time that that happened. Almostimmediately, know, we hadn't
been members more than a monthor two when I found out that
nominations were being receivedfor Deacon and that I was
(38:11):
nominated for Deacon.
Well, I had a couple of eldersthat showed up at my house to
say, Who are you? And I said,What do you mean? Well, you've
been nominated to be a deaconand we don't even know who you
are. I mean, you've joined thechurch and then they had 500,
six hundred members and I wasbrand new in the community
(38:35):
practically and a young guy inmy 20s. And so I started telling
them a little bit about my faithand whatnot and my background.
And they're like, well, was aGod thing. But in the church,
became a deacon. I was atreasurer. I was a Sunday school
teacher. Sang in the choir.
(38:57):
Everything I would do, it wasn'tenough. I just couldn't get
enough of doing church stuff.And the funny thing is that when
my wife and I married, she knewthat I was called to be a
preacher. I mean, she sensed it,she had good insight. And I
assured her I'd never do that.
(39:18):
That wasn't something that Iwould do, I'd already said no to
that. So a lot of things kepthappening and then she
challenged me and said, you knowGod's calling you to be a
preacher. And I'm like, but Idon't wanna do it. And I was
happy in business and my dad hadhuge shoes to fill and I didn't
(39:40):
really want to do anythingbesides Cumberland Presbyterian.
I wanted to be in the CumberlandPresbyterian church.
And a lot of neat things werehappening. I could take a long
time to tell you about manyaffirmations of my call that I
had to do it. But the one that Iwill tell you is that I had to
(40:06):
first move my membership back tothe Culmer Presbyterian Church.
And so we drove up to Knoxville,told my parents, and we made a
plan for me to come meet withthe committee on the ministry on
a Friday night before apresbytery meeting, and then at
(40:33):
presbytery I would be presentedto be received as a candidate.
T. J. (40:37):
All right, so really that close, Friday night, eleventh
and then Saturday was thepresbytery meeting.
Mark (40:45):
Right, right, so now my wife is, we had a child about
four, and she's great withchild. I mean she is like, this
happened the October 1 for thatpresbytery meeting and second
(41:09):
baby was born October 10. Soshe's great with child. And so
we're at my parents' house andmy parents are both passed, so I
don't mind saying that they keptthe house too hot at night.
Okay, I'm just saying, oh mygoodness.
And so we're relegated to one ofmy sister's bedroom staying in
(41:32):
my parents' house and there's acrib in there that our four year
old was able to sleep in. Sohe's in the bed now, we're on
central time and we've come backto Eastern. My parents have gone
to bed. Sally's pregnant, can'tsleep. She's in there reading.
I'm in the bed tossing andturning. I've met with the
(41:52):
committee on the ministry andthat night on Friday night,
they're pushing me on thecommittee on the ministry about
my call. And I said, well, I hadbeen called to administrate.
I've been called to teach. I'vebeen called to maybe go into
missions.
I've been called to do all thesethings. And what about called to
(42:15):
preach? And I said, I've notbeen called to preach. I don't
think I'm gonna preach. Right?
And they're hemming and hawingand they said, well, we think
that that'll come and we'regonna recommend you. So I'm
laying in the bed and need toget to sleep because I'm getting
up early to drive toPresbyterian and as I'm laying
(42:38):
there there's a light coming inthrough a cracked door, my
wife's down the hall, my parentsare across the hall asleep in
their room. There's a light inthe hallway that's still on, my
door's cracked to my sister'sbedroom, Got a kid sleeping over
here, pregnant wife down thehall, all this stuff's
emotionally in my mind. And Ilook over and laying on the side
(43:00):
table is my mother's NewTestament from Gideon that she
got at some school event whenshe was a kid in the thirties,
right? And I picked it up and Ijust kind of flipped it open and
it fell open to first Timothyfour.
(43:23):
And it had two different columnsbut reading straight across
these verses aren't together.But in the way I held them in
the light of the door and heldthe Bible at an angle it read,
go preach, tell Mark I have needof him. How about I fell out of
(43:43):
bed? And so I told that storythe next day at presenter and I
said, I take it back, I've beencalled to preach. He even used
my name.
T. J. (43:56):
Yeah, is certainly a big affirmation.
Mark (43:59):
Yeah, yeah. And so, then I was off and running with
preaching and the other thingthat was a major event was that
I found myself in interimministry. And so I served the
(44:26):
church as a state of supply fortwo years while I was in school.
And then I went back intobusiness and then I started
doing interims and pulpitsupply. And it felt very natural
and good.
Now I had my father at thatpoint has gone to the seminary
as president at MTS. And so heis just as disgruntled about my
(44:49):
path as anybody because I'mcalled to be a full time
minister. You know, I must belike a Jonah. And you know, I'm
running from the Lord. And Isaid, I'm doing ministry.
And I was being effective withserving in many different
churches and I felt very goodabout that. And I continued on
my interim journey. And I guessit was probably twenty years
(45:13):
into doing that before my dadfinally said one time that he
thought that I was doing theright thing. I was well, it's
good to know dad, thank you verymuch. But another time I was
wondering about my calling.
One of the things I alwaysthought about was this thing
about being full time businesspart time clergy. And now later
(45:34):
in life, God seemed to it that Icould retire from business and
be full time clergy in myretirement years, which is
great. But I remember somewherealong the way, a lot of ways, a
lot of the times I'm looking atmyself as, am I not doing the
right thing? Because I should befull time pastor, part time
(45:55):
business. And I never wanted thebusiness to be a lure of making
more money, having more freedom,doing more things differently.
And so I would always angst overthat not constantly, but I would
And many of the churches I'dserved as an interim, they'd
say, well why don't you stay andbe our minister? And I'd be, I'd
(46:18):
have to, you know, wrestlethrough that again, you know?
And
T. J. (46:22):
So you had those reminders. If it wasn't, if you
didn't bring it up mentallyyourself, was a Yeah.
Mark (46:30):
So one day I'm at lunch with Gene Richardson and he was
about my dad's age and sometimesyou can talk differently to
people that aren't family soclosely connected. And so I
shared with him my angst over mycalling and being part time,
(46:51):
full time, etcetera. And Gene,if you knew Gene, he had a way
of laughing at things and kindof chuckled at me and kind of
offended me at the same time.And I said, what is it? He said,
well Mark, he says, how often doyou pray for God's will?
And I said, well, all the time.And he laughed again and he
(47:16):
said, well, what makes you thinkyou're not in it? And it was
very satisfying that day. I waslike, yeah, yeah, good point. It
makes me think I'm not in it,right?
And so that was a goodaffirmation too that I was doing
the right thing. And even if Ididn't fully understand it it it
(47:38):
was what I did and it was good.
T. J. (47:41):
It's that comparison, comparing yourself to other
colleagues in ministry, theunderstanding of what ministry
is or the interpretation of whatministry is during that time and
even currently today. Yeah. Ican imagine you wearing
(48:05):
something on your shoulders thatprobably didn't need to be
there. There is the practicalityof just being able to to make a
living. And and being bivocational has always been part
of the Cumberland PresbyterianChurch, always.
Sure.
Mark (48:27):
Well, I liken myself to a Paul as far as being a
tentmaker. In fact, that's whatthey call the bivocational tent
making ministry, right? And so Ithink I did probably, I think I
counted 17 interims.
T. J. (48:45):
Good grief.
Mark (48:46):
And those interims lasted up to a year at a time, and then
I did a number of statedsupplies, so I had a little bit
of control, kind of like whatI'm doing in counseling, of
setting some parameters. So Iwent to a church that I felt
like I wouldn't mind stayingmore than a year. I would come
(49:14):
in as a state of supply. Andthen it enabled me to stay at
one church five years, onechurch four years, one church
three years.
T. J. (49:25):
But
Mark (49:26):
these were churches that just needed me part time. And I
would always stay only theinterim if I knew they needed a
full time person. And because weworked very hard to find that
(49:46):
full time person for them. WhenI came to Loudoun Church, which
I'm delighted to be at, I haddone, I only count them as one
interim, but I did fivedifferent interims there.
T. J. (50:04):
Okay.
Mark (50:04):
Was the pastor between every minister for five
ministers since 1989.
T. J. (50:13):
Now I wonder what that says.
Mark (50:16):
Well, they tried to get me to come and be their minister
back in the 80s, late 80s, and Iwrestled with that. I almost
said yes, didn't say yes. Infact, when went back in 2016, I
(50:39):
didn't take it as an interim, Itook it as a state of supply
thinking I may stay. Becausethey knew I would retire not
long hence, maybe I could stayand be the pastor, and that's
what's happened. And it's beengood, but being there nine
(51:00):
years, I tell them is not reallytrue.
I think if you add up all theinterims, I've been there, you
know, three or four years longerthan that. And so I've gone
through multi generations ofpeople there. And I apologize to
the man who was on the searchcommittee, he's passed now since
I've been there, but he was onthe search committee that were
(51:25):
very influential of wanting meto come back in the 80s. And I
apologized to him, Bill was hisname. I said, I'm sorry that I
didn't take the church all thoseyears ago because this is where
I need to be.
And he said, no, he said, thisis where you need to be now. And
we need you now. And it wasvery, again, affirming that he
(51:46):
was able to take my personalfeelings of wanting to be a part
of that church sooner. Butknowing that if I'd done that in
the eighties chances are Iwouldn't still be there. And
this is the time that I wasneeded to be there.
