Leadership transitions are often difficult – 1st Samuel 11 & 12, Part 3

My daughter ran the 4×800 relay on her track team, so over the years I’ve witnessed many baton hand-offs like the one depicted above. The hand-off can be tricky. Every so often the hand-off doesn’t go well, as the baton is fumbled or dropped.

Transitions in leadership are likewise complex. Will the outgoing leader prepare the organization for their departure? Will the organization handle the change-over well? Will the newcomer step into their new role well?

Israel’s first king, Saul, filled with the Spirit, has led the people to a massive victory, in his first action as king.  But just like that, a troubling issue arises, as we read in verse 1st Samuel 11, verse 12, and leadership transition is the focus on the issue.

“The people then said to Samuel, ‘Who was it that asked, “Shall Saul reign over us?” Turn these men over to us so that we may put them to death.’” 

The people seem very pleased with new leader, Saul’s, victory, and yet they go to old leader Samuel with their concern.  When an organization has a long-time leader (like Samuel was for the nation of Israel) their tenure adds even more complexity to the transition process, especially when the long-time leader remains connected to the organization.  This is why retiring pastors are often required to leave their congregations completely for at least one year, to let a new pastor establish themselves. 

But Samuel is still around.  He is still God’s prophet.  Where else would he go?  He doesn’t need to leave Israel and go to some other nation.  That means, however, that people who are accustomed to taking their problems to Samuel, still do so, even though Saul is now their king.  It can take time for new patterns of leadership to become normal.  So they bring their concern to Samuel.

What is their concern? The people are concerned about others who question Saul’s selection as king.  I suspect they are referring to the people mentioned at the end of chapter 10, verse 27, the troublemakers who despise Saul.  Should those detractors be put to death?  Should they get capital punishment just because they don’t support Saul as king?  What is justice here?  What will Samuel say? And will he address the leadership transition concern? Will he step aside and let Saul handle the concern?

Look at verse 13, “But Saul said, ‘No one will be put to death today, for this day the Lord has rescued Israel.’”

Saul, not Samuel, responds!  Saul is showing us that perhaps there is more to his leadership capability than meets the eye, especially when he is filled with the Spirit, as we learned in the previous post.  Saul makes a wise ruling, avoiding unnecessary bloodshed, turning everyone’s attention to the one they should be focused on, the Lord.  Saul praises the Lord, as it was the Lord who rescued Israel. 

I suspect Samuel is breathing a sigh of relief at this point.  In chapters 9 & 10, Saul seemed like a terrible candidate to be king.  In those early days, Samuel could have been thinking, “What does the Lord see in this guy?  He can’t possibly be a good leader.  Maybe the Lord is selecting a loser so the people will realize how much better they had it when I was judge and God was king.” 

But now that Samuel has witnessed Saul filled with the Spirit, leading Israel to a stunning victory and praising God, Samuel seems to be changing his mind.  Samuel seems to feel confident that Israel will not fall apart under terrible leadership.  Samuel led Israel faithfully for decades, so perhaps he can turn the reigns over to Saul.  Finally, Samuel speaks us. Will he now address the leadership transition? Look at what Samuel says in verses 14-15,

“Then Samuel said to the people, ‘Come, let us go to Gilgal and there renew the kingship.’ So all the people went to Gilgal and made Saul king in the presence of the Lord. There they sacrificed fellowship offerings before the Lord, and Saul and all the Israelites held a great celebration.” It’s a wonderful moment.  Now Samuel can confidently retire. 

With the people gathered, he delivers his retirement speech.  In chapter 12 verses 1-11, Samuel recounts how he sought to serve ethically, how God brought the nation out of slavery in Egypt, and how God forgave and rescued their forefathers when their forefathers sinned.  In verses 12 and 13, Samuel then needs to bring up some unfinished business.  A confrontation.  He reminds the people how they asked for a king, even though God is their king. 

