I am a pastor

(Written a week ago for my other blog, www.sethmarkwood.com)

I had a bit of a surreal moment today. This morning I wrote my first post on this blog which is going to be a blog following my journey of weight lose and ultimately getting healthy. In writing my introduction I wrote a small bio that included my pastoral status. It freaked me out a bit. As many of you know 6 years during an intense evening of prayer I heard God say (no audible voice or burning bush, it was more like I just knew what had to be done) that I was supposed to become a pastor and plant a church. It was an experience like no other, I had and to this day have no question it was God so I immediately (after freaking out for a bit… being a pastor was the last thing I would ever had wanted to do) started looking into what it would take to make that a reality.

For the last 6 years I have been in a constant state of “one day” being a pastor. As I started to pursue my Undergraduate degree in Religion at Liberty University it was so that “one day” I could get a Masters degree and become a pastor. When I started pursuing my Masters degree it was so that “one day” I could graduate, plant a church, and then I would be a pastor. In my mind pastor-hood has always existed for me in the future tense.

Last year I preached my first sermon ever. It was for a class, of course I don’t think it was great, I was nervous (who wouldn’t be when you’re speaking on God’s behalf), but there were some people that left impacted and that’s a win in my book. After the service my friends and family who were in attendance took me out to Steak and Shake for a celebratory dinner (I love those). While there two of my friends, who, if we understand the notion of the church Biblically, are among the people that make up my local church unit, decided that I was qualified and ready to be ordained, so they did.

This is my ordination document. I have it framed in my office; it is signed by my two friends who wrote it, my wife, and my brother-in-law. It was written on the back of a Steak and Shake place mat (you can see that in the thumbnail image above). I love it. According to the state and the Southern Baptist Convention, ordination is the process through which a body of believers (church) publically recognizes that an individual has been called by God to lead His people as a pastor (usually as their pastor). In most churches this process involves church leaders ordaining other church leaders but that is a process born out of tradition. The Southern Baptists recognize that if a congregation says an individual is their pastor and is ordained, that person is. Even though I am not a church traditionalist, and even though I love my “ordination document,” I have always felt that I needed to be “officially” ordained by a church. Therefore, even though ordained, being a pastor was still a “one day” event.

About six months ago a good friend of mine asked me to help him plant his church. He is planting in Concord, NC, about an hour away from Greensboro but we have both attended Liberty and have both focused on different areas while there so we have a good set of complementary skills and knowledge. Initially he asked me to help him with hospitalities but ultimately he asked me to be his Executive Pastor. In my mind that essentially meant that I was the administrative guy, which at this early stage is largely true. I do a lot of the necessary paperwork, making sure legal matters are taken care, I am the sole HR rep right, a lot of what I do is behind the scenes work done throughout the week. I’m also the guy that fills in the gaps where needed. For the last six months that has been my mindset. I have still been looking out for the day when I will “one day” be a pastor.

Last week I graduated with a Master’s Degree in Church Planting and Evangelism. I have decided not to continue pursuing my Masters of Divinity degree, many of the classes are not going to helpful for church planting. There is still, a week after graduating (which I am very proud of), feeling like I am not qualified to do the work ahead because I did not get that quintessential “pastor degree.” I recognize how silly this is, the classes that I would have had to take to finish that degree would have been mostly useless in helping me plant a church, I recognize that my time, energy, and money would be better spent taking other classes and taking away the knowledge, or spending the next few months focusing on learning all I can working with my friend. I know those things but still there is this part of my brain, and it must be located in the insecurity sector that feels that without that degree I’m not qualified to do this thing I know I have been called to. It makes me feel very silly.

So, now to what prompted this (very long) post. Earlier today I wrote this:

“Currently I am ordained working as the Executive Pastor at a church plant in Concord, North Carolina.”

It didn’t dawn on my until a good bit later that I have never written those words before. I have never written that I am ordained. I have never thought of myself as ordained, not really, although I recognize that I have been. I accept my ordination but because I don’t think many pastoral leaders would I feel like I shouldn’t accept it… but I do. It also made me re-examine my title. My title is the “Executive Pastor.”

While much of what I do revolves around paperwork I am still a pastor in this church. I am ordained, I have been trained to be a pastor and church planter, I am performing the roles of a pastor… I am a pastor. “One day” is here, it’s today. I recognize that to fulfill the vision for my life God gave me I still have a long way to go, namely I have to plant a church, but as far as the part about becoming a pastor I have arrived. It is a hard thing to grasp because it has always been some future reality. What is even weirder is to think about how my future reality has become my present reality and my future reality has changed.