So I thought that was very wiseand very comforting to hear. And
(52:10):
so I believe God has his handson all of us if we're willing to
listen and search and continueto ask God for him to guide us.
And then whatever we're in, whyshould we doubt we're not in
God's will if everything seemsto be falling into place?
T. J. (52:31):
What benefits do you think there are from a
minister's perspective of doingan interim in lieu of stated
supply or full time ministry,since you've done both?
Mark (52:48):
One thing about the interim is you're a member of
every church and you're a memberof none. So I would say that
anybody who does look at anintentional interim which I
didn't start out intending todo. I would suggest that first
of all they find a home churchthat they don't agree to be an
(53:10):
interim for. Because it's hardon the family As I dragged three
kids with us everywhere we went.Now I can tell you they know
every Southern Gospel songthat's ever written because we
sang them all the way church andback with great joy.
(53:33):
In fact I love hearing mygrandkids tell me that mom sings
these songs you know and I'mlike yeah yes I bet she does
they're in her head. But I wouldsay that an interim is able to
come in with a critical eye andsee things that a minister
(54:00):
moving into the community mightbe slower to process. And
because we're there for ashorter period of time, we might
be able to address some things.I did things like change the
bulletin and change the order ofworship from time to time. I did
(54:27):
some things intentionallybecause I felt like it would
make the next person, anythingthat they changed would be like,
well, we're glad somebody's putit back like it was or whatever,
even if it wasn't, right?
Also there's a sense of freedomin the fact that I'm not here
(54:49):
because I need this jobindefinitely. And so there's a
freedom to be able to call itlike it is and say what you
wanna say. And I've got a dayjob if I need to go back, but
it's a real opportunity to lovepeople. And a lot of
(55:10):
relationships I made withchurches, I still have closeness
to those churches and to thosepeople. But yeah, I'd say as the
interim, protect your family andjust the confession of faith can
be a tool to help you as wellbecause it says you can only
(55:35):
serve six months as an interimand you can renew it one time.
And so when people when I wasdoing an interim said, we'd like
you to stay. I'm like, I can't.And so I would use that in my
favor and state of clerk leavesit open. And so when I came and
said, I'll come clerk, not stateof clerk, but state of supply. I
(55:56):
knew what I was doing.
I knew that I was allowingmyself to stay longer if I
wanted to. I do think one otherthing I'll say is that
undoubtedly serving as aninterim pastor made me a better
(56:16):
business professional and beinga businessman made me a better
pastor. And so for the bivocational, it broadened my view
and spectrum of being one of thepeople while I was leaving at
the same time. So I felt like Iwas able to see things more
(56:39):
clearly because of thatexperience.
T. J. (56:42):
Yeah. You were in the investment world, the financial
world for a long time. What ledyou into retirement?
Mark (56:57):
Getting older, but I will say that when I looked at
retirement from business, I hadthought for many years and I
don't know how long, but let'ssay twenty, a long time. I had
(57:18):
prayed the prayer that if it wasin God's will, I would like to
retire from business at somepoint and be a full time pastor.
And I wasn't waiting until theright church came along. I
(57:40):
really aged out. I mean, so Iretired in 2021 from business
after forty four years.
And I was at a place where Icould transition that
effectively because I hadthousands of people that I cared
(58:00):
for in that regard. It was likemy congregation at work. And so
I was in a good place totransition that. I probably
would have done it a year or twoearlier, but COVID hit. And all
of a sudden I'm able to workfrom home and do my work
effectively without having totravel as much.
(58:25):
And so because of that, I thinkI extended it a couple of years.
And so I set the date and that'swhat I wanted to do. In the
meantime, I've been at thechurch working part time and
increasing hours as I went alongsince 16. So they waited five
years for me to fully retire,but now I'm full time at the
(58:48):
church and I can't tell muchdifference between the time I
was putting in part time and thetime I'm putting in full time.
It's just that I'm installed asa pastor now instead of being
the status fly.
T. J. (59:04):
Right, right. Your focus has changed because, you know,
you've shifted from the businessworld a little bit, but then you
become a student. And you becomefull time at the Loudoun
Cumberland Presbyterian Church.So it's not like you're doing
less.
Mark (59:24):
Oh, no. It's kind of stuff.
T. J. (59:27):
Focus is different. And that's why I asked. It wasn't a
loaded question. It was, youknow, if you had a full plate
already in the business world,what constituted that shift?
Because hours per day, you'restill filling it up with
different activities.
Mark (59:48):
Well I'm a busy guy and I wouldn't know any other way to
live except to be busy. Some ofthat might be genetics that are
coming out of working a lot. AndI think genetics sometimes, you
(01:00:10):
mentioned earlier aboutministers that run from a
calling or run toward a calling,but I also think there's some
like me that come back to itbecause the gene surface at
different times of what probablyis in your background. But I
will say about schooling is thatI'd always wanted to go back to
(01:00:33):
school. I had taken a multitudeof continuing ed in the
financial world because I hadto, To keep up and to have the
credentials and the licensuresand all the ability to do what I
did, I had to go to a number ofprograms and get a lot of
certifications.
(01:00:54):
And I always had been in schooland in training and just didn't
have time to go back forreligious training until I
retired from business. And Itold my wife, I said, wife, I
said, I wanna go back to school.And so when I retired, she said,
please wait a year, please waita year. I thought that was great
(01:01:16):
advice. So I waited a year afterI retired.
And then I called my friendBarry Anderson at the seminary
who's since retired and said,Dean of Students at that time.
And said, Barry, I wanna comeback to school. What do you
recommend I take? And herecommended I get in a DMN
program. And I'm like, I don'twant a doctorate.
(01:01:36):
And he said, well, you've had somuch of the other stuff. He
says, there's a place for you inthe doctoral program and you
might really like it and yadayada yada. So I thought, well, I
don't want a doctorate, but I'llsign up for the class. Well, I
signed up for the class andfound that I loved it and I
(01:02:01):
seemed to be doing the rightthing. And I will tell you that
MTS is tricky in the DMINprogram.
They automatically sign you upfor the next class. So I
finished one and now all ofsudden I'm in the second one.
And then I finished it and I'min the third one, I'm in the
(01:02:22):
fourth. And so now I am in Julytaking the last of those
academic classes and withnothing left except to work. If
the dean's listening night andday on my project until it's
complete.
But it's been a journey, anadventure, and it seemed like a
(01:02:46):
great fit for me. I found mypeople, if you will, this
enables me to continue to servethe church. And there could be a
time, I'm sure there will be atime when lot will realize that
they've got an old preacher andthey need somebody with my
(01:03:07):
experience that's half my age.And perhaps I'll be able to
continue serving the church as atherapist. And so I felt like it
was a good fit that's how ithappened.
T. J. (01:03:25):
Mark, our conversation has kinda gone full circle.
Excuse me. It's gone fullcircle. We started with the
doctorate of ministry program,and now we're kind of back to
it, back to present tense.Looking over your life and
(01:03:46):
thinking about your faith, whenhave you felt nearest to God?
Mark (01:03:55):
Well, I'd say right off the bat that preparation for
sermons. I love that. Everyminister, every Christian person
(01:04:20):
should be spending a lot of timein the Bible. I found that when
I'm doing a teaching class,preaching a sermon, whatever, I
am more in the word than whenI'm not teaching or preaching.
And I usually am thinking one,two, three weeks ahead of what
(01:04:48):
I'm going to preach.
I love looking at the lectionaryevery week. I read all the
scriptures in the lectionaryevery week. I usually rely on
the spirit to lead me into whichscripture I'm gonna preach on. I
don't always use lectionary, butI primarily do.
T. J. (01:05:10):
And
Mark (01:05:12):
when I feel led to do a particular scripture, I'm
already outlining it in my headand writing some things down.
And I do that a week, two, threeahead of time. And then that
particular week, I do a lot ofreflection. After I reflect and
(01:05:32):
write my own thoughts andoutline and lay out my thoughts
on it. Then I love going tobooks.
I'm still a book guy, and Idon't search for it on the
(01:05:53):
computer. I have a greatlibrary, I'll go to my favorite
references and read what thesepeople have to say about it. And
then I take notes and reflect,so that when I sat down to write
a sermon, I've had all the fun.And it's been enriching and
(01:06:17):
rewarding. I feel really goodabout that.
And then of course the sermonwrites itself, you know, with
all that prep in there. Ofcourse some weeks I'm not able
to give it as much time asothers. Some weeks I don't pull
a resource book out because it'sall there, or maybe it's in
(01:06:40):
storytelling form. But anotherthing that makes me feel real
close to God is going to sleep,praying every night. It's very
similar to how I started offpraying as a child before I went
(01:07:03):
to bed.
And it's just very calming andmy wife is jealous that I can go
to sleep really fast. But that'smy secret is that when I lay
down to sleep, I'm laying myselfdown to sleep, know. And so
that's a very close encounter.And you know from being in
(01:07:27):
ministry, there's so manymeaningful experiences with God.
One thing fun at this church isthat because I've been there so
many times as an interim, I amleading people to Christ of kids
(01:07:49):
whose parents came to Christwhile I was there before and
knowing their grandparents andhaving this multi generational
connect.
I think that's all very specialtoo, is being able to have some
small part in the development ofpeople's life and their
(01:08:09):
Christian faith journey. I thinkthat's very impactful and very
humbling to be part of that.
