At the age of fourteen John Robert McFarland traded his life for his sister's. "Save her from death," he prayed to God, and "I'll . . . be a minister." It wasn't what he wanted to do, but it was the only bargain the teenager could think of that would get God’s attention.

For forty years McFarland worked to see if his "strange" calling was really to the "high calling," the ministry. That calling has taken him to Alabama to march with Martin Luther King, Jr., to the chaos of university campuses in the 1960’s, to the families of murder victims and abused children, through a cancer diagnosis, and to the grave of ambition.

For anyone who's ever felt "called," for anyone who's ever been a minister or contemplated it, for anyone who's ever experienced the care of those who answer the strange call, for anyone who's ever wondered who ministers are and why they do what they do, this book tells the story of every minster by telling the stories of one minister.