BAY SHORE, N.Y.—Disaster relief volunteers working on Long Island are “touching people’s lives, I can tell you that,” Glenda Watson, a volunteer from First Baptist Church of Leonard, told the TEXAN on Nov. 7.

The team of 15 SBTC DR workers waited out the cold rain, sleet, and then snow from a nor’easter that blew in that afternoon, delaying their clean-up and recovery work in several cities on Long Island, including Bay Shore, Lindenhurst, Freeport and Long Beach.

The SBTC contingent arrived in metropolitan New York City on Nov. 2 for relief work in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy. About 60,000 utility customers who lost power during Sandy lost it again on Nov. 7, the Associated Press reported. Many homes on Long Island were still waiting for power to be restored in their homes before the winter storm blew in.

Disaster relief workers who were helping with clean up and recovery in flooded houses rushed to help homeowners get salvageable furniture and other belongings inside before the sleet turned to snow, Watson said.

The SBTC group, working in tandem with another Southern Baptist team from Tennessee, has developed a rapport with officials in several of the Long Island communities, said George Yarger, pastor of Harbor Baptist Church in Payne Springs.

In the community of Long Beach, Yarger was trying to go through proper channels to get the team in for work. When an off-duty police officer asked him what the disaster relief teams were charging for their services, Yarger replied, “Our services are free; the price has already been paid by Jesus Christ!”

Yarger said the man began to cry, then immediately went to a city official and told her exactly what Yarger told him. Within minutes, they had the clearance with city officials that they needed.

The city has fed the volunteers and given them quick attention to all their needs, Yarger explained. And strangers have paid for their meals in restaurants.

“People are being very open and thankful for the help. There is a wide open door for the gospel here and they need it. They are broken,” he said.

Many homes on Long Island took in four to six feet of saltwater and their cars were submerged. Most of those without power were staying with family or friends and trying to come home during the day to recover what they can.

A week after Sandy hit, Yarger said he drove by a gasoline line that stretched 100 cars or longer. The people in the hardest hit areas are facing weeks of recovery.

“We are going to be here as long as we can,” Yarger said. The teams are deploying in 14-day cycles, SBTC DR Director Jim Richardson said.

In Long Beach, one of the poorer areas on Long Island, dozens of cars were parked in the town square and people there were eating military-style heater meals provided by the federal government. They were using a row of portable toilets and have no laundry service, Watson said.

George Maldonado, a deacon at the First Spanish Baptist Church in Bay Shore, where the SBTC team is housed, said everybody in his community was getting along well but the lack of gasoline was a problem. He has electricity at his home in Bay Shore, he said.

“We need a lot of prayer,” he said when asked how Texans could pray for the people there. “Praying for everything to go back to normal so that we can help people in whatever way we need.”

More than a decade ago, Chris Osborne, longtime pastor of Central Baptist Church in Bryan-College Station, saw a need for mentoring and follow-up for the young men from the large, college-town congregation who had been called to full-time pastoral ministry.  

Osborne has helped guide dozens of young men into the pulpit over his 26 years at Central, most of them Texas A&M Aggies. Osborne’s wife, Peggy, said they have lost count at well over 100 men and women serving as pastors, missionaries and in other ministries who were active collegians at Central.     
“When we were young in the ministry, we had no one to go to. We had to figure things out on our own,” Chris Osborne recalled telling Peggy.

As a pastor’s wife, Peggy Osborne knows the difficulties of young pastors. She told the TEXAN that although pastors can “share a lot” with their deacon bodies or staffs, there are limits to such sharing. “What do you do when [certain] situations happen in your church? How do you handle staff? How do you lead them?”

Young pastors face challenges dealing with their own families, raising kids, keeping their marriages strong. “They will hit hard times,” she said. “We didn’t want to see our young men and their wives getting discouraged.”  

Thus, 11 years ago, Central Baptist began sponsoring its yearly gathering for these pastors and their wives at the Resort at Tapatio Springs, nestled in the Texas Hill Country near Boerne. The location is a draw; the resort hosts golf tournaments, concerts and private events. Participants simply call it “Tapatio” or the CAPS (Central Aggie Pastors) retreat.

“It was the quickest thing that ever passed a deacons’ meeting,” recalled Chris Osborne about Central’s initial commitment to the retreat. “An older deacon got up and said, ‘We should have been doing this years ago.’” The vote was unanimous.

Central Baptist continues to pay for the Hill Country weekend, including lodging and meals for the pastors and their wives. Participants must arrange their own transportation to Boerne, but otherwise they incur no expenses.

The prerequisites for participation: one must have attended Central Baptist and must currently be the pastor of a church. While some attendees come from out of state, all Texas participants are pastors of SBTC churches of varying sizes, from small congregations to megachurches. The group, which started with four couples, has grown to 15 couples, including the Osbornes.

The young men have a lot of connections, Peggy said. In addition to their involvement at Central and choice of vocation, all were students at Texas A&M.    

Kevin Ueckert, pastor of South Side Baptist in Abilene, was a college minister at Central Baptist when the retreat started. “Chris’s vision was to continue to equip and encourage pastors. That Central would continue to foot the bill even though we are long gone from the church is unbelievable,” said Ueckert, who, with Nathan Lino of Northeast Houston Baptist Church, helps Chris Osborne map out the plan for each year’s retreat.

“We are indebted to Central Baptist for providing this ministry to us,” Lino commented. “Central is amazing when it comes to supporting missionaries and pastors who come out of their church. For Central, out of sight is not out of mind.”

Ueckert added, “Guys say this is the most valuable weekend they spend all year for their churches and marriages.”

It is not just a weekend of R&R.

