For my church’s Summer Reading Challenge, I chose as my final book this anecdotal memoir from 30 years past, Stories I Couldn’t Tell While I Was a Pastor by Bruce McIver. Now, I have to admit from the get-go that the first appeal for me was the guy’s name. My family recently started re-watching the old MacGyver series, so when I tell my kids that “I’m reading a book by McIver,” they flip. I couldn’t not read this when I saw it.

After serving thirty years in (what I believe to be) a Southern Baptist church in Texas, Pastor McIver retired from the ministry and decided to write down for posterity a collection of stories from his years of service. Whether humorous or heartwarming, most of these stories are feel-good for sure…but not all of them.

McIver opens by setting the context of his life and ministry, delving painfully into the loss of his wife to a sudden illness. Left as a single father to a young daughter, he faced some rude and sad awakenings, and seems never to have lost the tenderness that was forced upon him at so young an age.

Those tear-jerking first chapters really entrenched me in the book, and the rest was just smooth and humorous sailing from there. Not many of the anecdotes were laugh-out-loud funny (though his Palm Sunday snafu and a few others certainly were), but they do bring a smile. I’ve already shared one of his stories with a few pastor friends, which has only caused them to share with me some of their most embarrassing moments. Maybe I’ll make a collection of their stories for my own book someday! Pastors, beware.

This was a fun read and a little glimpse into the role of the Baptist pastorate during my grandparents’ generation. Not sure if it’s still out there in print, but it might be a good gift for your retiring pastor, a relief to know that as bad as things got, they probably weren’t McIver-bad.

©2021 E.T.