EM Pastor's Column
Thoughts on my 20th year of vocational ministry.
Rev. Jacob Park
For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I
know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully
known. – 1 Corinthians 13:12
I predict that 2020 will be a year of retrospection and renewing
vision for many Christians around the world. 20/20 means “near
perfect sight”, but we hardly ever see 20/20 when it comes to our
perspective on the world. We rarely ever see 20/20 in hindsight,
contrary to the cliche “hindsight is 20/20”. By nature, we are in-
fluenced by our conscious and unconscious preferences and fears.
For myself, 2020 will mark the 20th year of vocational ministry.
Looking back on things, I know fairly clearly that I knew nothing
when I started as a young 25 year old Youth Pastor at Korean
Community Presbyterian Church of Atlanta (KCPC,아틀란타연
합장로교회). I went from a comfortable and lucrative IT career,
where I was a respected pioneering expert in the field, to working
at a Korean American mega-church where I was paid less than
1/3 of what I was making in IT, and where no-one respected me
other than the kids in the Youth group of which I was the Pastor.
The first 2 years of full-time ministry at KCPC were among the
hardest, yet most joy-filled and growing years of my life.
A couple of things that I’ve come to know for certain (nearly
20/20) are that God is sovereignly faithful, and that His Word
endures and is what leaders in the church really need to focus on.
I’ve seen God at work, there have been times when I doubted that
He was working, but when I look back, I can see how His hand
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