Why drag up the past, when Israel asked for a king? Clearly, things are good now. Yes, the nation was selfishly sinful in asking for a human king, but God allowed it, and it is going well. Why does Samuel feel the need to confront the people now? We’ll find out in the next post. 

How the Spirit of God transforms us – 1st Samuel 11 & 12, Part 2

The Ammonites have laid siege to the Israelite town of Jabesh Gilead, threatening to gouge out the right eyes of all the men in the town. Desperate, the people of Jabesh send messengers around Israel begging for help from their countrymen.

How will Israel respond to this threat? How will Israel’s new king respond to the threat? We learned in 1st Samuel chapters 9 & 10, Israel’s new king, Saul, was shy, seeming like he didn’t want to be king.  That’s why Saul’s response is shocking to this threat from the Ammonites. Look at 1st Samuel chapter 11, verses 6-9,

“When Saul heard their words, the Spirit of God came powerfully upon him, and he burned with anger. He took a pair of oxen, cut them into pieces, and sent the pieces by messengers throughout Israel, proclaiming, ‘This is what will be done to the oxen of anyone who does not follow Saul and Samuel.’ Then the terror of the Lord fell on the people, and they came out together as one. When Saul mustered them at Bezek, the men of Israel numbered three hundred thousand and those of Judah thirty thousand. They told the messengers who had come, ‘Say to the men of Jabesh Gilead, “By the time the sun is hot tomorrow, you will be rescued.”’ When the messengers went and reported this to the men of Jabesh, they were elated.”

Notice a very important detail in verse 6: “The Spirit of God came powerfully upon him.”  The presence and power of the Spirit changes shy Saul into inspired Saul.  When the Spirit of the Lord is present, watch out. 

The Spirit fires Saul up and he institutes the most unique military draft you ever heard of.  Cutting up a pair of oxen, he sends their body parts around Israel saying, “Show up or this is what will happen to your oxen.”  That is intense.

As a result of that butcher draft, the terror of the Lord comes upon the people, and they get motivated.  You might think that word “terror” sounds awful when connected to God. People should never feel terror toward God, right?  What is going here? Are the people more afraid of what the Lord might do to them (or their oxen) if they don’t come out fight with Saul, than their fear of what the Ammonites might do?  No doubt God is infinitely more powerful than the Ammonites, so there is a sense in which people would be right to fear him more than a human army. 

But this terror, which is translated “fear” in many other places in Scripture as “the fear of the Lord,” should be understood as “respect.”  Awe.  The feeling of awe and terror are extremely similar.  I’ve previously written that I love looking at the moon.  But it freaks me out.  I can’t stop looking, though, because I find it awe-inspiring.  Something so massive, so far away, that I can see?  And with my telescope, I can see the craters.  It’s astounding.  It rises up inside me a feeling that is terror and amazement and respect.  That’s what is going on in this passage.  We can call it, “Healthy fear.” 

The Israelites healthy fear is reflected in the New Testament, in Paul’s letter 2 Corinthians.  He writes, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is present, there is freedom.”  A linguist I appreciate suggests this could be translated, “where the Spirit of the Lord is present, a person is not dominated” or “… a person does not feel under constraint.”[1] 

The Spirit of God frees us from unhealthy fear, giving us a proper respectful fear of God!  In Saul’s life, a normally shy, timid person becomes a strong leader when the Spirit fills him.  330,000 Israelites sign up to rescue their brothers and sisters in Jabesh.  They do not, however, simply attempt a full frontal attack.  They are smart about it, depending on whether you view feigning surrender a lie, or a normal part of war.

In verse 10, we read, “They said to the Ammonites, ‘Tomorrow we will surrender to you, and you can do to us whatever you like’.”  This is a lie, meant to lull the Ammonites into a peaceful sleep. It seems to work.  Here’s what happens next,

“The next day Saul separated his men into three divisions; during the last watch of the night they broke into the camp of the Ammonites and slaughtered them until the heat of the day. Those who survived were scattered, so that no two of them were left together.” 

