My path to becoming an ordained minister was pretty direct. I set my eyes on theological education fairly early in my college career. Although I technically graduated from college under the college’s independent studies program, I had earned enough credits for a double major in Christian Thought and Philosophy with a minor in French, which was a pretty good foundation to go on to theological seminary. I had made my intention of becoming a pastor clear in my local church and Conference as well, and served as a licensed minister in a local church during my senior year of college. Interestingly my license authorized me to perform all the rites and sacraments of the church with the exception of marriage. No one in the congregation I served at the time asked me to officiate at a wedding, so the exception never came into play. I suspect it was put there more to prevent me from officiating at the weddings of friends and classmates, but none of them asked me to do so, either. I was married at the time and had classmates who married, but there was no shortage of ordained ministers at our college.

I took what became known as the direct route of preparation for ordination after college, going straight to graduate theological seminary and there enrolled in a program in which I earned a combined Masters of Divinity and Doctor of Ministry degree in a four-year period with two internships. I became a “Student in Care of the Association” before heading to seminary and had an advisor in my local Association throughout my seminary time. In the spring of our last year of seminary, as we were preparing for graduation, we circulated our professional profiles and interviewed for and received the call to become local church pastors. After graduation we began serving two congregations while completing the steps to ordination in our home association, which included being interviewed by the Committee on Ministry for fitness for ordination, presenting a paper to an Ordaining Ecclesiastical Council of the churches in our Association and being ordained at a special meeting of the Association before being examined and installed as pastors in the congregations we were serving.

Somewhere along that journey I was at a couple of church meetings where a pastor was asked to give the blessing over a meal and declined, saying, “Others can say the blessing. It doesn’t always have to be the pastor who gives the prayer.” While I agree with the truth of that statement, there was something awkward about the way in which those particular situations were handled and I resolved to myself that when I became ordained I would never decline to offer a public prayer when asked. To the best of my knowledge I have kept that promise.

I have offered public prayers at a lot of church dinners. I have also prayed publicly in a lot of different places including delivering the invocation at City Council and State Legislature sessions, praying at service club meetings and fund-raising banquets for nonprofits, blessing fire trucks, ambulances, and law enforcement vehicles, dedicating homes and public buildings, and more.

I have also delivered a lot of prayers in more intimate settings. I have prayed while visiting church members in homes, hospitals, and care centers. I have offered a lot of prayers in hospital waiting rooms and patient care rooms, intensive care units and emergency rooms. I have prayed as people took their last breath and I have prayed as they recovered from near death experiences. I have prayed with the victims and survivors of sudden loss and trauma. I have prayed in jails and juvenile corrections facilities with inmates and with corrections officers.

There have been many places where I have had the opportunity to craft careful prayers. A teacher and mentor once challenged me to write a prayer for each class I taught. The challenge was specific about writing the prayer, not just offering an extemporary prayer. I believe the discipline of thinking about the class content, the students, and the learning process in advance and carefully choosing the words of the prayer has made me a better teacher. When giving an invocation at a formal event, I took time to craft prayers with great care. I once was asked to deliver a prayer to a group of persons with disabilities, their caregivers and family members and worked diligently on the prayer. The prayer was so well received that I was asked to pray with that group at every annual gathering until I retired and moved from that town. I always invested hours in writing and editing those prayers. I always wrote out the prayers for funeral and wedding services. Those are once-in-a-lifetime experiences for those involved and I was intentional about choosing the right words and avoiding misspeaking.

But there have also been occasions for prayer when there was no opportunity to prepare. I have walked into hospital rooms where I didn’t know anyone and been called to pray within moments of arriving, sometimes even before I knew the names of each person in the room. I have prayed with parents who have lost a child and with families who have lost an elder. I have prayed with persons who are unconscious and those who are in shock.

After a lifetime of praying in public, I recently was given a copy of a book by a colleague who I did not meet until he was very near to the end of his life. The book, published posthumously, is a collection of poems, prayers, and reflections of his years of ministry, including several years as a night chaplain in a major trauma hospital. “Lord of the night, Lord of the day” is the collection of writings by Dale Kimball. It is a powerful volume and an opportunity for me to learn even more about the craft of praying in public. One brief reflection has been dancing in my brain since I read it:

“Praying aloud in the presence of others helps me to keep some important things straight, such as telling the truth and not trying to be more than I really am.”

I know Dale is right. It is humbling to be truly honest in prayer and to bring your full self into the relationship with God and those who hear your prayer.

These days, I am not often asked to offer prayers. But there are still opportunities for public prayer that come to me. Dale’s simple statement has become a challenge for me just like the challenge to write prayers in preparation for teaching. I may have become a minister 46 years ago, but there is still much that I am called to learn, and many more prayers to offer.