On Monday, October 24th, Eugene Peterson, pastor, professor, and author of The Message and numerous other books died at the age of eighty-five. He left a rich, reflective, earthy, and grace-filled legacy. Below are the insights from his writings that I’ve appreciated or have influenced me the most. At the beginning, I’ve also included one passage from The Message because it illustrates how Peterson was so often able to capture both the heart of the text and the human experience in pursuit of God.
Romans 7:14-25
“I know that all God’s commands are spiritual, but I’m not. Isn’t this also your experience? Yes. I’m full of myself—after all, I’ve spent a long time in sin’s prison. What I don’t understand about myself is that I decide one way, but then I act another, doing things I absolutely despise. So if I can’t be trusted to figure out what is best for myself and then do it, it becomes obvious that God’s command is necessary.
But I need something more! For if I know the law but still can’t keep it, and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don’t have what it takes. I can will it, but I can’t do it. I decide to do good, but I don’t really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don’t result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.
It happens so regularly that it’s predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God’s commands, but it’s pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.
I’ve tried everything and nothing helps. I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?
The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.”
Discipleship and Holiness
In his classic on discipleship, Peterson describes sanctification as “a long obedience in the same direction.” He writes in his book by the same name, “There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue, little inclination to sign up for a long apprenticeship in what earlier generations of Christians called holiness.”[1]
Praying with Others at Church
“What things do we learn in common prayer?
One thing we learn is to be led in prayer. I’m apt to think of prayer as my initiative. I realize I have a need or I am happy, and I pray. The emphasis is on me, and I have the sense when I pray that I started something.
But what happens if I go to church? I sit there and somebody else stands before me and says, ‘Let us pray.’ I didn’t start it; I’m responding. Which means I am humbled. My ego is no longer prominent… So the congregation is the place where I’m gradually learning that prayer is not conditioned or authenticated by my feelings.”[2]
Sabbath, Busyness, and Serenity
Definition: “Uncluttered time and space to distance ourselves from the frenzy of our own activities so we can see what God has been and is doing. If we do not regularly quit work for one day a week we take ourselves far too seriously. The moral sweat pouring off our brows blinds us to the primal action of God in and around us.”[3]
“How can I lead people into the quiet place beside still waters if I am in perpetual motion?”[4]
“The appointment calendar is the tool with which to get unbusy. It’s a gift of the Holy Ghost (unlisted by St. Paul, but a gift nonetheless) that provides the pastor with the means to get time and acquire leisure for prayer, preaching, and listening… I say ‘My appointment calendar will not permit it’….”[5]
“All the water in all the oceans cannot sink a ship unless it gets inside. Nor can all the trouble in the world harm us unless it gets within us.”[6]
Conversational Humility
“Pastors especially, since we are frequently involved with large truths and are stewards of great mysteries, need to cultivate conversational humility. Humility means staying close to the ground (humus), to people, to everyday life, to what is happening with all its down-to-earthiness.”[7]
Science vs. Faith
“Since the days of Galileo, Genesis 1 has been controversial. But the controversy is not between science and faith, not between the person who reads Darwin and the one who reads Calvin. Whenever the controversy has been conducted along those lines, it has been the wrong battle, like two brothers fighting over a woman they find out is their sister.”[8]
If you know little of Peterson or would like to know more, here’s a great 19-minute video:
[1] A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an Instant Society.
[2] The Contemplative Pastor (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1989) 8-9.
[3] Working with the Angels.
[4] Op. Cit., 19.
[5] Op. Cit., 22.
[6] A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an Instant Society, 43.
[7] The Contemplative Pastor (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1989) 115.
[8] As Kingfishers Catch Fire.