"IT WAS 20 YEARS AGO TODAY..."

“Thus have I been twenty years in thy house;”  (from Genesis 31:41)

Fans of The Beatles will recognize that,  “It was 20 years ago today” is a line from the Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”.  I’m in a reflective mood today.  I’ve been thinking about the fact that it’s been roughly twenty years that I’ve been at First Assembly of God of Framingham.  The small church’s previous pastor, The Rev. Tom Gurney, left in August 1986 after having been pastor for a little over eight years.   At the time, I was serving as an Assistant Pastor at a large church in Walpole.  I first came to the Framingham church as a guest speaker on a Sunday morning in October of 1986.  Shortly thereafter, I was invited to meet with the church’s Pulpit Committee.  We did meet on a weeknight in early November of 1986.  I was craving Dunkin’ Donuts when I arrived at that meeting, and I guess it was a “God thing” that they had Dunkin’ Donuts as refreshments that night!

On the Sunday before Thanksgiving, I “candidated” to be the pastor of the Framingham church.  In the Assemblies of God,  like most other Pentecostal bodies, as well as Baptist and Congregational churches, the local church usually chooses their pastor, actually voting “yes” or “no” in a secret ballot vote.  I got a unanimous “yes” vote that day.

My wife and I, along with our three preschool children, moved into the church owned residence on Harrison Street on a very snowy Saturday in early January of 1987.  I was 32.  I was filled with energy and idealism.  I was (honestly) very impractical and inexperienced.  I envisioned this little church of (give or take) around 45 people growing to hundreds.  The church DID grow over the first couple of years.  (In those days we were in a small wooden church building with no parking lot at Hartford and C Streets.)  Unfortunately, the church shrunk again.  Over the coming twenty years it would grow and shrink and grow and shrink, although we never had more than 85 people at a time.   Currently, we have fewer people than when I came.  In 2001 and 2002, we came very close to closing the church’s doors, but we are actually starting to slowly grow again.  I have a “Christy Mihos” personality.  People either really love me or can’t stand me!  Over the years I’ve been told I’m everything from virtually the greatest pastor alive, to the phoniest and sleaziest pastor alive!  I will say, I’m much more mature than I was in 1987.  I’m much less impulsive.  I tend to be much more realistic.  In those days I was on the far right politically.  I guess today I’d be classified as “moderate” or “slightly right of center” politically.  I began to get very community-minded  somewhere around ten years ago, and that involvement has grown.  Today, I’m widely known around town, whereas in the late 1980s, pretty much nobody outside the church knew I existed.   My late mother struggled with weight and I’ve got that tendency.  I’m forty pounds heavier than I was the day I candidated for the church in November of 1986!  I had only a few stray gray hairs then- now it’s getting to be pretty much “salt and pepper”.  My youngest is now 20 and a Sophomore in college.  

On Thursday,  I made a deposit at the BankNorth on Franklin Street.  The teller was the person my wife and I opened a bank account with at the old Pioneer Financial Bank in 1987, which was on Union Avenue between the police station and the Memorial Building.  (The Town now has a municipal parking lot on that site.)  I wondered if that teller would remember that?  (I didn’t ask!)  That was ANOTHER Framingham, in many respects.  There were very few Brazilians in Framingham at that time.  I think there was one Brazilian business in downtown Framingham.  There was still a Brigham’s ice cream and sandwich shop in downtown Framingham, and there was Laurence Stationery.  Duca’s was still a “hot” nite spot on Route 9 (on the site of what’s now Walgreen’s at Prospect Street.)  There was a very old-fashioned  Stop & Shop at Beaver Street and Route 135.  What’s now the “Han Dynasty” on Concord Street was “Wallace’s” a landmark family restaurant.

At that time, I was amazed at the longevity of the clergy in town.  The Lutheran pastor had been in Framingham since 1955!  The Episcopalian rector had been in Town since 1961!  These guys remembered shepherding their people through the Cuban missile crisis and the J.F.K. assassination.  I could not imagine what if would feel like to be in Framingham THAT long.  Now I pretty much know!  

It freaks me out, because when I add twenty years to my present age, I’ll be 72.  Will I still be pastoring then, or will I be retired?  (Will I even still be on this earth?!)  I WOULD love to see the church grow to at least a hundred and become a much more stable congregation!  I’d also like to see our church make much more of an impact in the community.  I have dreams for myself, as well.  I’m a very good speaker, and I’d love to book a number of speaking engagements outside of the Framingham church.  I DID book a number of speaking engagements a couple of years ago, but after awhile I got SO tired of trying to sell myself as a speaker that I kind of gave up on it...maybe that was a mistake.  I’d love to write a regular newspaper column.  I’d love to have a part-time radio talk show.  But I will never put anything ABOVE pastoring, which is probably the highest calling God will ever give an ordinary human being.

Well, to quote a singer from my kids’ generation (Avril Lavigne), “I’m wishin’ my life away, with these things I’ll never say...”

Listen, make the most of EVERY day- twenty years goes by really fast!