The Pastor's Handbook

Sunday you can prepare for. These arrive with a phone call.

Somebody dies on Tuesday and you are standing in front of the family on
Thursday. A couple asks you to marry them and suddenly you are running a
rehearsal and holding a legal document with a filing deadline. A young mother
asks about having her baby dedicated, and half the church is not sure what a
dedication even is.

Seminary gave these one afternoon between them.

THE PASTOR'S HANDBOOK is what should have been in your hands the first time.
Three books in one volume, written out of forty years of ministry.

FUNERALS AND MEMORIAL SERVICES. What to say on that first phone call and the
three things never to say. The family interview, with the eight questions that
actually produce a eulogy. Timed orders of service for a funeral, a memorial and
a graveside. The call to worship, the committal in both burial and cremation
forms, and the benediction, printed to be read aloud on the worst day of your
week. Working with the funeral director. And the hard ones - the death of a
child, suicide, when you do not know where the person stood with God, and when
you never met them at all.

WEDDINGS. What to ask before you agree, and when to say no. Four premarital
sessions written out. How to run a rehearsal for thirty people who are all
talking at once. Three ceremony lengths, three sets of vows, and every word from
the welcome to the presentation. The marriage license, who signs it, and your
filing deadline - the part nobody warns a young pastor about.

BABY DEDICATIONS AND WATER BAPTISM. What a dedication is and what it is not.
The charge to the parents, including the question most churches never ask. Five
things to teach before anyone gets in the water. And the mechanics nobody
teaches - water temperature, footing, the hold, and how to keep hold until they
have their feet.

FREE PRINTABLE FORMS. The interview sheets, checklists, the ceremony script
page and both certificates are yours to download and print as often as you need
- the address is inside the book.

Scripture is from the Berean Standard Bible. Buy it once and use it for the life
of your ministry - permission is given to reproduce the checklists, interview
sheets and certificates for use in your own church.

Written for solo pastors, bivocational pastors, associate pastors handed their
first funeral, chaplains, and anyone who has ever driven to a house not knowing
what they were going to say.