In the summer of 2010, I wrote to Eugene Peterson. His gracious response encouraged more boldness on my part. So I wrote again, this time to ask if I could ever visit him to wrestle through some questions that his books had provoked in me at a very pivotal time. He was gracious enough to say yes and to allow one other person to come with me. And so it came to be that Aaron Stern, the pastor now of Mill City Church in Fort Collins, Colorado, and I took a trip to Montana.

I have waited to write about my visit. I didn’t want to short-circuit the slow work of his words taking root in my heart. These are not sound-bites; they are themes I have returned to over and over.

It is difficult to overstate the impact that Peterson has had on our church, first through his books on pastoral ministry (The Contemplative Pastor, Working the Angles, Under the Unpredictable Plant), and through the visits that different ones of us have been able to make to the Peterson home.

It is also difficult to summarize ...