Editor’s note: People of Faith is an occasional question and answer series highlighting leaders and others among the diverse faiths and houses of worship in Bartholomew County.
One cannot miss the books on every shelf imaginable in the office of Pastor Paul Dazet — a man who has read more than 200 titles this calendar year alone.
The new pastor at Sandy Hook United Methodist Church in Columbus truly avoids such details in most conversations because he worries it can sound boastful, un-Christian, to an unassuming fellow who seems largely unimpressed with himself.
“I’m telling you only because you specifically asked,” Dazet said.
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Dazet’s reading and listening to authors such as Henri Nouwen and Eugene Peterson like a man running out of time; making notecards of most of the volumes he finishes only because of his fire as one knowledgeably pointing to one greater than himself.
“It’s about retention — retention for sermons, retention for general learning,” he said of his voracious spiritual and intellectual insight. “I’m very passionate about teaching, and training people and equipping people.”
Dazet is so passionate, in fact, that every Sunday, he ignores the fact that this lungs, damaged with fibrosis from lymphoma treatment 12 years ago, operate at only 53% capacity. And, after two services of speaking of God’s love and mercy under such a challenge, he must nap extensively each Sunday afternoon to recharge.
“We all suffer in some way,” he said.
But he must speak, guide and encourage, reminding people that Jesus was vulnerable, relatable and touchable.
“If he were Superman coming down here to earth, we would have no means to be able to relate to him,” Dazet said. “…But the comment I get so often is, ‘Well, we’re just sinners.’ And there’s a truth to that. But we are meant for so much more.”
He left the business world of corporate training for the ministry nearly 20 years ago with a drastically different leadership perspective than today.
“Back then, it was about the numbers (of people attending) and how big of a church I could grow,” he said. “I adapted to all that rather quickly. But, over time and specifically through cancer, I lost the desire for all that. And then I just wanted to be faithful.”
He recently sat in his office at the church at 1610 Taylor Road and answered a few questions.
How do you look at people, including those who perhaps may have been harsh or mean to you at some point in life?
“Every person on the planet bears the fingerprint of God…even though we’re all broken. Behind all our mess and all our sin, there is good there. That fingerprint of God is there, though we might not always be able to easily see it very clearly. You know, there’s a reason why people are the way that they are. And sometimes they are acting out of a wound that hasn’t been healed. I choose to have Jesus as my healer.”
You frequently have said ‘I am just me.’ What does that mean?
“If I am the same person at home if you were to knock on my door as I am in the office as I am in the pulpit, then there is no need for me to ever put on a different hat to go somewhere. I am just Paul, and there is something very freeing about that. You can choose to love me or to hate me, but I am just being honest and being myself. That’s a sense of integrity.”
Do you have something of a central message or theme that you often refer to?
“I talk about the kingdom of God and the kingdom of heaven a lot. In the Lord’s prayer, it says “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” I substitute the phrase “in Columbus as it is in heaven.” I have t-shirts over there with that phrase on them. We should be praying that God’s will in heaven — no more tears, no more death, no more pain — should begin to show up in some way right where we live.
“Here in Columbus, we should begin to see pieces of heaven show up, if we do our part. There should be less pain, fewer hungry people.”
What was one significant way that God worked through you in Muncie when you were ministering there before coming here?
“We did what a lot of churches do — it’s nothing new — we would gather and pray together on Sunday morning, and then go out in various ways and serve our community. Sometimes, you have to help people love others amid an outreach so they can then love people in everyday life at work and at school. And I think it eventually made a big difference in the lives of people.”
[sc:pullout-title pullout-title=”About the pastor” ][sc:pullout-text-begin]
Age: 51.
Hometown: Cincinnati, Ohio.
Ordained: In the Nazarene church.
Current position: New pastor at Sandy Hook United Methodist Church in Columbus.
Past position: Lead pastor at South Side Church of the Nazarene in Muncie.
Family: Wife Stacy and children Rebecca Milne, the new pastor at Petersville United Methodist Church locally, Jacob and Micah.
A night out with his spouse: Might include dinner and bookstores.
The reader is a writer: And a pretty polished one at that. Some of his musings are available at pauldazet.com
What’s in his Facebook posts: A lot of coffee, a lot of wisdom from Christian writers of depth, a lot of Christian singer TobyMac quotes — and a warning for Christians to avoid nationalism in exchange for a commitment to Christ that embraces all nations and nationalities.
Socially aware on Twitter: "It is not either/or. Black lives and blue lives matter."
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