Saul, filled with the Spirit, has led the people to a massive victory, in his first action as king. 

But just like that, another issue arises for Saul, and we’ll learn about that issue in the next post.

[1] Johannes P. Louw and Eugene Albert Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains (New York: United Bible Societies, 1996), 487–488.

Photo by Melanie Magdalena on Unsplash

When life boxes you in – 1st Samuel 11 & 12, Part 1

I recently listened to a podcast about ocean temperatures.  Ocean temperatures are rising.  They have been rising for many years.  But in 2023, they rose faster than normal.  Rising ocean temperatures are concerning.  Fast rising ocean temperatures are really concerning. 

This is not a post about the environment, though sometime I should write about caring for God’s beautiful earth, over which he has made us stewards.  But this post is not about that.  Instead, I want to talk about how that podcast made me feel. 

I was listening to the podcast on my way to the ministerium meeting at another church about 10 minutes away.  So I didn’t get to hear the whole podcast.  After the ministerium meeting, I got back in the car, and I thought about turning the podcast back on, but I hesitated.  I could continue listening.  But I was feeling something inside me holding me back.  What I was feeling made me not want to listen to the podcast anymore. 

Anger?  No.  Disgust?  No.

I was feeling fear.  I was looking around the beautiful Lancaster County farmland, thinking about the environment, feeling fear. What would happen to all this beauty? I feared that it could be ruined.

Fear is a common feeling in our world.  We are inundated with scary images.  We’ve been watching a war in Ukraine for three years.  We’ve been watching a war in Gaza for seven months.  We hear about gang violence and anarchy in Haiti.  We hear about a civil war in Myanmar.  There is always trouble in the Middle East.  There are terrorists.  There is China.  There is Russia. 

Here in the USA, we’re in another testy political election year, with the same candidates telling us the fate of our nation is at stake.  All of it can create fear in our hearts and minds.  We are told, “The nation and the world are slipping off the edge of the precipice into oblivion!  We’re doomed!”  So much fear. 

Today we continue our blog series through the books of 1st and 2nd Samuel, and we come to a passage about fear.  We’re going to study 1st Samuel chapters 11 and 12 this week.  Let’s review.  The nation of Israel has asked God to give them a king.  They’ve always had a king, of course.  God himself is their king.  But they want a human king like the other nations around them.  So God tells Samuel to anoint Saul to be king. 

Saul is handsome and tall. He looks like a king, but he is shy and seems really iffy about being king.  It doesn’t matter, though, because he is God’s choice, so Samuel anoints him. In front of the whole nation, Samuel gives Saul God’s regulations for how a king should be king. 

At this time in their history, Israel has neither a capital city nor a palace.  After the coronation, then, Saul goes home. We read that he has some backers and some skeptics.  That’s where we left of in chapter 10.  Now we begin chapter 11, and immediately Saul faces his first challenge.  Look at verses 1-5,

“Nahash the Ammonite went up and besieged Jabesh Gilead. And all the men of Jabesh said to him, ‘Make a treaty with us, and we will be subject to you.’ But Nahash the Ammonite replied, ‘I will make a treaty with you only on the condition that I gouge out the right eye of every one of you and so bring disgrace on all Israel.’  The elders of Jabesh said to him, ‘Give us seven days so we can send messengers throughout Israel; if no one comes to rescue us, we will surrender to you.’ When the messengers came to Gibeah of Saul and reported these terms to the people, they all wept aloud. Just then Saul was returning from the fields, behind his oxen, and he asked, ‘What is wrong with everyone? Why are they weeping?’ Then they repeated to him what the men of Jabesh had said.”