T. J. (01:08:15):
Yeah. It's one of the only, if not the only, vocations
or callings that allows us tohave the ability to share and
have access with all aspects ofan individual or a family's
life. It isn't just thoseappointments where you schedule
(01:08:40):
things, but it is the joys andthe sorrows, all of it. And,
yeah, a physician doesn't havethat an attorney doesn't have
that a therapist doesn't havethat. Maybe even neighbors don't
have that or even other familymembers.
It's a very unique calling. It'sa very unique profession.
Mark (01:09:06):
And as I've been told in years past by many, if you're
called you really can't doanything else.
T. J. (01:09:15):
That's what I've come to understand by doing this, by
having Cumberland Road.
Mark (01:09:22):
So it's not work to me. I mean, went to work for forty
four years in business, but whenI go to church, I'm going to
church. I'm not going to work. Iused to leave notes to my wife
and say, I'm gone to work andhere's where I'll be today or
(01:09:46):
I'm gonna, know, this is myschedule if I'm in another state
working or whatever. But now ifI leave a note that I'm going to
the church, I'm not really goingto work.
I'm just going to church. So itfeels very good, very enriching.
And I don't tell my church, butI would do it for nothing.
(01:10:13):
Because it's not work to me. AndI'm just giving back what's been
given to me, and it's aprivilege.
Mark,
T. J. (01:10:24):
you have a scope and a perspective on church and
specifically with the CumberlandPresbyterian Church. Looking
into the future, what hopes doyou have for the denomination?
Mark (01:10:41):
Well, what hopes? Well, I hope it's always the church of
Jesus Christ. And I hope that wealways find the will of God to
(01:11:02):
lead us and not let it be ourwill. So I have always been one
of embracing medium theology.And I remember when Forrest
Prosser was a moderator someyears ago and he gave a message
(01:11:24):
on medium theology and I thoughthe did an excellent job.
I think we were in Chattanoogaat the time. And I thought he
did an excellent job of talkingabout how a needle in the middle
doesn't mean we're stuck in themiddle. And how we're able to go
to one side or the other asneeded, and we can center back
(01:11:47):
in the middle. And I like thatimagery, and I think about that
a lot. And I think that ourchurch the church throughout
many denominations arestruggling with trying to move
that needle further to the rightor further to the left.
(01:12:10):
When I believe that Jesus diedwith all sinners. And I believe
that Jesus could be more thanstuck in the middle. And yet, I
think he still would bringeverything back to a centralized
(01:12:31):
place in service to God. So whatI'd like to see is if I could,
wave a wand that doesn't existand say, let's do this. I can
admire people who are passionateabout their faith.
I have people in my church whoare passionate way progressive.
(01:12:58):
Passionate way conservative. AndI love them both. And I respect
them both. And I admire theirpassion.
But I don't want to do thingsthat alienate either one. And so
I'd like to see our church bemore loving with praying
together what God's will iswithout excluding extremes.
(01:13:25):
Mark,
T. J. (01:13:28):
what have we missed in our conversation that we haven't
talked about yet that you'd liketo share before we conclude?
Conclude is such a strong word.I feel like conversations can
always be ongoing. But before wepart ways, what did we miss?
(01:13:50):
What questions did I not askthat you wanted an opportunity
to speak to?
Mark (01:13:58):
Well, I don't know what they would be. I appreciate the
time to talk about the DMINproject for a doctorate that I
didn't really want. But Ibelieve this is God's path for
(01:14:18):
me right now, is to do this. Iwill say that since I have been
taking an approach ofintentional counseling, And
since I have created anenvironment of safe sanctuary
(01:14:41):
and safe space for people tocome, I have seen my counseling
time increase a lot. And I didnot know that there was so much
(01:15:01):
need in my particular churchthat once I turned it on, I
haven't tried to turn it off orslow it down, I'm just letting
it happen.
But I remember in the process,our assignment is that we have
to have at least fifty hours ofsupervised counseling where
(01:15:23):
people, where we talk to someoneabout the people that we're
seeing, not so much the people,but just to talk about how we
handled it and what we learnedand how we applied it and all
this kind of stuff. And Iremember my wife saying 50
people. How will you ever get 50people? Well, that's not a
(01:15:45):
problem. And so many people arecoming.
So I feel like that when wecontinue to learn, continue to
pray for God's will, continue toplace ourselves out there in
service, that when we pray Godsend us somebody that we can
minister to, he will. And so Ifeel like I'm in the middle of
(01:16:09):
God's grace and mercy andservice doing things that I
never thought I'd be doing justsimply because I was willing to
go take a class. And so I wouldchallenge people to be willing
to step out of the norm andbreak the paradigm and try
something different, and whoknows, it could be God leading
(01:16:31):
you on a new path.
T. J. (01:16:33):
Mark, how did you make that shift for the people at
Loudoun specifically, who'dknown you for years, known you
as an interim, known you asbeing bi vocational, knowing you
as stated supply. How did youarticulate that shift that yes,
(01:16:54):
I am those things. And, I alsowant to add the ability to spend
time with you in a therapeuticsession?
Mark (01:17:06):
Well, I may know, I wasn't trying to hide anything from
going to school. I didn'tbroadcast it, but the elders all
knew, the session knew, familyknew, people would ask me why am
I going back to school and whatare you doing and all this stuff
and conversation was out there.But when I had transitioned the
(01:17:33):
office, I had some ladies in thechurch who were very helpful in
making that happen with makingit look good and appropriate.
And at the same time I ranannouncements in our newsletter
that I was taking people in forcounseling and this is what I
(01:17:55):
was doing with school. Andthough I had been counseling for
all of my ministry, this is adifferent level of counseling
that was now available throughacademics and learning and
intentional type of therapy,etcetera.
And I've had people come in totalk nothing but religion. And
(01:18:16):
I've had other people come in totalk to me about their broken
families, dysfunction this,triangle that, health, whatever
it might be. And so it kind ofopened the door. So I ran that
ad maybe once in one month, oncethe next month, and then
word-of-mouth. And it seems tobe very effective.
(01:18:39):
Now one of my elders said to me,as he was helping take the table
out of my office and put thecouch in the office, said, and
he's a friend and he's about myage. And he says, well, he says,
my wife and I may wanna cometalk to you. And I said, that'd
(01:18:59):
be great. He says, but we'regonna wait till you get more
experience. And so I've taken itall with a grain of salt and if
I can help, I'm ready.
I have more tools available thanever before to help you. And yet
(01:19:21):
I'm not keeping a list of who'sbeen in and who's not, And so
it's just making people awarethat this is something that I
can do and will do. And I'veeven had a few refer me to
somebody outside our church inthe community to call me who
didn't wanna talk to their ownminister. And so I've had a few
(01:19:42):
of those that happened and thatdoesn't bother me either at this
point. But that's how ithappened.
Just was transparent with who Iam and what I'm doing.
T. J. (01:19:57):
Mark, I appreciate your time. I appreciate you sharing
me sharing with me your yourjourney, and, it was interesting
to be able to come full circle.We kinda came full circle twice
in one conversation, which isalways enjoyable. Especially for
(01:20:17):
your time.
Mark (01:20:17):
I really appreciate it. Interest in in facilitating this
and making it happen. So thankyou.
T. J. (01:20:26):
Thank you for listening to this episode of Cumberland
Road. I hope you find thispodcast both enjoyable and
insightful and helps you connectwith others to have deep faith
conversations. In closing,here's a quote from Paul Tillich
in his book Dynamics of Faith.If faith is understood as
(01:20:51):
belief, that is something istrue. Doubt is incompatible with
the act of faith. If faith isunderstood as being ultimately
concerned, doubt is necessary.It is the consequence of the
risk of faith. Thanks forlistening.
You're listening to the Cumberland Road and I am your
host TJ Malinoski. The followingis a faith conversation with
Mark Hester. He has had a longbi vocational career as an
investment advisor, financialplanner, and a Cumberland
(00:26):
Presbyterian minister, oftenserving in the role as interim
and supply pastor. He iscurrently serving as the senior
minister at the LoudounCumberland Presbyterian Church,
and he's in his final year ofdoctoral studies and pastoral
therapy at Memphis TheologicalSeminary. His doctoral research
(00:51):
is on clergy care for CumberlandPresbyterian ministers involving
their self care and continuingeducation. If you are a
Cumberland Presbyterianminister, click the link in the
show notes and take the survey.I just took it. It takes about
five minutes, and it's justpoint and click. Easy, and
(01:15):
you're done, and it will helpministers now and in the future.
Here is my conversation withMark Hester.
Mark, you are in your final yearin a doctor of ministry and
(01:35):
pastoral therapy. If you don'tmind, what is pastoral therapy
and does it differ from pastoralcare?
Mark (01:47):
Well, you for that question. I believe it does
differ. I believe that everyonein ministry is participating in
pastoral care. And so for all ofmy parts of four or five
decades, I've been in pastoralcare because one of the things
(02:07):
that we do as ministers is wecare. We don't cure, but we
care.
And we look after our flock andour church family. And that's
all part of the caringstructure. The therapy structure
is more intentional that we'relooking at transgenerational
(02:33):
family structures, and we'relooking at order of children,
we're looking at the trianglesthat they have in their life and
it could be that we're trying tode triangle. But we're looking
for how to help somebody move orchange or get more tools to deal
(02:54):
with problems. One of the thingswe learn along the way is many
of the people who might hearthis will already know this, is
that a lot of the problems youcan't cure and you can't fix
everything.
And so it's an opportunity to domore than pastoral care. It's an
opportunity to listen and leadpeople to talk about the things
(03:18):
that maybe bothering them. I'llgive you one example and that
would be the couple that comesto talk about the child that's
creating so many problems andyou get the child in there with
the family and you discover thatthe problem is not the child.