So, this is me, Seth Markwood, totally inadequate, ordained, qualified pastor; just a messed up kid working my hardest to please God and live a life that brings Him honor and glory. Even though I don’t feel good enough for my calling who am I to tell God He’s got the wrong guy? When God calls you its okay to think He’s got the wrong guy but trust Him and do it anyway. He knows more than us. He knew more than Moses and he’s the quitasential archetype of a guy who didn’t feel worthy for his calling, but look at what God did through his obedience. All you have to do is what God says. That’s why I can say, even though I don’t understand why, that I am a pastor. Weird.

The Rain, the Park, and Prune Things

I have some exciting news on the weight loss front but I have even more exciting news on the spiritual front. Let me qualify this by stating how amazing God is, how He provides for me always, even when it doesn’t feel like it. 41 days ago I embarked on an amazing journey of spiritual discipline, prayer, self discover, and… fasting. For the last 40 days I have put nothing into my body except juice and water (with 2 exceptions discussed later). I take church ministry very seriously. I think that if God calls you to a work you have every obligation to do it with the utmost excellence, care, and concern because you have an opportunity through that work to impact lives and ultimately impact the Kingdom of God and to not take that seriously is dishonoring to God. I believe that we are all in ministry, we have all been called to the jobs we have for a purpose. My calling just happens to be church planting which I feel has an even higher level of responsibility because the church is the bride of Christ. If I dishonor that… I know how I feel about people who dishonor my bride and I never want to be on the receiving end of those feelings from Jesus.

Jesus says in Matthew 16:18

“And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.”

There are a dozen ways I could examine this one verse but what strikes me here, given that I am working with a church plant, is that Jesus will build his church. We have a lot of training, a lot of schooling and data that tells us this strategy or that is effective but the reality of the situation is that we are not in control. Jesus builds His church. What power do we have then? I believe the greatest tool we have in our arsenal is prayer, fasting, and Bible study. If Jesus builds the church then our greatest asset is seeking His favor.

Jesus began His ministry by 40 days of fasting. Since I am the Executive Pastor a church plant I felt it necessary to mimic Christ’s behavior. While fasting I prayed for the church, prayed for my church plant, who to pursue, when, and where. I was in a great place spiritually which is the only reason I attribute to being successful. It was surreal. I did not experience hunger at all. I was mentally hungry, I wanted to taste my favorite foods (juice and water get old fast), but I never felt tempted to actually break the fast. Until the last 5 days I didn’t feel any hunger pains and those that I had at the end were completely manageable. It truly was a spiritual experience. I could not have succeeded if not for God. Last night when it ended I experience what many pastors call a “holy hangover.” This phrase typically means the feeling pastors have on a Monday morning. There is something about doing spiritual work that, when finished, you are left feeling exhausted. I had a bit of a crash last night and am still really tired today, it is a very interesting feeling.

There were two times I broke the fast. The first was about a week in. I was watching an online church service and they did communion. They provided time for the people at home to get something to join and I felt compelled to do so, so I got myself a stale frosted flake and some juice. That was the first solid food I had. The second was with 2 weeks left. I went to a conference of 13,000 people, the auditorium was packed, and at one point they announced that we were going to make a Doritos commercial to submit into the Super Bowl contest. They passed bags of Doritos around and asked everyone to take one chip, then on the count of 3 we all chomped the chip, making the most audible *crunch* I have ever heard. It was an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that I just couldn’t pass up.

My purpose in fasting was purely spiritual and it was a great success on that front. The secondary source of excitement comes from a physical result of the fast. While I understood that I would probably lose some weight because, well, I wasn’t eating, I figured that since I was drinking a lot of juice which is full of sugar my weight would mostly maintain. Imagine my shock when a friend asked me, half way through, to weigh myself. When I started weight watchers several months ago I weighed 480 pounds. Under any normal circumstances that number would have freaked me out but at the time I had already resolved to change my lifestyle so I recognize that that is just a really high starting point. When I started the fast I had already lost 10 pounds so 41 days ago I weighed 470. Half way through the fast my weight was down dramatically to 435.

