|
|
|
In an era of multiple broken homes, a Carthage pastor, his wife and five children are proof that a family cannot only survive but thrive.
Timothy Buelow, pastor of Faith Lutheran Church, and his wife, Sara, who serves as the organist, are the parents of children whose Christian faith and participation in church have carried them far, while helping to stress the importance of family values.
Two of the children are well on their way to becoming ministers themselves. Titus, the oldest, is a junior at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary in Mequon, while Julius is a junior in pre-ministerial studies at Martin Luther College in New Ulm, Minn.
Marjorie, a graduate of a Lutheran prep school, is a freshman at Crowder College and is planning to go into nursing. She hopes to help out on the missionary field by volunteering at a medical clinic in central Africa.
The other two are Amos, 15, in his second year at Luther Preparatory School in Watertown, Wis., and Katrina, a sixth grader at Carthage Middle School.
“Amos is the one boy who said ‘I don’t want to become a pastor like the other two,’” Rev. Buelow said. “He thought, ‘Well, maybe I can become an architect and design churches for my brothers.’ Now he is at this prep school where they do a lot of recruiting and we found out recently that he said to his sister that he is starting to think about becoming a pastor.”
Although Buelow, of course, is proud of his children wanting to go into the ministry, there is another area that receives even more emphasis.
“It is not just about the ministry but about Christian education,” said Buelow, who added that Lutherans have the most thorough educational system of any church body in the world. “These schools teach Bible knowledge incredibly well, plus they are surrounded by really good and dedicated kids, as well as academic and fellow Christian kids. It is just a real extra blessing.”
Buelow said that his 85-year-old father wrote in a recent Christmas letter to the family how fantastic it is that his grandchildren are still firm in their Christian faith and active in the church.
“That is really what it is all about,” Buelow said. “I want my kids to read scripture to me when I am on my death bed. I want them to be moved by the same scriptures that move me. I want to sing hymns together with them, and that is what it is all about.”
In an era of multiple broken homes, a Carthage pastor, his wife and five children are proof that a family cannot only survive but thrive.
Timothy Buelow, pastor of Faith Lutheran Church, and his wife, Sara, who serves as the organist, are the parents of children whose Christian faith and participation in church have carried them far, while helping to stress the importance of family values.
Two of the children are well on their way to becoming ministers themselves. Titus, the oldest, is a junior at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary in Mequon, while Julius is a junior in pre-ministerial studies at Martin Luther College in New Ulm, Minn.
Marjorie, a graduate of a Lutheran prep school, is a freshman at Crowder College and is planning to go into nursing. She hopes to help out on the missionary field by volunteering at a medical clinic in central Africa.
The other two are Amos, 15, in his second year at Luther Preparatory School in Watertown, Wis., and Katrina, a sixth grader at Carthage Middle School.
“Amos is the one boy who said ‘I don’t want to become a pastor like the other two,’” Rev. Buelow said. “He thought, ‘Well, maybe I can become an architect and design churches for my brothers.’ Now he is at this prep school where they do a lot of recruiting and we found out recently that he said to his sister that he is starting to think about becoming a pastor.”
Although Buelow, of course, is proud of his children wanting to go into the ministry, there is another area that receives even more emphasis.
“It is not just about the ministry but about Christian education,” said Buelow, who added that Lutherans have the most thorough educational system of any church body in the world. “These schools teach Bible knowledge incredibly well, plus they are surrounded by really good and dedicated kids, as well as academic and fellow Christian kids. It is just a real extra blessing.”
Buelow said that his 85-year-old father wrote in a recent Christmas letter to the family how fantastic it is that his grandchildren are still firm in their Christian faith and active in the church.
“That is really what it is all about,” Buelow said. “I want my kids to read scripture to me when I am on my death bed. I want them to be moved by the same scriptures that move me. I want to sing hymns together with them, and that is what it is all about.”
The Carthage pastor said there is no question that the family unit in America is weaker today than ever before.
“I read an article where they were talking about homosexual marriage and it said that the homosexuals never wanted the kind of marriage that we all defined as marriage back in the 1950s,” he said. “Over the course of 30 years, the definition of marriage had to weaken and that is what made the gays and and lesbians want it because it doesn’t represent what it did 30 years ago. First we destroyed the institution of marriage and then we opened it up to homosexual couples.
“I put a lot of blame on the Baby-Boomer generation. I find that a lot of young people don’t want to go to church today because they see it as the cheapened type of experience that so many places have made it. Young people are looking for authentic Christianity and they don’t get it passed on to them by their parents.”
Buelow said he is not surprised about his children going into the ministry.
“I made it clear that it is an incredibly rewarding profession,” he said. “What you do there lasts. Teaching people about their savior is rewarding.
“One of the things I have always enjoyed about the ministry is visiting shut-ins. I have so many great friends who are in heaven already and I know I will see them again and that is what makes it so worthwhile ... to be with somebody on their death bed and having the privilege of helping them through the doorway to eternity and knowing that they will be waiting for you on the other side.
“I have passed that on to my kids. So I am happy if they want to go into the ministry. I made it a point of doing what my dad did. He would always say ‘I really think this would be great if you did this but do not do it for me. It would be terrible if you went into the ministry and this is not something that would make you happy.
Don’t do anything that is not going to make you happy and don’t do it for me.’ So I have made sure to pass on that same wisdom that I got from my dad.”