(03:41):
The problem is the couple orsomebody's relationship with
their family. And the good newsis you're able to tell little
Johnny, there's nothing wrongwith you.
We're gonna help your mamathough or we're gonna help your
daddy though. And a lot of timesthat the healing mechanism can
(04:02):
just be jumpstarted by therapy.So in my opinion, the difference
in between pastoral care andpastoral therapy is a lot of
times in pastoral care you mighthave a set number of visits you
might be willing to do with apremarital counseling. And you
might say, I require all of thepeople I married to meet at
(04:25):
least three times. But some ofthose will be just quick hits.
They probably won't explore thefamily makeup. It'll just more
or less touch on somepersonalities. Whereas family
therapy or pastoral therapy willperhaps pick up on the fact that
(04:51):
somebody in the marriage hasbeen married before. And what
happened with that? When didthat happen?
And so it gives a much broaderministry that can help people
and the counseling can be anunlimited thing if the pastor
has time to take that on. So Ithink in my particular
(05:12):
circumstance, I don't intend tobe the pastoral therapist that
hangs a shingle on the cornerand everybody's welcome. I see
it more as a expansion of myministry as a pastor, long term
minister, to help more people ina more in-depth way.
T. J. (05:35):
Why would a person want to receive therapy or seek out
therapy, kind of in the churchinstitution setting? Because
therapy is available in in manydifferent venues and spaces. So
(05:56):
is there a distinction betweenpastoral therapy and then maybe
a therapy that you might get ina clinic or a hospital or a
private practice?
Mark (06:09):
Yes, I think there's a distinct difference in the fact
that if this person is part ofyour church family, you've had
the exposure as the minister tosee their family, to see them
interact with others. You mayknow a lot of history about
them, but the people who come tome or a pastoral therapist,
(06:34):
they're wanting this to be partof their faith journey. They're
wanting to make sense of theirthings that they're concerned
about as part of their faith, aspart of their Christian
(06:55):
heritage. And so I think thatthe minister is at a clear
advantage in the fact that he orshe may be able to have much
more knowledge about this personthat if you went to a private
therapy, it may take a long timejust to get to that point. And
(07:17):
so a lot of times in privatetherapy, for example, what you
share, what's drawn out and youshare, that's your snapshot as
the counselor's looking.
We have this unique placementwhere we see whether they are
(07:38):
active in church or not. We seeif they participate in a variety
of things. We see what some oftheir gifts are and talents, and
we see their family that mightnot ever go with them into a
private setting. So I think theclergy is in a very unique
situation to help people in amuch more personal basis right
off the bat.
T. J. (08:00):
There is that line between seeking therapy from a
professional where we only havea certain allotted amount of
time per week
Mark (08:11):
Mhmm.
T. J. (08:11):
And then be able to step away. And there's some freedom
in there, maybe even some safetythat I'm not gonna run into you,
or the odds of running into you,you know, at the grocery store
or in other settings, aballgame. But in a pastoral
therapy, it sounds like you asthe counselor, you as the
(08:31):
therapist, you you're part ofother realms and circles of my
life. That can be both good andbad.
Mark (08:42):
I agree with that. And so I think the pastoral therapist
has to have a clearunderstanding of what they're
willing to take on and also knowwhen to help somebody with a
referral to someone else. I'vehad that happen in multiple
(09:04):
settings. Of course, being twoyears into this three year
program, a lot of it isaffirmation and new knowledge
academically and from lecturesand whatnot. Things that I've
been practicing for a long time,but not as a doctoral type work.
(09:29):
And what people, academia peoplelike John Patton would say that
ministers should probably put athree to five visit cap on how
many times they would seesomebody in their church. And
the primary purpose for that, hewould say, is that we just don't
(09:53):
have time. We absolutely don'thave time. But then I think
there's also the person thatmight come to me and want to
talk to me about the spouse, butthey don't want the spouse to
come in and they're both membersof your church and then there's
(10:15):
an awkward thing. So what I sayto them in those circumstances,
if I'm not able to get to likethis one does, I've had this
actually happen where this onedoesn't want the other one to
know that they're in counselingor they want them to know it's
in counseling, but I'm notallowed to say what it's about.
And it's about the other person.And in those types of settings,
(10:39):
if I'm not able to get everybodytogether on the same page, then
I pray with them and I try togive them a few tools but I
actually find a referral andmake the phone call. I have even
driven people to the firstappointment with someone else
(11:01):
because it's appropriate thatthey get help, but I'm not the
guy. And maybe it's outside myexpertise, but there's also this
risk that you run, that youalienate people in your church.
And that's something you have towatch out for.
So to summarize it, yes, I agreeyou have to be careful, time
(11:22):
restraints you may have to limitit. And another thing I recently
have done at the suggestion ofprofessors and part of the
program is I've transformed mypastoral office, which was more
administrative for half theoffice to be safe sanctuary type
(11:44):
space. If you went to anycounseling office you'd probably
see a couch, two chairs andlamps and coffee table in a very
pleasant setting. I've done thatand transformed the office and
so now people come in and theymake themselves comfortable and
I have to watch the time. Soit's just like preaching, know,
(12:04):
I'm watching the clock if I runover, know, but I'm watching the
counseling time, not because offeasts, because I don't charge
fees to my church family.
I'm watching the clock because Iknow that one hour is like a
church service. It just gets tothe point where you're repeating
(12:25):
and it's not as effective. Andso I don't want somebody to sit
there for two hours when we werejust as effective in an hour and
fifteen minutes. But it it bothsettings, I'm watching the clock
a little bit.
T. J. (12:40):
So the boundaries are really important. Boundaries of
time, boundaries of your ownabilities and limitations.
Boundaries are extremelyimportant in pastoral therapy.
Mark (12:57):
Absolutely. Also in the church setting or any pastoral
setting, I always wanna makesure somebody else is in the
building and hopefully rightacross the hall. You want your
confidentiality, but you alsowant a safe space for the
(13:20):
counselor. And so that'ssomething that's very important.
One thing different in privatetherapy that's probably better
than pastoral therapy is theanonymity perhaps of people that
come to the office.
When it's a church person, thenpeople will know that someone
(13:43):
so's car is sitting outside thechurch door, right? And so there
needs to be an openness with noindication that people are there
to, could be there to do anykind of counseling. And for
(14:06):
people to view it in the churchas something helpful and to be
applauded that people arelooking for good wholeness and
good mental health as opposedto, I wonder what they're in
there for. Right? And so that'ssomething that is necessary to
(14:27):
cultivate.
T. J. (14:27):
Yeah. And I think it's human nature to think both.
Mhmm. Oh, I recognize the car.It's attached to person x.
I want them to be healthybecause I know who that person
is. I want them to heal and havegood relationships. And I wonder
(14:49):
what they're in the church for.I think we can do both. I think
we I think it's human nature todo both.
Mark (14:58):
But when you're seeing the pastor We could be talking about
visitation. I mean, we couldtalk about, you know, anything.
T. J. (15:04):
That's true.
Mark (15:05):
And so I don't put a sign up saying, you know, like Lucy
used to do on peanuts and saythe doctors in, you know, bring
your nickel. And so I make myown appointments and I set the
times. I make it unlike theprivate counselor that's
probably doing it four or fivedays a week, certain time frame
(15:29):
of the day, I do mine more asneeded. Now if somebody calls
and I sense urgency then I tryto make that something that I
can do that day or the next day.But if I am starting a
relationship and I don't hearthe sense of urgency, then I'll
(15:52):
look at the calendar and I'llconveniently book it at times
that are convenient with me.
Because as a pastor, I'm notdoing the counseling full time
because I don't have time,right? And that's different too.
T. J. (16:07):
You're in your final year, usually in a program, an
educational program, there'ssome sort of thesis or project
that you have to complete. So doyou have one of those? And what
is it?
Mark (16:23):
Well, my project is clergy care for Conan Presbyterian
ministers. So having beensomeone that's always cared
about the clergy, my dad was aminister, I've always been in
that ministry family. And Ithink my grandfather was
(16:49):
somewhat of a lay preacherlooking at my great
grandmother's diaries. It sureseemed like he was, but I don't
think he was ever ordained. Buthe taught the men's Bible class
and occasionally filled a pulpitand he was an elder and
different things.
So I think that there's just alot of care that I've always
had. And even in my businesslife, I looked to the care of
(17:11):
ministers. So one of the thingsI wanted to do was enhance one
particular area. And in thedoctorate ministry program, it's
a project rather than a thesis.And with that project, what I'm
wanting to do is I'm wanting tosurvey our church and find out
(17:34):
why or how they can be moreeffectively taking care of their
mental health.
For example, we have in thedenomination a program that
people can utilize to receive upto eight visits per year by
(17:55):
phone or FaceTime or in personfor counseling services. And
that's eight times per year perissue per household. Or so if
there's two in your household,then you get twice that. If
there's three in your household,you get three times that. And
(18:15):
last year, for example, out ofthe hundreds of CPs plus their
families, hundreds more thatcould have utilized the program,
I believe last year withouthaving the notes in front of me,
there were 21 families that usedthem.
21 times when there could havebeen a thousand, for example. So
(18:39):
my surveys and material that I'mputting together would be why
are you not using it? How wouldwe get people to use it? And
hopefully bring people to anunderstanding that we will use
it. And so I am seeking the helpof our pastoral development
(19:01):
ministry team and PamPhillipsburg, using Jen Newell
and asking if I can be of helpas they can be of help and
putting things together in jointwork with the purpose being of
how can we come to a bettersense of caring for the common
(19:23):
Presbyterian clergy for mentalhealth.
