'One aspect of that uniqueness is that we make far more mistakes in our line of work than other so-called professionals. If physicians and engineers and lawyers and military officers made as many mistakes in their lines of work as we do in ours, they would be out on the street in no time. It amazes me still how much of the time I simply don't know what I am doing, don't know what to say, don't know what the next move is. The temptation in that state of being is to determine to be competent at something or other. Unfortunately, there are many "ways of escape" in which we can exercise and develop areas of administrative or therapeutic or scholarly or programmatic competences in the church and in doing so avoid the ambiguity of being a pastor.
But I also had a sense that much of the time (but not by any means continuously) that "not knowing what I am doing" is more or less what it feels like when I am "trusting in God" and "following Jesus."'
Eugene H Peterson, The Pastor, p.314.
