Conviction plus humility
Shortly after being called to serve my very first Covenant congregation in Seattle in 1978, I was introduced to the concept of Pietism. Shortly thereafter, I met a man who provided a face to the concept. Gilbert Otteson loved Jesus. He knew God’s Word. He had a heart for people. He spoke his mind unabashedly. He sang with enthusiasm. (Actually, he couldn’t imagine life without music.) He was a Mission Friend.
Gilbert, who had just turned eighty at the time, was invited to be a guest preacher at Interbay Covenant Church. It was a congregation he had served as interim pastor some years before. Standing behind the pulpit, he graced the congregation with an exposition of scripture and illustrated the heart of his message by reciting a lengthy poem he had committed to memory.
Like much of the poetry he often wove into his sermons, it celebrated the seasons of life, the importance of faith and the value of what it means to be Mission Friends.
As Gilbert said, “Gratitude exudes from every pore of the soul. The only unfilled longing is to reach one’s arms around all those who have loved us, encouraged us, helped us, smoothed the wrinkles, tempered the storms and healed the wounds caused by
these clumsy feet still
in the mire
go crushing blossoms
without end.
These hard, well-meaning
hands we thrust
among the heart strings
of a friend…”
As a newly minted pastor who had been rhyming words and writing hymn lyrics for years, I was drawn to this man three times my age, and a friendship was born.
I learned he was born and raised on a farm in rural Minnesota and that he attended Moody Bible Institute in Chicago before enrolling at North Park Seminary. It was there, while directing the choir at a local Covenant church, he fell in love with the organist. Gilbert and Judith were married in 1926.
I also discovered that early in his ministry, Gilbert traveled for five years as the choir director, song leader and soloist for a popular evangelist during the roaring twenties. His name was Jim Rayburn. If that name sounds familiar, there’s a reason. Jim Rayburn, Jr. was the founder of Young Life. But the younger Rayburn’s father held meetings like Billy Sunday had and like Billy Graham would. And Gilbert was what Ira Sankey had been for D. L. Moody.
Like his Scandinavian forebears, Gilbert knew the power of song. He understood how music loosens the heart’s door to open to the message of the gospel. He realized how the lyrics of a hymn give wings to worship.
I would also learn that Gilbert had the privilege of serving alongside legendary Covenant pastors like Gustav F. Johnson and Paul Rees at First Covenant Church in Minneapolis. From those mentors my friend saw modeled the power of the pulpit, and witnessed the importance of prayer and preparation.
Upon learning that 300 young men from First Covenant Church were serving in World War II, Gilbert felt an inner compulsion to do his part. He enlisted as chaplain where he found himself behind the frontlines of combat in Europe. Serving Uncle Sam and his Heavenly Father was a source of great gratitude and much pride. And there were spiritual rewards only God could have orchestrated.
While overseas, Gilbert led several young servicemen to Christ. Gilbert would later discover that one G.I. in particular had grown up at First Covenant Church in Minneapolis. That young man returned home, married, and became the father of Mark Stromberg, former Northwest Conference Superintendent.
After the war, Gilbert served effectively as the pastor in Worcester, Massachusetts. But his outgoing personality and unique ministry gifts found him tapped by the denomination to be a traveling ambassador-at-large. Being away from home was something with which Gilbert was familiar. He once calculated that between his years in the military and traveling to churches and evangelistic gatherings, seventeen years of his first thirty-four years of marriage were spent away from home.
Like early circuit-riding Mission Friend pastors, Gilbert looked back with some regret on the amount of time his work for God separated him from his family. He openly expressed second thoughts about the impact his travel had on his first priority.
Gilbert’s last and most fulfilling call was to First Covenant Church in Spokane, Washington. While there he mentored the likes of John Notehelfer and Donald Njaa who would in turn influence a new generation of Covenant leadership.
Gilbert retired from full-time pastoring in 1966. His love of preaching, however, continued to be expressed in interim opportunities that found him serving as a transitional pastor in Kansas, Florida, and Washington. Helping churches face challenges and change energized him.
This remarkable man embraced the most challenging ministry assignment of his life during his eighties when he was called on to care for the needs of his wife. Alzheimer’s disease took a drastic toll, but Gilbert was Judith’s caring shepherd. I was able to personally witness the demands that memory loss placed on their relationship. I was deeply moved by Gilbert’s patience and tenderness to one to whom he was married for fifty-nine years.
As chaplain at Covenant Living at the Shores in suburban Seattle, I love celebrating historical milestones of this beautiful retirement community. Recently we observed the fortieth anniversary of “Covenant Shores.” Our leadership team pulled out all the stops with banners, balloons, photos, and newspaper clippings. As I researched our campus archives, I was delighted to discover that Gilbert and his wife had the distinction as being the very first residents of “The Shores.”
Because of their proximity to Mercer Island Covenant Church (now Evergreen Covenant), Gilbert and Judith attended faithfully. This much-loved retired pastor was both recognized and celebrated. It was not out of the norm for Gilbert to express his opinion from the back row of the sanctuary loud enough for everyone to hear. Bellowing an “amen” or insisting that the worship leader sing the first verse of the last hymn again was not uncommon.
Gilbert treasured God’s Word like gold and mined the scriptures regularly. His well-worn Bible was ample proof. The continuation of his legacy is seen through his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren who have embraced personal faith and even followed Gilbert’s example in church leadership.
Gilbert’s New Testament — that he used as a chaplain during the war — is now the prized possession of Elliot, a great-grandson, who pastors in Portland, Oregon.
During my second pastorate, I carried on written correspondence with Gilbert. I was serving a Covenant congregation in Northern California. His health was failing as was his vision, but his mind was as sharp as ever. Although his ability to read was hindered, his ability to encourage younger pastors like me continued unabated.
Gilbert died just shy of his 97th birthday in the spring of 1995, a quarter century ago, but I still miss him. I have kept two of his handwritten letters in a file titled “Notes of Encouragement.” It is a manila folder to which I have turned when the demands of ministry have found me questioning my call. Gilbert’s contributions to that file folder are among my most treasured notes.
A pietist has piety,
conviction plus humility,
a love for people and God’s
Word without pious-ity.