And that's a long way of sayingit. And all this is heating up
right now because of the timingof the general assembly that's
meeting in Knoxville, is myhometown for now. I grew up in
Memphis, but I've been here mostof my adult life. And because
(19:47):
they're coming to town, I'mhoping that it will stimulate
opportunities to encourage ourministers to complete surveys.
There's one going out into themarketplace today.
They'll see it on the Six Roadstill Sunday, the link. And I
(20:07):
sent you the link in an email,you've got it there if there's a
way to include that link in thispodcast. But basically that's
our starting point is getting CPministers to complete the survey
and then there'll be more tofollow-up after that.
T. J. (20:25):
Yeah, I'd be interested to know what are the barriers
that ministers throw uppreventing from accessing, you
know, care, mental health care,you know, is it can't be
(20:47):
financial with the particularprogram and what you're
mentioning. Right. Is itembarrassment? Is it trust? I'll
be interested to see the resultsof the of the survey of what
what those barriers are, whatthe stigmas are.
Because then once we label them,once we name them, then we're
(21:09):
able to kinda either break thosebarriers down or find
workarounds.
Mark (21:16):
If we can name the silences, I think that as
Stanley Nawain wrote a bookabout that, if we can name the
silences, I believe that it's astarting point for us to receive
help or at least recommend help.But I don't wanna say too much
(21:39):
about what I think becausesomebody may be looking at this
or hearing this and hasn't donethe survey yet. I would
encourage that if you haven'tdone the survey, it's like
voting. We can't do anything ifyou don't vote. Everybody needs
to vote.
Everybody needs to do thesurvey. And there's a certain
(22:02):
number of people that have torespond for it to be, it raises
the accountability of accuracy.So if we have only 15% response,
then the information we receiveis not as accurate as if we
receive a 60% response. And soit is important that everybody
(22:28):
answer that survey and thenhopefully it will help us decide
how to make those improvements.
T. J. (22:37):
On average, how long does it take to complete the survey?
Mark (22:40):
Ten minutes.
T. J. (22:42):
Okay.
Mark (22:43):
Yeah, it's a quick survey. It's I think a dozen questions.
There's could be 15 questions.So I did this in conjunction
with the Eliza WoolseyFoundation or preaching
initiative that Jen Newell isdoing. She's looking for
(23:08):
information very similar to whatI'm looking for, for different
reasons.
And where one of her focus isgonna be is clergy care for the
next bit. And I'm lookingspecifically for clergy care
mental health benefits. And sowe've combined the questions and
(23:31):
some of us, the two of us havesome joint questions that we
both agree on. And then there'sa few in there that are just
really for her and a few inthere just for me. And, but that
will come out today and beavailable through, I believe a
few days after general assembly.
I think the cutoff might be thefollowing week. And so that's
(23:57):
the time frame, but it won'ttake ten minutes to complete it.
T. J. (24:02):
Alright. Alright. Mark, you mentioned earlier that you
come from a line of CumberlandPresbyterians and churchgoers.
What is the earliest memory thatyou have, that is faith based,
whether it's about God orchurch, what would be the
(24:29):
earliest memory that you canrecall?
Mark (24:34):
Well, we grew up in the church at a time where church
was everything. We were in acommunity. We lived in a manse
across the street from thechurch. We were at the church
(24:56):
literally every time the doorsopened, and back in that day
there was church on Sundaymorning, Sunday night, Wednesday
nights. You had breakfastsduring Lent.
Your baseball, basketball,everything you did, Boy Scouts,
(25:18):
was through the church. And sowe were on church teams and
church leagues and parentsbowled in a church league. We
were, everything we did live andbreathe in church. And so I was
connected to CumberlandPresbyterian by birth and never
(25:45):
questioned God, never questionedfaith, going to church, all that
felt very good to me. I canremember going to revivals with
my dad, and there were fourchildren, the youngest two were
(26:07):
six, seven years younger thanme.
But I can remember going torevivals that were popular when
I was a boy when the rest of myfamily wouldn't go. And so I
always wanted to go. And it wasduring a revival when I was nine
that we had a evangelist at thechurch speaking and on a Friday
(26:34):
night and I remember hearingHave Thine On Way, Lord song and
I'm trembling all over and Iexcused myself and got stepped
over all the other eight, nine,10 year olds that were all
together on the pew. And I wentup and gave my life to Christ.
(26:55):
So it's been a journey of faiththat I had no major crossing to
do.
I was, I felt early on that Iwould be a minister. In fact, I
(27:19):
remember telling my grandmotherthat I was gonna be a minister
when I was only about 12. And Idon't know if she told my
parents or not, but my parentsnever talked to me about that.
They kind of let me do my ownthing. As we became 15, 16 years
(27:40):
old, my dad moved from Memphisto Knoxville.
And I wasn't quite sure whereKnoxville was. And I don't think
I had Tennessee history yet, youknow, I just knew it was
somewhere way away. And so itwas a time before cell phones.
It was a time before longdistance calls were expensive. I
(28:04):
was, you know, and no internet.
And so when we moved, it wasvery hurtful leaving a youth
group of 50 people and going toa church that the youth group
was my sister and me and a fewother people, but not very many
and not active at that, goingfrom a suburban church to a
(28:30):
downtown church. And everythingwas different, it was as
different as walking to school,as having to ride a bus. So it
was day and night different andI thought at that time, I never
wanna be a preacher, if I'mgonna have to do that to my
(28:51):
family. And it was actuallyabout twelve years later, was 28
when I finally yielded to thecall to go into the ministry.
And I always knew that that waswhat I wanted to do.
I emulated my dad, he was themost influential of me and my
(29:11):
faith journey. I just soaked upeverything, I remembered
sermons, I was probably the mostoutspoken in Sunday school,
except for Janet, if you're outthere. Janet, you talked a lot,
but I liked everything you said.But church was always normal and
(29:33):
I never have gotten away fromthe church. Even the time that I
wasn't living at home, my wifeand I both have always gone to
church and been active in ourfaith journey.
T. J. (29:49):
When you were growing up and then both your your father
and your mother were very active
Mark (29:56):
Right.
T. J. (29:57):
In the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. What were
those conversations like aroundthe kitchen table? Because I've
noticed in in my own life, wehave faith conversations, you
know, may even be aboutscriptures and what it means to
be a disciple. But there's alsoconversations about the life of
(30:19):
the church, you know, almost theadministrative side or the the
people side. So what was thatenvironment like, for you?
Were were there faithconversations in the home, or
was the church life separatedfrom the home life?
Mark (30:39):
Separated to some degree. You're right, my mother was
certainly involved as well. Andshe would say, if I was talking
about priorities of I've got todo this for school, I've got to
do this for church, here'ssomething happening at the
(31:02):
church, but I've got this schoolconflict. Unless we were on
deathbed, we were expected to goto church. And if we had to stay
up late to do our schoolproject, we did.
So she was adamant about that.It's interesting around the
table, a lot of times growingup, we were quite, we always ate
(31:30):
together, dinner, I rememberdinner just every night you
didn't go out that much, thereweren't that many places to go
early on and I doubt my dadcould afford to take us many
places, but it took a lot oftime and effort to take out six
people and money. And mother wasa great cook and we sat down and
(31:53):
dad would, many years, pull outan upper room and read a
devotional. And then he'd letthe older children, me and my
sister, take turns or motherreading the devotional, he'd
pass it on and we readeverything including the prayer.
But the funny thing was, as Ilooked back that mother was
(32:18):
frustrated.
In fact, I'm this way now when Icook, which not very often, but
I do cook some and when I haveit ready, I wanna sit down and
eat right then. It's all ready,it's hot, it's ready, it's right
now. And you know my wife mightthink of three things she has to
(32:39):
do real quick, right? And I'mtrying to count to 10, know, I
don't wanna get upset, but Ithink it dates back to my mother
because we would sit down at thetable and everything's piping
hot and we serve the food on thetable and it would be in front
of us family style to pass bowlsaround. And then we'd have this
(33:00):
devotional that took fiveminutes and mother sometimes
would look awfully exasperatedlike I worked so hard to get
this on the table.
As far as conversations,especially Sunday afternoon
conversations, usually a roastwas in the oven or something and
we have a fun Sunday afternoonlunch. But the conversation was
(33:22):
primarily between my mother anddad who would talk about the
people that were there or notthere. And I still remember one
of the greatest in-depthdiscussions was about the first
time a woman wore pants tochurch. And my mother was just
thought that was the worst thingthat she'd ever seen in her
(33:45):
life. And who was that?
Yeah, did you see her? And Ican't believe that they did
that. And so those were some ofthe conversations of just kind
of deprogramming of whathappened. Well, I didn't see so
and so that day. And I noticedsomeone so was there and that's
(34:06):
bled over to me a lot of timeson Sundays.
I'm processing stuff like thatto myself, not so much over a
dinner table. We typically goout to lunch on Sunday and
probably as a way to kinda do abreak from one thing to the
next. But, so a lot of theconversation was not so much
(34:32):
family order, it was just afamily way of doing things of
dad would give a monologue,mother would give a monologue,
not much dialogue and talkingabout what had happened that
day. And it could be as simpleas, well, we thought that the
anthem went well, the music wentwell. All my family sang, My dad
(34:57):
sang, mother sang and played thepiano in Oregon.
