10/30/2026
"Soon after I received the call to be Marion’s pastor, I had the opportunity to take a class on church revitalization with the late Dr. Harry Reeder. I told him that I worried about the size of our church and the possibilities of growth. He replied with a story of a church he spoke at several years earlier. The church had experienced a serious decline over the pastor’s years of ministry. After one of Dr. Reeder’s talks, they were in the pastor’s office when he suddenly broke down. When he came to the church, there were 300 members. Now, twenty years later, they were just above 100. There was no church controversy or issue. The town itself had rapidly declined as the economy shrank. Children didn’t move back home because of that, and the parents would follow their kids to be closer to their grandkids. Dr. Reeder didn’t give him an evangelism campaign plan, an outreach plan, or five steps to grow the church. Instead, he told him to be faithful to the calling he received. Instead of thinking, 'Look at how few we are!' Think, 'Thank God we’ve got who we’ve got.'”
- Philip Ryan
Introduction One of the best books I’ve read on pastoral ministry was The Pastor of Kilsyth. Written by Islay Burns, it describes the life and ministry of his father,…
