June 17 Today in OPC History

On June 17, 1967, college sweethearts Don and Anne Buchanan were married. Don had just completed his first year of seminary, preparing for gospel ministry. Anne had just graduated from college. Two years later, Don took his M.Div. degree, and a pastoral call to a small countryside Southern Presbyterian church in SW Virginia. About the same time, Anne delivered their firstborn, a son they named Bruce.

By 1976, Don was working for a foreign-national church support organization. He and Anne had three more children—all daughters: Grace, Faith, and Joy. Don's ministerial credentials were now held by the Presbytery of Northern California of the OPC. The Committee on Foreign Missions (CFM) extended him a call to serve on the field in Alexandria, Egypt. The family of six left for overseas in 1979.

Don's retirement came at the end of 2011, after more than 42 years of continuous, active ministry, the great majority of it in the OPC. His call at that time was to Calvary OPC, La Mirada, CA, where he ministered for more than a decade. Meanwhile, during all these years Anne was tirelessly working that time-honored role of mother and homemaker, in addition to being a pastor's wife, a missionary's wife, and a bureaucrat's wife.

Don and Anne still live in southern California., where Don's ministerial services are used regularly by the Presbytery. Today, Bruce is an OPC minister in Michigan. Grace is a medical doctor's wife living in the Middle East. Faith is wife to OPC staff member David Nakhla living on the east coast. Joy is an OPC wife living on the west coast, not far from Mom and Dad. “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth” (3 John 1:4).

Picture: Don and Anne Buchanan

Note: Today's entry was written by the Rev. Bruce Buchanan.