My siblings all sang, we're allstill in choirs. And it was
always a big deal. And there wasmore gathering around it. For
me, I don't remember my siblingsas much, but they could have
done that without me there. Butthere was a lot going on when my
(35:19):
mother played the piano.
I would go and stand at thepiano and sing anything she'd
play. And so there was a lot ofmusic in the home and that was
one of my early memories ofdoing all that.
T. J. (35:32):
Are you the eldest of the siblings?
Mark (35:36):
No, oldest son, but I have a sister that's twenty one
months ahead of me, one yearahead of me in school. Okay. And
so I wasn't the oldest. Right.
T. J. (35:46):
Alright. Why the ministry? Because you've had
that opportunity. You had thosekitchen table and living room
discussions of the wonderfulfamily that is found in the
community of faith. Butsometimes it's that family that
also can hurt the minister, theminister's family.
(36:12):
And I know it's hit and miss ofthe people that I know. Some
have been attracted, and and itseems to be sort of in the blood
in terms of calling intoministry, some type of vocation.
And then others are justcompletely repelled and may not
even be active in any faithcommunity or any church. What
(36:34):
was it for you, Mark, thatattracted you and initiated your
call and kept that fire burninginto your late twenties?
Mark (36:45):
Well, as I said, we were quite active in church. My
company that I worked for movedme to Huntsville, Alabama. And
that was a pleasant move. Wewere in still Tennessee Valley.
(37:08):
Going to the CumberlandPresbyterian Church there, I was
known as David and not Mark.
And it didn't take very long forus to join and become active in
a church that was going to be aPCUSA church that was going to
(37:29):
be part of the church to start atri union church back then the
Presbyterian still had northernand southern Presbyterians. I
hadn't joined yet and they weregoing to have a tri union church
with the Cumberland Church nearour house. And we thought, we'll
start here in the PCUSA and thenwe'll move to this union church,
(37:50):
tri union church. We ended upbeing just a union church by the
time that that happened. Almostimmediately, know, we hadn't
been members more than a monthor two when I found out that
nominations were being receivedfor Deacon and that I was
(38:11):
nominated for Deacon.
Well, I had a couple of eldersthat showed up at my house to
say, Who are you? And I said,What do you mean? Well, you've
been nominated to be a deaconand we don't even know who you
are. I mean, you've joined thechurch and then they had 500,
six hundred members and I wasbrand new in the community
(38:35):
practically and a young guy inmy 20s. And so I started telling
them a little bit about my faithand whatnot and my background.
And they're like, well, was aGod thing. But in the church,
became a deacon. I was atreasurer. I was a Sunday school
teacher. Sang in the choir.
(38:57):
Everything I would do, it wasn'tenough. I just couldn't get
enough of doing church stuff.And the funny thing is that when
my wife and I married, she knewthat I was called to be a
preacher. I mean, she sensed it,she had good insight. And I
assured her I'd never do that.
(39:18):
That wasn't something that Iwould do, I'd already said no to
that. So a lot of things kepthappening and then she
challenged me and said, you knowGod's calling you to be a
preacher. And I'm like, but Idon't wanna do it. And I was
happy in business and my dad hadhuge shoes to fill and I didn't
(39:40):
really want to do anythingbesides Cumberland Presbyterian.
I wanted to be in the CumberlandPresbyterian church.
And a lot of neat things werehappening. I could take a long
time to tell you about manyaffirmations of my call that I
had to do it. But the one that Iwill tell you is that I had to
(40:06):
first move my membership back tothe Culmer Presbyterian Church.
And so we drove up to Knoxville,told my parents, and we made a
plan for me to come meet withthe committee on the ministry on
a Friday night before apresbytery meeting, and then at
(40:33):
presbytery I would be presentedto be received as a candidate.
T. J. (40:37):
All right, so really that close, Friday night, eleventh
and then Saturday was thepresbytery meeting.
Mark (40:45):
Right, right, so now my wife is, we had a child about
four, and she's great withchild. I mean she is like, this
happened the October 1 for thatpresbytery meeting and second
(41:09):
baby was born October 10. Soshe's great with child. And so
we're at my parents' house andmy parents are both passed, so I
don't mind saying that they keptthe house too hot at night.
Okay, I'm just saying, oh mygoodness.
And so we're relegated to one ofmy sister's bedroom staying in
(41:32):
my parents' house and there's acrib in there that our four year
old was able to sleep in. Sohe's in the bed now, we're on
central time and we've come backto Eastern. My parents have gone
to bed. Sally's pregnant, can'tsleep. She's in there reading.
I'm in the bed tossing andturning. I've met with the
(41:52):
committee on the ministry andthat night on Friday night,
they're pushing me on thecommittee on the ministry about
my call. And I said, well, I hadbeen called to administrate.
I've been called to teach. I'vebeen called to maybe go into
missions.
I've been called to do all thesethings. And what about called to
(42:15):
preach? And I said, I've notbeen called to preach. I don't
think I'm gonna preach. Right?
And they're hemming and hawingand they said, well, we think
that that'll come and we'regonna recommend you. So I'm
laying in the bed and need toget to sleep because I'm getting
up early to drive toPresbyterian and as I'm laying
(42:38):
there there's a light coming inthrough a cracked door, my
wife's down the hall, my parentsare across the hall asleep in
their room. There's a light inthe hallway that's still on, my
door's cracked to my sister'sbedroom, Got a kid sleeping over
here, pregnant wife down thehall, all this stuff's
emotionally in my mind. And Ilook over and laying on the side
(43:00):
table is my mother's NewTestament from Gideon that she
got at some school event whenshe was a kid in the thirties,
right? And I picked it up and Ijust kind of flipped it open and
it fell open to first Timothyfour.
(43:23):
And it had two different columnsbut reading straight across
these verses aren't together.But in the way I held them in
the light of the door and heldthe Bible at an angle it read,
go preach, tell Mark I have needof him. How about I fell out of
(43:43):
bed? And so I told that storythe next day at presenter and I
said, I take it back, I've beencalled to preach. He even used
my name.
T. J. (43:56):
Yeah, is certainly a big affirmation.
Mark (43:59):
Yeah, yeah. And so, then I was off and running with
preaching and the other thingthat was a major event was that
I found myself in interimministry. And so I served the
(44:26):
church as a state of supply fortwo years while I was in school.
And then I went back intobusiness and then I started
doing interims and pulpitsupply. And it felt very natural
and good.
Now I had my father at thatpoint has gone to the seminary
as president at MTS. And so heis just as disgruntled about my
(44:49):
path as anybody because I'mcalled to be a full time
minister. You know, I must belike a Jonah. And you know, I'm
running from the Lord. And Isaid, I'm doing ministry.
And I was being effective withserving in many different
churches and I felt very goodabout that. And I continued on
my interim journey. And I guessit was probably twenty years
(45:13):
into doing that before my dadfinally said one time that he
thought that I was doing theright thing. I was well, it's
good to know dad, thank you verymuch. But another time I was
wondering about my calling.
One of the things I alwaysthought about was this thing
about being full time businesspart time clergy. And now later
(45:34):
in life, God seemed to it that Icould retire from business and
be full time clergy in myretirement years, which is
great. But I remember somewherealong the way, a lot of ways, a
lot of the times I'm looking atmyself as, am I not doing the
right thing? Because I should befull time pastor, part time
(45:55):
business. And I never wanted thebusiness to be a lure of making
more money, having more freedom,doing more things differently.
And so I would always angst overthat not constantly, but I would
And many of the churches I'dserved as an interim, they'd
say, well why don't you stay andbe our minister? And I'd be, I'd
(46:18):
have to, you know, wrestlethrough that again, you know?
And
T. J. (46:22):
So you had those reminders. If it wasn't, if you
didn't bring it up mentallyyourself, was a Yeah.
Mark (46:30):
So one day I'm at lunch with Gene Richardson and he was
about my dad's age and sometimesyou can talk differently to
people that aren't family soclosely connected. And so I
shared with him my angst over mycalling and being part time,
(46:51):
full time, etcetera. And Gene,if you knew Gene, he had a way
of laughing at things and kindof chuckled at me and kind of
offended me at the same time.And I said, what is it? He said,
well Mark, he says, how often doyou pray for God's will?
And I said, well, all the time.And he laughed again and he
(47:16):
said, well, what makes you thinkyou're not in it? And it was
very satisfying that day. I waslike, yeah, yeah, good point. It
makes me think I'm not in it,right?
And so that was a goodaffirmation too that I was doing
the right thing. And even if Ididn't fully understand it it it
(47:38):
was what I did and it was good.
T. J. (47:41):
It's that comparison, comparing yourself to other
colleagues in ministry, theunderstanding of what ministry
is or the interpretation of whatministry is during that time and
even currently today. Yeah. Ican imagine you wearing
(48:05):
something on your shoulders thatprobably didn't need to be
there. There is the practicalityof just being able to to make a
living. And and being bivocational has always been part
of the Cumberland PresbyterianChurch, always.
Sure.
Mark (48:27):
Well, I liken myself to a Paul as far as being a
tentmaker. In fact, that's whatthey call the bivocational tent
making ministry, right? And so Ithink I did probably, I think I
counted 17 interims.
T. J. (48:45):
Good grief.
