JON ALLEN

I have been a pastor for almost two years now and have learned more in that time than I think I did in all of the years prior. I have been constantly learning about God, other people, and myself.

Every one of us has differing levels of stress, responsibility, and reward in the jobs that we do. After the experience that I have had so far, I have come to the conclusion that being a pastor is probably the most rewarding position I can imagine because the rewards effect every area of your life. However, it is also the most stressful I can imagine (for the very same reason) because the stress effects every area of your life.

I can remember how apathetic I was about my last job. I worked 8-5 Monday through Friday, didn't think about work after 5 or before 8, just went in and did my thing. If things went well I didn't get too excited about it, and if thing didn't go well, I really didn't think much about it. My spectrum of emotions was pretty small, not too many highs, not too many lows.

All of that has changed now. We are in an environment as a church family that creates huge highs and huge lows. Now that I am pouring passion into something, my emotional spectrum has gotten bigger. I don't escape my work anymore, for the most part, I don't want to! High Rock is not just a part of my life, it is all of it. I eat, sleep, and breath God's work here. All week I think about you, how to bring more people into our family, how to make the worship service better, how to make small groups stronger, how to make the message more applicable to life, and so much more.

I can't even put into words the feeling of fulfillment we get when we have the opportunity to lead someone to the truth about salvation and have them accept it, or the elation when someone who we have poured our life into steps up to a new level of responsiblity. Or even to see God use us as a church in a distinctively bigger way that He had before. This weekend was unbelievable! I always think Easter is exciting because of what Jesus did for us, but this year was even more special because of the amazing way that God moved at HRCC. We opened a brand new campus in Kannapolis and saw brand new guests come in and worship with us in a middle school, we ran out of seats at our Bringle Ferry campus at the 10:00 service and had people sitting on the floor, and filled up our Denton campus with 175 people with two people accepting Christ for the first time on Friday night! God is good! I cannot imagine any drug that could get me higher than I am right now. Many of you feel the same.

However, we must continue to pray for each other for strength, and I will continue to pray for you, because the lows will come. But let's enjoy the highs while they are here and give God every single bit of the credit. He did it, He always does.