Mike Kasting was an ordinary Hoosier boy who dreamed of being a pastor. This is the story of how his dream came true, but not often in the way he expected. "It has been, " he says, "a romance stranger and sweeter than any movie." Come along on a journey of unexpected turns to a fascinating array of places -- a Tlingit village in Alaska, a Benedictine monastery in Minnesota, a row house in a Chicago ghetto, a fishing boat in Washington, and an archeologist's trench in ancient Jericho. This book is far more than a travelogue through 40 years of ministry in the Lutheran church. It is a transparently honest, sometimes funny, sometimes heart-breaking look inside the life of a parish pastor and his family. In these pages you will meet an intriguing array of people and travel to the joyful and sorrowful poles of human experience. In the process, you will watch the wondrous and sometimes mysterious working of the grace of God. Prepare for some surprises! As one veteran pastor said, "People really have no idea what it's like for us.