Mark (48:46):
And those interims lasted up to a year at a time, and then
I did a number of statedsupplies, so I had a little bit
of control, kind of like whatI'm doing in counseling, of
setting some parameters. So Iwent to a church that I felt
like I wouldn't mind stayingmore than a year. I would come
(49:14):
in as a state of supply. Andthen it enabled me to stay at
one church five years, onechurch four years, one church
three years.
T. J. (49:25):
But
Mark (49:26):
these were churches that just needed me part time. And I
would always stay only theinterim if I knew they needed a
full time person. And because weworked very hard to find that
(49:46):
full time person for them. WhenI came to Loudoun Church, which
I'm delighted to be at, I haddone, I only count them as one
interim, but I did fivedifferent interims there.
T. J. (50:04):
Okay.
Mark (50:04):
Was the pastor between every minister for five
ministers since 1989.
T. J. (50:13):
Now I wonder what that says.
Mark (50:16):
Well, they tried to get me to come and be their minister
back in the 80s, late 80s, and Iwrestled with that. I almost
said yes, didn't say yes. Infact, when went back in 2016, I
(50:39):
didn't take it as an interim, Itook it as a state of supply
thinking I may stay. Becausethey knew I would retire not
long hence, maybe I could stayand be the pastor, and that's
what's happened. And it's beengood, but being there nine
(51:00):
years, I tell them is not reallytrue.
I think if you add up all theinterims, I've been there, you
know, three or four years longerthan that. And so I've gone
through multi generations ofpeople there. And I apologize to
the man who was on the searchcommittee, he's passed now since
I've been there, but he was onthe search committee that were
(51:25):
very influential of wanting meto come back in the 80s. And I
apologized to him, Bill was hisname. I said, I'm sorry that I
didn't take the church all thoseyears ago because this is where
I need to be.
And he said, no, he said, thisis where you need to be now. And
we need you now. And it wasvery, again, affirming that he
(51:46):
was able to take my personalfeelings of wanting to be a part
of that church sooner. Butknowing that if I'd done that in
the eighties chances are Iwouldn't still be there. And
this is the time that I wasneeded to be there.
So I thought that was very wiseand very comforting to hear. And
(52:10):
so I believe God has his handson all of us if we're willing to
listen and search and continueto ask God for him to guide us.
And then whatever we're in, whyshould we doubt we're not in
God's will if everything seemsto be falling into place?
T. J. (52:31):
What benefits do you think there are from a
minister's perspective of doingan interim in lieu of stated
supply or full time ministry,since you've done both?
Mark (52:48):
One thing about the interim is you're a member of
every church and you're a memberof none. So I would say that
anybody who does look at anintentional interim which I
didn't start out intending todo. I would suggest that first
of all they find a home churchthat they don't agree to be an
(53:10):
interim for. Because it's hardon the family As I dragged three
kids with us everywhere we went.Now I can tell you they know
every Southern Gospel songthat's ever written because we
sang them all the way church andback with great joy.
(53:33):
In fact I love hearing mygrandkids tell me that mom sings
these songs you know and I'mlike yeah yes I bet she does
they're in her head. But I wouldsay that an interim is able to
come in with a critical eye andsee things that a minister
(54:00):
moving into the community mightbe slower to process. And
because we're there for ashorter period of time, we might
be able to address some things.I did things like change the
bulletin and change the order ofworship from time to time. I did
(54:27):
some things intentionallybecause I felt like it would
make the next person, anythingthat they changed would be like,
well, we're glad somebody's putit back like it was or whatever,
even if it wasn't, right?
Also there's a sense of freedomin the fact that I'm not here
(54:49):
because I need this jobindefinitely. And so there's a
freedom to be able to call itlike it is and say what you
wanna say. And I've got a dayjob if I need to go back, but
it's a real opportunity to lovepeople. And a lot of
(55:10):
relationships I made withchurches, I still have closeness
to those churches and to thosepeople. But yeah, I'd say as the
interim, protect your family andjust the confession of faith can
be a tool to help you as wellbecause it says you can only
(55:35):
serve six months as an interimand you can renew it one time.
And so when people when I wasdoing an interim said, we'd like
you to stay. I'm like, I can't.And so I would use that in my
favor and state of clerk leavesit open. And so when I came and
said, I'll come clerk, not stateof clerk, but state of supply. I
(55:56):
knew what I was doing.
I knew that I was allowingmyself to stay longer if I
wanted to. I do think one otherthing I'll say is that
undoubtedly serving as aninterim pastor made me a better
(56:16):
business professional and beinga businessman made me a better
pastor. And so for the bivocational, it broadened my view
and spectrum of being one of thepeople while I was leaving at
the same time. So I felt like Iwas able to see things more
(56:39):
clearly because of thatexperience.
T. J. (56:42):
Yeah. You were in the investment world, the financial
world for a long time. What ledyou into retirement?
Mark (56:57):
Getting older, but I will say that when I looked at
retirement from business, I hadthought for many years and I
don't know how long, but let'ssay twenty, a long time. I had
(57:18):
prayed the prayer that if it wasin God's will, I would like to
retire from business at somepoint and be a full time pastor.
And I wasn't waiting until theright church came along. I
(57:40):
really aged out. I mean, so Iretired in 2021 from business
after forty four years.
And I was at a place where Icould transition that
effectively because I hadthousands of people that I cared
(58:00):
for in that regard. It was likemy congregation at work. And so
I was in a good place totransition that. I probably
would have done it a year or twoearlier, but COVID hit. And all
of a sudden I'm able to workfrom home and do my work
effectively without having totravel as much.
(58:25):
And so because of that, I thinkI extended it a couple of years.
And so I set the date and that'swhat I wanted to do. In the
meantime, I've been at thechurch working part time and
increasing hours as I went alongsince 16. So they waited five
years for me to fully retire,but now I'm full time at the
(58:48):
church and I can't tell muchdifference between the time I
was putting in part time and thetime I'm putting in full time.
It's just that I'm installed asa pastor now instead of being
the status fly.
T. J. (59:04):
Right, right. Your focus has changed because, you know,
you've shifted from the businessworld a little bit, but then you
become a student. And you becomefull time at the Loudoun
Cumberland Presbyterian Church.So it's not like you're doing
less.
Mark (59:24):
Oh, no. It's kind of stuff.
T. J. (59:27):
Focus is different. And that's why I asked. It wasn't a
loaded question. It was, youknow, if you had a full plate
already in the business world,what constituted that shift?
Because hours per day, you'restill filling it up with
different activities.
Mark (59:48):
Well I'm a busy guy and I wouldn't know any other way to
live except to be busy. Some ofthat might be genetics that are
coming out of working a lot. AndI think genetics sometimes, you
(01:00:10):
mentioned earlier aboutministers that run from a
calling or run toward a calling,but I also think there's some
like me that come back to itbecause the gene surface at
different times of what probablyis in your background. But I
will say about schooling is thatI'd always wanted to go back to
(01:00:33):
school. I had taken a multitudeof continuing ed in the
financial world because I hadto, To keep up and to have the
credentials and the licensuresand all the ability to do what I
did, I had to go to a number ofprograms and get a lot of
certifications.
(01:00:54):
And I always had been in schooland in training and just didn't
have time to go back forreligious training until I
retired from business. And Itold my wife, I said, wife, I
said, I wanna go back to school.And so when I retired, she said,
please wait a year, please waita year. I thought that was great
(01:01:16):
advice. So I waited a year afterI retired.
And then I called my friendBarry Anderson at the seminary
who's since retired and said,Dean of Students at that time.
And said, Barry, I wanna comeback to school. What do you
recommend I take? And herecommended I get in a DMN
program. And I'm like, I don'twant a doctorate.
(01:01:36):
And he said, well, you've had somuch of the other stuff. He
says, there's a place for you inthe doctoral program and you
might really like it and yadayada yada. So I thought, well, I
don't want a doctorate, but I'llsign up for the class. Well, I
signed up for the class andfound that I loved it and I
(01:02:01):
seemed to be doing the rightthing. And I will tell you that
MTS is tricky in the DMINprogram.
They automatically sign you upfor the next class. So I
finished one and now all ofsudden I'm in the second one.
And then I finished it and I'min the third one, I'm in the
(01:02:22):
fourth. And so now I am in Julytaking the last of those
academic classes and withnothing left except to work. If
the dean's listening night andday on my project until it's
complete.
But it's been a journey, anadventure, and it seemed like a
(01:02:46):
great fit for me. I found mypeople, if you will, this
enables me to continue to servethe church. And there could be a
time, I'm sure there will be atime when lot will realize that
they've got an old preacher andthey need somebody with my
(01:03:07):
experience that's half my age.And perhaps I'll be able to
continue serving the church as atherapist. And so I felt like it
was a good fit that's how ithappened.
T. J. (01:03:25):
Mark, our conversation has kinda gone full circle.
Excuse me. It's gone fullcircle. We started with the
doctorate of ministry program,and now we're kind of back to
it, back to present tense.Looking over your life and
(01:03:46):
thinking about your faith, whenhave you felt nearest to God?
Mark (01:03:55):
Well, I'd say right off the bat that preparation for
sermons. I love that. Everyminister, every Christian person
(01:04:20):
should be spending a lot of timein the Bible. I found that when
I'm doing a teaching class,preaching a sermon, whatever, I
am more in the word than whenI'm not teaching or preaching.
And I usually am thinking one,two, three weeks ahead of what
(01:04:48):
I'm going to preach.
I love looking at the lectionaryevery week. I read all the
scriptures in the lectionaryevery week. I usually rely on
the spirit to lead me into whichscripture I'm gonna preach on. I
don't always use lectionary, butI primarily do.
