Like his father (the late Rev. Gareth Kok) JIM KOK began his career as a pastor for the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) and concentrated on issues of pastoral care & late more specifically kindness ministry. Early on, he worked as a parish pastor in Iowa City, as well as did Clinical Pastoral Care (CPE) in upstate New York as well as Ann Arbor MI, and then became a CPE superrvisor & chaplain at a Christian hospital (Pine Rest) in Grand Rapids, Michigan . After leaving Pine Rest he took on the position of director of pastoral care at the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, CA from 1984 to the present (yes, he still works there & the church still gathers for worship every Sunday in the glass church, although they will be moving soon) .
While at the Crystal Cathedral he began the annual International Care & Kindness Conference, which helped inspire, equip, & teach others how to respond to the world in a more kindly manner in various ways on a day-to-day basis. The three-day conference is (or was, up until recent economic setbacks at the church) devoted to issues of kindness & care & various guest speakers & experts in the fields of spirituality, medicine, social work & psychology, etc speak/spoke on the many different topics of care & kindness integrated with a Christian emphasis (the kindness conference will continue at _____ ) He has a book entitled "Miracle of Kindness", among others (see
http://www.amazon.com/Miracle-Kindness-James-R-Kok/dp/0615127479 ) and a blog . Some previous issues of his "care capsule" can be seen at http://www.simpleacts.org/capsules/capsule23.htm#a, also see the crystal cathedral kindness website at http://ccmcare.blogspot.com/