Talk about fear.  The people of Israel are boxed in.  In previous weeks in our study of 1st Samuel we heard about the threat from the west, the Philistines.  Now we hear about a threat from the east, the Ammonites, who have besieged the Israelite town of Jabesh Gilead, threatening to gouge out the eyes of the people of Jabesh.  This is brutal, brutal stuff.  War is awful.  Of course the people are afraid and weeping.  They are fearing for their eyes…and their lives. 

Maybe you’ve experienced something difficult.  Hopefully not the threat of someone gouging out your eyes.  But I suspect you have gone through or are currently going through feeling attacked on multiple sides.  Difficult relationships, financial struggles, health concerns.  Sometimes life is filled with things that make us fear. 

This is why Saul’s response is shocking, and we’ll learn about his response in the next post.

Photo by Wil Stewart on Unsplash

The state of fear in America – 1st Samuel 11-12, Preview

What keeps you up at night?  Ever experience the syndrome where you cannot turn your mind off because you’re thinking about stuff?  I fall asleep rather easily, but if I wake up in the middle of night, usually to use the restroom, anxious thoughts can creep in my mind, and it can be so difficult to shut them down.

Chapman University has a Survey of American Fears, nine years running.  Before continuing to read this post, what fears do you think make Chapman’s 2023 Top Ten Fears list?  The fears that come to my mind are personal financial instability, political turmoil, the environment, and something bad happening to my family.  What about you?  Here’s the 2023 list of what Americans report makes them afraid or very afraid:

1.    Corrupt government officials (60.1%)

2.    Economic/financial collapse (54.7%)

3.    Russia using nuclear weapons (52.5%)

4.    US involvement in World War (52.3%)

5.    People I love becoming seriously ill (50.6%)

6.    People I love dying (50.4%)

7.    Pollution of drinking water (50.0%)

8.    Biological warfare (49.5%)

9.    Cyber-terrorism (49.5%)

10. Not having enough money for the future (48.0%)

How does your list compare?

Because Chapman University has been studying fear for nine years, they’ve seen significant changes in people’s impressions of fear.  Environmental concern is decreasing, while concern about war is on the increase.  Makes sense when we consider that there was no war in Ukraine or Israel nine years ago. New life circumstances can make us feel new fears.

Rather than be subject to the swirling storms of local, national or international events, is there any way we Christians can find stability in the midst of what might cause us fear?  Come to think of it, Is all fear bad?  What does the Bible say about fear?  As we continue studying 1st Samuel, chapters 11 and 12 have a lot to say about fear.  Read them this weekend, and then I look forward to studying them with you on the blog next week.

Photo by Vadim Bogulov on Unsplash

The battle with “Bigger is Better,” and 2 other battles I wasn’t prepared for…and one great joy – What I wish I would have known before becoming a pastor, Part 5

All week long on the blog, I’ve been trying to answer the question: “What I wish I would have known before becoming a pastor.” In this final post in the series, I have a few more responses.

I wasn’t prepared for the Christianity of it all.  My life is in large part wrapped up in our church family.  Christians, Christians, and more Christians.  That’s not wrong.  But it sometimes can get too Christiany.  It doesn’t help that I’ve also taught classes in exclusively Christian settings at LBC, Messiah or India, which admittedly has been my choice.  But when you only have educational degrees and professional experience in pastoral ministry, Bible and theology, you are kinda limited.  Years ago I looked into becoming a chaplain in the National Guard, and I was close to doing it.  I would have still been full-time pastor at Faith Church, but I would have been part-time with the Guard. I often wonder if I should have done that rather than getting my doctorate.  My point is that sometimes pastors can get stuck in a total Christian world. That’s not a good thing.

I wasn’t prepared for the complexity of cultural change.  Every local church is a culture unto itself.  Any organization has its own culture.  That’s normal.  What I didn’t realize is how complicated it can be for those cultures to change.  In 22 years I have seen Faith Church change.  Sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes joyfully, sometimes in turmoil.  I don’t believe I have always led well, or that I have handled change well.  It’s very tricky.  But I believe that over the last 16 years since I became senior pastor, we have changed for the better, that there is a vibrant health in our church family.  I love how people are stepping out of their comfort zone to serve in many ways.  I love how we are emphasizing the Fruit of the Spirit. I am grateful to God for that, and for the people’s choice to pursue the Fruit of the Spirit!