I was shocked. Again, I didn’t expect to lose much if any weight and I had lost 35 pounds in a matter of 20 days. That’s unheard of. As you can imagine, that was an exciting bonus and at face value it may have seemed like that was the primary purpose of fasting. It was an unexpected shock and was certainly exciting, and was really the easiest to share news. Since most of what I was doing was praying there wasn’t much to share, but the fact that I’ve lost weight is exciting. So yesterday I went to the doctor and while there I had them weigh me on their very accurate scale. My weight at the end of the fast was 405. I had lost 65 pounds in 40 days! Now, I recognize that becomes my body isn’t used to holding food, because it thinks it has been starving it will probably hoard everything I eat for a few days so I’ll probably gain back 5-10 over the next week, but I’m okay with jump-starting my weight watchers journey with a net loss of 55 lbs.

To give you an idea of how much weight that is, here is a picture of me holding a Shopsmith headstock, it weighs 62 pounds. I could only hold it for about 4 minutes. It is insane to think that 41 days ago I was carrying that, plus 3 sugar bags with me everywhere I went.

So, that is my exciting update. I started the slow journey of become re-acclimated to food today. Prunes and Cheez-Its are not as great a combination as they might sound but it’s better to start slow and not wreak havoc on my body, yet. I’ve decided I will take 1 week off to enjoy some of my favorite foods (though the quantity will be greatly decreased since my stomach has shrunk, I could only eat 10 prunes and 20 crackers before I felt stuffed), and then I’ll be back to weight watchers and back to exercising regularly. 

Why Shrink?

I have been overweight all my life. I don't ever remember a time when I would have been qualified to hold the titles "skinny," "thin," "small," or if I'm honest, "healthy." I broke my femur when I was 8 which for those of you who don't know, is the strongest and thus hardest bone in your body to break. I did it again when I was 12. Perhaps the breaks where not caused by my weight but they certainly did not help me get healthy. To the contrary, they only amplified my already sedentary lifestyle.

Two years ago today I married my best friend, the most Godly woman I know and one day the mother of my children. People don't lie when they tell you that getting married often results in weight gain and there was no exception in my case. Unfortunately my already sedentary life magnified and to my dismay it transferred to my bride.

A long time ago I had given up on ever getting healthy. I had tried diets, all sorts. My favorite, being an avid carnivore, was the Low Carb diet which let you eat all the meat and cheese you could handle. Unfortunately I am also an avid pizza-vor and to my surprise a month of eating nothing but bacon and cheese does actually get old. I realize now that it didn't help that mentally I always viewed those months as diets which, if I am honest, I never expected to last. I wanted to lose some weight and maintain it, yes, but I never expected my lifestyle to change, never expected to get healthy, never expected to become that which I had never been, small, skinny, healthy.

A few months ago that changed. I wish I was a better husband and could say that my motivation for getting healthy was wanting to grow old with my wife. Certainly I want to do that, more than many things, but I am still in my 20's and think I am invincible so getting into better shape does not seem like it will extend my life expectancy. I wish I could say I was motivated to do it for my future kids so I can play with them when they are growing up, to ensure that I am around for them to see them graduate, to walk my daughter down the wedding aisle, to hold my first grandchild. While I recognize both of these and while they both played some part in my decision they were honestly not enough on their own to make me make what I thought to be an impossible change. Again, I have never thought I could be successful.

So, back to the title, why shrink? As the title suggests I am a pastor. Currently I am ordained working as the Executive Pastor at a church plant in Concord, North Carolina. I believe that God has called me to plant a church in Greensboro, NC in the near future. One day a few months ago I was convicted. I recognized that Biblically my complacency about being unhealthy was sinful and if I was choosing to live a life of sin I did not feel fit to lead God's people.

On this Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9:25-27:

Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.

Proverbs 23:20-21 says:

Do not join those who drink too much wine
       or gorge themselves on meat, 

 for drunkards and gluttons become poor,
       and drowsiness clothes them in rags.

Phillipians 3:17-21 says:

Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you. For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.

All of this to say that a few months ago I started Weight Watchers. They say it is good to document your weight-loss journey so that is what I am going to try to do. When I started a few months ago I was 480 pounds. Yes, I was a big, big unhealthy boy. My body mass index or BMI says that my ideal weight for my height is 205 (that is the high end) but I don't think my frame would allow that. If I can get down to 250 (and have muscles, something I lack right now), I think I would be happy. Ultimately my goal is to be able to go to Cedar Point in Ohio and fit in any seat on the roller coasters, not just the fat man seat. As of now I probably couldn't even fit their. If I were dieting and weighed myself I would have flipped out and probably eaten a pizza. This is not a diet, this is the beginning of a life-long journey, a lifestyle change. I refuse to be my own downfall in ministry. I refuse to the catalyst for getting to spend any less time with my wife or kids.

That is why I must shrink.