Without A Flock

About the Book

In the free church tradition, the pastoral prayer has long assumed an important place in the worship of the congregation. It is expected that the pastor will have a more or less extended prayer pertinent to the day and/or to the run of the service in general. Under the circumstances of normal practice, these would involve awareness of a congregation, or a "flock" for a pastor to tend. After ending a normal pastorate and entering retirement and the far more occasional happenstance of entering a pulpit as a guest, the regular preparation for a worship-leading practice became desirable, personally. As a part of that preparation, most often without entering the leadership of worship, least of all as pastor, the pastoral prayer was prepared. This book collects eleven years worth of pastoral prayers, linked to the preaching text of the day by way of the sermon prepared. As there is no flock as reference point, these are, indeed, "Without A Flock".

About the Author

I am a retired minister from the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) living in the hills of the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia. In the practice of ministry over the years I served congregations, I was called upon to include a pastoral prayer in the course of the service. Within the free church tradition, this is a normal, though undefined, piece of the service. From my first entrance into the pulpit, I carried the text of a prayer with me, being unlikely to manage on the spot through capable enough without pressure. After my tenure as an active pastor, I found I was more satisfied preparing for a Sunday that would slip by without entering a pulpit or leading a congregation in worship than otherwise. Accompanying that sermon would come a pastoral prayer along the models that I had evolved over the years. These are collected here as representative of the practice developed, these surveying the most recent eleven years of that ministry. I continue to live quietly with my wife of fifty-two years, two dogs and several cats.