T. J. (01:05:10):
And
Mark (01:05:12):
when I feel led to do a particular scripture, I'm
already outlining it in my headand writing some things down.
And I do that a week, two, threeahead of time. And then that
particular week, I do a lot ofreflection. After I reflect and
(01:05:32):
write my own thoughts andoutline and lay out my thoughts
on it. Then I love going tobooks.
I'm still a book guy, and Idon't search for it on the
(01:05:53):
computer. I have a greatlibrary, I'll go to my favorite
references and read what thesepeople have to say about it. And
then I take notes and reflect,so that when I sat down to write
a sermon, I've had all the fun.And it's been enriching and
(01:06:17):
rewarding. I feel really goodabout that.
And then of course the sermonwrites itself, you know, with
all that prep in there. Ofcourse some weeks I'm not able
to give it as much time asothers. Some weeks I don't pull
a resource book out because it'sall there, or maybe it's in
(01:06:40):
storytelling form. But anotherthing that makes me feel real
close to God is going to sleep,praying every night. It's very
similar to how I started offpraying as a child before I went
(01:07:03):
to bed.
And it's just very calming andmy wife is jealous that I can go
to sleep really fast. But that'smy secret is that when I lay
down to sleep, I'm laying myselfdown to sleep, know. And so
that's a very close encounter.And you know from being in
(01:07:27):
ministry, there's so manymeaningful experiences with God.
One thing fun at this church isthat because I've been there so
many times as an interim, I amleading people to Christ of kids
(01:07:49):
whose parents came to Christwhile I was there before and
knowing their grandparents andhaving this multi generational
connect.
I think that's all very specialtoo, is being able to have some
small part in the development ofpeople's life and their
(01:08:09):
Christian faith journey. I thinkthat's very impactful and very
humbling to be part of that.
T. J. (01:08:15):
Yeah. It's one of the only, if not the only, vocations
or callings that allows us tohave the ability to share and
have access with all aspects ofan individual or a family's
life. It isn't just thoseappointments where you schedule
(01:08:40):
things, but it is the joys andthe sorrows, all of it. And,
yeah, a physician doesn't havethat an attorney doesn't have
that a therapist doesn't havethat. Maybe even neighbors don't
have that or even other familymembers.
It's a very unique calling. It'sa very unique profession.
Mark (01:09:06):
And as I've been told in years past by many, if you're
called you really can't doanything else.
T. J. (01:09:15):
That's what I've come to understand by doing this, by
having Cumberland Road.
Mark (01:09:22):
So it's not work to me. I mean, went to work for forty
four years in business, but whenI go to church, I'm going to
church. I'm not going to work. Iused to leave notes to my wife
and say, I'm gone to work andhere's where I'll be today or
(01:09:46):
I'm gonna, know, this is myschedule if I'm in another state
working or whatever. But now ifI leave a note that I'm going to
the church, I'm not really goingto work.
I'm just going to church. So itfeels very good, very enriching.
And I don't tell my church, butI would do it for nothing.
(01:10:13):
Because it's not work to me. AndI'm just giving back what's been
given to me, and it's aprivilege.
Mark,
T. J. (01:10:24):
you have a scope and a perspective on church and
specifically with the CumberlandPresbyterian Church. Looking
into the future, what hopes doyou have for the denomination?
Mark (01:10:41):
Well, what hopes? Well, I hope it's always the church of
Jesus Christ. And I hope that wealways find the will of God to
(01:11:02):
lead us and not let it be ourwill. So I have always been one
of embracing medium theology.And I remember when Forrest
Prosser was a moderator someyears ago and he gave a message
(01:11:24):
on medium theology and I thoughthe did an excellent job.
I think we were in Chattanoogaat the time. And I thought he
did an excellent job of talkingabout how a needle in the middle
doesn't mean we're stuck in themiddle. And how we're able to go
to one side or the other asneeded, and we can center back
(01:11:47):
in the middle. And I like thatimagery, and I think about that
a lot. And I think that ourchurch the church throughout
many denominations arestruggling with trying to move
that needle further to the rightor further to the left.
(01:12:10):
When I believe that Jesus diedwith all sinners. And I believe
that Jesus could be more thanstuck in the middle. And yet, I
think he still would bringeverything back to a centralized
(01:12:31):
place in service to God. So whatI'd like to see is if I could,
wave a wand that doesn't existand say, let's do this. I can
admire people who are passionateabout their faith.
I have people in my church whoare passionate way progressive.
(01:12:58):
Passionate way conservative. AndI love them both. And I respect
them both. And I admire theirpassion.
But I don't want to do thingsthat alienate either one. And so
I'd like to see our church bemore loving with praying
together what God's will iswithout excluding extremes.
(01:13:25):
Mark,
T. J. (01:13:28):
what have we missed in our conversation that we haven't
talked about yet that you'd liketo share before we conclude?
Conclude is such a strong word.I feel like conversations can
always be ongoing. But before wepart ways, what did we miss?
(01:13:50):
What questions did I not askthat you wanted an opportunity
to speak to?
Mark (01:13:58):
Well, I don't know what they would be. I appreciate the
time to talk about the DMINproject for a doctorate that I
didn't really want. But Ibelieve this is God's path for
(01:14:18):
me right now, is to do this. Iwill say that since I have been
taking an approach ofintentional counseling, And
since I have created anenvironment of safe sanctuary
(01:14:41):
and safe space for people tocome, I have seen my counseling
time increase a lot. And I didnot know that there was so much
(01:15:01):
need in my particular churchthat once I turned it on, I
haven't tried to turn it off orslow it down, I'm just letting
it happen.
But I remember in the process,our assignment is that we have
to have at least fifty hours ofsupervised counseling where
(01:15:23):
people, where we talk to someoneabout the people that we're
seeing, not so much the people,but just to talk about how we
handled it and what we learnedand how we applied it and all
this kind of stuff. And Iremember my wife saying 50
people. How will you ever get 50people? Well, that's not a
(01:15:45):
problem. And so many people arecoming.
So I feel like that when wecontinue to learn, continue to
pray for God's will, continue toplace ourselves out there in
service, that when we pray Godsend us somebody that we can
minister to, he will. And so Ifeel like I'm in the middle of
(01:16:09):
God's grace and mercy andservice doing things that I
never thought I'd be doing justsimply because I was willing to
go take a class. And so I wouldchallenge people to be willing
to step out of the norm andbreak the paradigm and try
something different, and whoknows, it could be God leading
(01:16:31):
you on a new path.
T. J. (01:16:33):
Mark, how did you make that shift for the people at
Loudoun specifically, who'dknown you for years, known you
as an interim, known you asbeing bi vocational, knowing you
as stated supply. How did youarticulate that shift that yes,
(01:16:54):
I am those things. And, I alsowant to add the ability to spend
time with you in a therapeuticsession?
Mark (01:17:06):
Well, I may know, I wasn't trying to hide anything from
going to school. I didn'tbroadcast it, but the elders all
knew, the session knew, familyknew, people would ask me why am
I going back to school and whatare you doing and all this stuff
and conversation was out there.But when I had transitioned the
(01:17:33):
office, I had some ladies in thechurch who were very helpful in
making that happen with makingit look good and appropriate.
And at the same time I ranannouncements in our newsletter
that I was taking people in forcounseling and this is what I
(01:17:55):
was doing with school. Andthough I had been counseling for
all of my ministry, this is adifferent level of counseling
that was now available throughacademics and learning and
intentional type of therapy,etcetera.
And I've had people come in totalk nothing but religion. And
(01:18:16):
I've had other people come in totalk to me about their broken
families, dysfunction this,triangle that, health, whatever
it might be. And so it kind ofopened the door. So I ran that
ad maybe once in one month, oncethe next month, and then
word-of-mouth. And it seems tobe very effective.
(01:18:39):
Now one of my elders said to me,as he was helping take the table
out of my office and put thecouch in the office, said, and
he's a friend and he's about myage. And he says, well, he says,
my wife and I may wanna cometalk to you. And I said, that'd
(01:18:59):
be great. He says, but we'regonna wait till you get more
experience. And so I've taken itall with a grain of salt and if
I can help, I'm ready.
I have more tools available thanever before to help you. And yet
(01:19:21):
I'm not keeping a list of who'sbeen in and who's not, And so
it's just making people awarethat this is something that I
can do and will do. And I'veeven had a few refer me to
somebody outside our church inthe community to call me who
didn't wanna talk to their ownminister. And so I've had a few
(01:19:42):
of those that happened and thatdoesn't bother me either at this
point. But that's how ithappened.
Just was transparent with who Iam and what I'm doing.
T. J. (01:19:57):
Mark, I appreciate your time. I appreciate you sharing
me sharing with me your yourjourney, and, it was interesting
to be able to come full circle.We kinda came full circle twice
in one conversation, which isalways enjoyable. Especially for
(01:20:17):
your time.
Mark (01:20:17):
I really appreciate it. Interest in in facilitating this
and making it happen. So thankyou.
T. J. (01:20:26):
Thank you for listening to this episode of Cumberland
Road. I hope you find thispodcast both enjoyable and
insightful and helps you connectwith others to have deep faith
conversations. In closing,here's a quote from Paul Tillich
in his book Dynamics of Faith.If faith is understood as
(01:20:51):
belief, that is something istrue. Doubt is incompatible with
the act of faith. If faith isunderstood as being ultimately
concerned, doubt is necessary.It is the consequence of the
risk of faith. Thanks forlistening.
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