The Two Best Pieces of Advice I've Received
This morning I saw a question, “What is the best advice you have received?”
Two things immediately popped into my brain.
Interestingly both happened within a couple of years of each other. Late 80s, early 90s. I was on staff at an Assemblies of God church in Albany, starting a campus fellowship at the University at Albany. And yes, it was Chi Alpha, which has been in the news recently for some disturbing stuff. (I left Chi Alpha in 1997. I wrote about it here.)
One of the people oversaw youth ministry in New York and drove a nice car. I don’t remember much more about him, but he was always friendly and approachable. (He was the one person at the district office you could call by their first name rather than “Brother Whatever”). The other guy I worked much closer with, and for years after, was the person that came to mind when I read the passage about ‘a thorn in the flesh’. While I looked at them differently, they were both people of character.
Piece of Advice Number One: Listen to Your Wife
One day I was sitting in the office of pastor number two. While we had little overlap in how we thought about ministry or much of anything, he had been pastoring long before I was born and often said things that impacted me.
For example, one of the rants he would go on (which I heartily endorse) was about pastors climbing the denominational ladder. He had a supervisory role, so when people were considering leaving their current positions and taking a new job, he would be one of the first people they had to tell. He said everyone tells him that God is calling them to a new thing, but that new thing is always a better position. No one ever came to him and said God is calling me to a role with less salary and more obscurity. That wasn’t the advice, but it stuck with me.
Here is the advice.
He was frustrated by various situations in which people around him had gotten themselves into. And he said so many of these men think they are in charge and don’t need their wife’s input. He believed that God thwarted men who did not involve their wives in the important decisions of their lives.
That was huge. I wasn’t married yet, and that stuck with me. In the link at the top of this post, I wrote about deciding to leave the Assemblies/Chi Alpha. I was ready in July of 1997, but Liz wasn’t. We agreed to make no move until Liz had reached a decision.
It was in December of that year when I was informed I needed to decide between staying or leaving. (Since I was ordained, they were concerned that I was no longer attending an AG church…fair enough). That is when I told Liz that you have the final say in what we do, but the higher-ups insist on an answer tomorrow. We can’t extend it any longer.
Early in our marriage, we decided that all major decisions we made would only be made when we agreed. That has built a lot of trust and goodwill.
Advice Number Two: House Before Cars
I only remember one extended conversation with pastor number one. Liz and I drove to Syracuse from Albany to meet him for lunch. He handed us a financial workbook, which was not what I was expecting. He began the conversation by telling us that he had seen too many young people leave the ministry because they made bad financial decisions.
Like many of them, I had entered adulthood with no idea how to handle money and had not seen many good examples.
What was the top advice from the guy with the fancy sports car?
Don’t spend money on cars.
Don’t get into debt.
Buy a house. Just get on the ladder.
And until your housing is settled, don’t spend money on cars.
He mentioned that people would look at his car and decide it was okay. He pointed out that he got his family on solid financial footing before buying the vehicle.
We walked away from that meeting knowing that, although we would likely never be rich, we wanted to be good stewards of what we were given.
[Note: Personally, I don’t have a goal to own a fancy sports car, and this post is not to debate if pastors should own sports cars.]
[Interesting side note. If you drive ‘beaters,’ people tend to give you cars.]
[Interesting side note 2 - Our first house was pretty much a ‘beater’ as well]
Twelve years after that lunch, we were driving this beauty! 👇 A guy in our church told me I had better not rob a bank.
A Couple of Thoughts
It is over 30 years since those two conversations. I’ve received other good advice along the way, but those two have been crucial. I’m grateful for those two encounters, and I’m grateful that Liz and I were able to hear what was being said.
While typing the title into this post, I recognised that it isn’t just “hearing” good advice. The important part is being able to receive it.
As I’m writing this, it hits me that we were able to buy a home in Dublin amid a severe housing crisis. That has meant we are no longer subject to landlords raising the rent or evicting us (legally or illegally…we have experienced both here.)
I don’t know if we would be here if we had not listened and taken to heart what these two people took the time to tell us.
How about you? What is the best piece of advice you received?