Let me tell you some good news. Isn’t it time for some?
If you have been in the job twenty-five years and are beloved, you often get gifts. Today we celebrated twenty-five years since our own Bishop Basil was elevated. He was in Houston to celebrate a wedding and the wonderful folk at Saint George wanted to honor this great pastor. He asked that his gift go to the students of our school and so, as a result, a student of The Saint Constantine School will get a scholarship this year from Bishop Basil. The school could not exist without his vision for education for all God’s children in Houston.
I know many people discouraged just now with pastors and the state of the church. It isn’t the right time to criticize, but to be thankful for what I have seen over the last five years here in Houston. We have good pastors and our bishop is very good. I think normal, good, and holy people are hard to describe in this era, because normal is becoming abnormal.
He is a pastor. I watched him today in line speak to many people and ask about their families. He was kind without a trace of falsity or show. It must be tiring to hear from all of us, but he was patient with our stories, our questions. When I told folk I was moving to Houston, they often said how blessed I would be to meet this pastor.
They were right.
The Bishop is good, but that does not mean boring. He is spirited and in the few chances I have had to speak with him, he is insightful about the world. He is the sort of person who measures his words, but can preach and teach. That is a rare combination: stirring up folk without manipulation while giving wisdom. Humble and powerful men may be more rare than good men just now, but so our pastor has seemed to me. He has listened when I have shared an idea, as if he has not heard such ideas before now, but then acts decisively. He is wise enough that he makes the foolishness in me still and suggests deeper possibilities.
Isn’t it good when my own beloved pastor can come home from visiting his pastor and tell us that the Bishop made breakfast? Isn’t it good in an age when so many leaders have people for their people and administrators for their administrators to meet a man who will pick you up at the airport?
Yet he has done much and will do more. If there is one thing I know, it is how to spot a teacher . . . and our Bishop is a teacher. By this, I mean that he asks questions as he teaches. Our school has three pillars; wisdom, virtue, and joy. That sums up what I have seen from this man of God. In perilous times, he is wise. In a decaying period full of angst, he fights for virtue with joy.
It is good to be able to look at a man of God and say: “Worthy! Axios!”
Isn’t that great news?
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