“The vast majority of the time is spent with the men meeting with Chris and the wives meeting with Peggy,” Lino said. Pastors and wives arrive on Thursday afternoon. After dinner, the men and women split into separate groups for sessions. Separate morning meetings follow Friday breakfast. The women head to the Peach Tree Café in Boerne for lunch and then a free afternoon of shopping, fellowship or resting while the men participate in an afternoon session at Tapatio. Saturday features much the same schedule except that the men have a free afternoon for golf or other activities while the women have a book exchange at the home of a local Christian photographer.

Evening meals at local restaurants—where the rule is that couples must eat with different people each night—are followed by sessions as well. The retreat concludes Sunday with a time of teaching and prayer led by Chris Osborne

The sessions are demanding. “Chris has cultivated an environment with the men that really sharpens us on several levels, as Peggy has with our wives,” Lino said. “We are challenged and held accountable. We evaluate each other’s philosophy of ministry and preaching. We discuss trends going on in the church world. We discuss different scenarios pastors face. We also spend a lot of time discussing our marriages and fatherhood/parenting. Chris is interested in our being effective husbands and fathers [as well as] effective pastors,” Lino said.

The group reads books and other material in advance of the retreat, and each man submits a sermon to be read and critiqued by the others.

“We don’t pull punches,” Chris Osborne remarked.

 “It is very much a ‘lion’s den,’” affirmed Nathan Lino, who added, “If you just want to be patted on the back and told ‘Good job,’ you probably won’t like it. But if you want peers who love you and will be very honest with you so you can grow and be sharpened, it is a fantastic experience.”

“It’s good for me, too,” said Chris Osborne, who insists that the retreat has been a blessing for him. “At 60, you can be kind of old school. These guys help me learn what’s working out there.”

If the men are challenged and encouraged by the weekend, the women benefit equally. According to Lino, “My wife, Nicole, often says if she could pick one resource to equip her as a pastor’s wife, she would select her time with Peggy.” Ueckert’s wife, Lynlee, has said that the retreat “brings life” into her soul. Peggy Osborne sees her role as that of encourager and “mom.” Topics discussed include how the wives can better support their husbands. The women are encouraged to share what God is teaching them individually.

“I learn much more than they do,” Peggy said. “I get so inspired! I don’t worry about the future of the church when I see what God is doing with these young men and women.”

The women’s book exchange has become a retreat favorite, with Beth Coyle, a Boerne-area photographer, opening her  Hill Country home to the group for the Saturday event. Even that connection is remarkable. Peggy, a fan of Coyle’s work, contacted her last year to see if she would be exhibiting her work at a local craft fair. During the ensuing conversation, both women discovered common ties (Peggy had taught school with Beth’s mother), and Coyle volunteered her home for the book exchange.

The 2013 CAPS retreat is already scheduled for next May. Pastors Osborne, Lino, and Ueckert all confirm that the retreat has fostered deep friendship among the men and their families. Some couples vacation together. The men fill one another’s pulpits. They go on mission trips together. Perhaps most important, the men and women are modeling in their own churches what they have learned from the Osbornes.

“Several of us are very intentionally spending time discipling guys called to ministry from our own churches,” Kevin Ueckert said. “I’ve got guys who are pastoring churches asking me, ‘When are you going to start Tapatio for us?’ It’s a question we are asking at my church. How will we be investing in the young pastors with whom we have a relationship?”

Chris and Peggy Osborne said they are happy to share with other churches what they’ve done at Tapatio. They may be contacted through the Central Baptist Church website: centralbcs.org.

The best-selling book “Fifty Shades of Grey” has become one of the most controversial books in recent years, especially appealing to women. It has been eagerly welcomed into the mainstream of popular literature, even though it is classified as “erotica.” Coined “mommy porn,” it is a sexually explicit story involving sadism, masochism, bondage and other deviant sexual practices between a young woman and a businessman. (Porn differs from erotica in that erotica has a story arc as well as character and plot development.) There are a multitude of reviews, blogs, and articles written from a Christian perspective regarding this book, all extremely helpful in understanding its insidious danger. We at Flourish want to specifically urge ministry wives to respond to this phenomenon and to guide women to a clear biblical understanding of this book.

Do not be so naïve to think that the women in your church aren’t reading Fifty Shades. They most likely are, but probably won’t mention it at Bible Study! If they aren’t reading it themselves, I can promise you they know women who have. Don’t be afraid to bring it up when you have the opportunity—I imagine you will find it is quite a conversation starter. As a pastor’s wife, the women in your church need to hear your take on the cultural influences they deal with, especially ones that are so blatantly evil and destructive. Your informed perspective can clear the muddy waters for women who are deceived into believing this book is innocent fun.

There are several “talking points” that need to be explored in determining a biblical and spiritually mature response to this book. Why are women vulnerable to this type of literature anyway? What are women looking for in a relationship with a man? Why is Fifty Shades so dangerous? What does Scripture say about what we put in our mind and how it affects our behavior and thought life?

In my view, one of the strongest cases against Christian women reading this book is the argument for the purity of the marriage relationship. Women claim that reading this book has “spiced up” their sexual relationship with their husbands. But this kind of literature does not lead to intensifying romantic love, but rather leads ultimately to dissatisfaction and disrespect. Marriage is honorable among all and the marriage bed is to be undefiled—by body or by mind.

Paul warns us about this in 2 Timothy 3:6-7: “They (godless people) are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth.” May the Lord deliver us from being “weak-willed” and gullible women. We pray he will give us wisdom, grace and spiritual understanding as we speak truth to other women, and to ourselves.

Susie Hawkins lives in Dallas and has been actively involved in women’s ministry as a pastor’s wife, author, teacher and volunteer. This article first appeared at the flourish.me blog, an online community for ministry wives.