These "Studies" comprise the bulk of my more or less academic-styled searching toward understanding of aspects of my ministry, particularly with regard to ministry itself, to the life of prayer, to ecumenism and various other aspects of ministry as I encountered them along the way.

These "Studies" comprise the bulk of my more or less academic-styled searching toward understanding of aspects of my ministry, particularly with regard to ministry itself, to the life of prayer, to ecumenism and various other aspects of ministry as I encountered them along the way.

I had been asked to do a Bible study when I began my first church out of seminary. I agreed, so long as I could do it my way. In the fourth year of my work at Hilltop Christian Church in Mantua, Ohio, I chose to do the Song of Solomon (known in many circles as the Song of Songs). I was guided in the development in part by the then-recent anchor Bible commentary by Marvin Pope. The study influenced me greatly. In the next decade or so, I indulged a variety of works on the Song of Songs, largely but not exclusively in the Christian mystical tradition. In 1997, I found a way to work on a devotional development from the Song of Songs, resulting in a work I found satisfying. From those two major efforts, a few minor ones arose. I have collected here the ways in which the Song of Songs has woven into my work as a pastor.

These pastoral notes concern an effort to provide a pastoral input to my congregations in a way that is not sermonic in nature. The "Letters to Anna" deal with reflections on spiritual matters addressed to a young girl asking about matters of faith. The "Occasional Pamphlets" represent various other writings of a largely pastoral nature.

I n the Christian church Disciples of Christ, a prominent part of the leadership of the local congregation consists of elders. These are lay people, for the most part. The first and major part of this book consists of studies prepared for the elders at First Christian Church in New Martinsville, West Virginia. There are also some other studies on the same model for other purposes and a few samples of materials I had earlier prepared to assist elders in their normal worship responsibilities. I have served as a minister in the Christian church Disciples of Christ from the time I finished seminary in the spring of 1976. I retired in October 2007 and have continued in a modest role since then. Out of my ministry came an impulse to come to terms with the rich spiritual and theological, pastoral, and personal ferment that I encountered. The bases of that search lay in my reading and study, in my prayer, and in my pastoral practice. My background includes a BA from the College of Wooster with a major in chemistry and an MS from Purdue University, working in the school of chemical engineering. I left Purdue as a PhD student, having completed everything except the dissertation, in January 2003. I received my DMin from Christian Theological Seminary in 1976 and was then ordained to Christian ministry by the Region of Indiana and First Christian Church in Lafayette, Indiana. Over the years, I found that my writing in a variety of formats served me well in growing my understanding and capacity as a pastor, sharing the writings as I went along with friends and colleagues and parishioners. These I am collecting in major part in the series I am calling Directions of a Pastoral Lifetime. I hope that the value I have found in them may be more broadly shared.

The Psalm Meditations take up my own translation of the selected psalms based on the Hebrew Masoretic Text and a meditative reflection addressed, for the most part, to God. All but the last of these are in prose; the reflection on Psalm 66 has its own pattern. The Regula Vitae (Rule of Life) arose in response to a particular reading and served to reflect over aspects and qualities of my life as a pastor.