I wasn’t prepared for the nonstop struggle with “bigger is better.” While I am very glad that Faith Church has changed in a healthy direction, I recognize that we are smaller than when I started.  And I always struggle with the “bigger is better” mentality.  That’s another one I didn’t realize about pastoral ministry. 

I have not been able to shake the mentality that “bigger is better”.  Even though I know that mentality is not founded on Scripture, the idea that “bigger is better” is so deeply entrenched in our culture, even in our Christian mindset, that I can often feel like a failure.  Let me give you a recent example. 

A few weeks ago, Faith Church held our annual Super Mission Sunday. Our guest speakers were missionaries from our congregation who have been serving in Kenya for 15 years.  And people showed up.  No doubt there were visitors specifically for the missionaries.  No doubt Super Mission Sunday is a draw.  And our attendance was high, 95 people. But the primary reason for that attendance is because a large percentage of the 110 or so of us that call Faith Church our home church attended. 

The next week?  59.  34 fewer people.  I thought about writing the missionaries to say they need to speak every week. I’m joking!  But I will admit that I carry emotion about that.  I carry self-worth about that.  And I have carried that every week for the 16 of my 22 years that I have been senior pastor. 

But here’s the truth.  Bigger is not necessarily better.  I’m preaching to myself.  Instead, a healthy church is one that is growing and flowing with the Fruit of the Spirit, making disciples, following the mission of Jesus in our local community.  I am thrilled how Faith Church is doing that in so many ways.  Helping at CVCCS in their food and clothing bank.  Helping with CV SEEDS teaching English and providing meals and childcare.  Helping lead worship at the Prison.  Helping resettle refugees with Church World Service.  I could go on and on. 

I also didn’t know how deeply joyful being pastor of Faith Church would be.  I’ve been here longer than any other pastor in the church’s history, and part of that is God’s grace and strength, and part of that is the church family’s graciousness and love.  Together, seeking God, pursuing his mission in our local community

So what do I wish I’d known before becoming a pastor?  So much!  And yet pastoral ministry is like most anything.  You learn as you go.  You change.  You grow.  Faith Church and my wife and I have done that together.  Being a pastor is a privilege, and it is a heartache.  It is filled with both joy and sadness.  It involves the sacrifice of time, self, finances.  It is also receiving the gift of growing, learning, and change.  

Michelle and I were young parents of 2 children when we started at Faith Church on October 1, 2002 as youth/associate pastor.  The church family has been with us as we had two more children, then many years later added two daughters-in-law, and now two grandchildren.  They have walked with us through the ups and downs of life. We thank you, Faith Church.

Photo by Heather Marie

People can see pastors as vending machines – What I wish I would have known before becoming a pastor, Part 4

Pastors are spiritual vending machines.  Well, not really, but some people view their pastors and ministry staff like they view vending machines.  You put your money in, you get your spiritual goods and services out. 

We live in a consumer society, so it is very common for people to view most everything in our lives from the framework of consumerism, including pastors.  But let me turn the tables.  Should pastors view the congregation as consumers who give us money?  Some pastors do, often devising ways to justify their congregations enriching them. Private jets. Mansions. Luxury vehicles. But that would be wrong for pastors to view their congregations as vending machines. Should it not also be wrong for congregations to view their pastors likewise?

To illustrate how pastors could view their ministry through a consumerist lens, I’ve joked that I could offer BOGO deals.  You know BOGO?  Buy One Get One.  You buy a baptism and I’ll throw in a wedding.  You buy an infant dedication and I’ll throw in a funeral. 

That might come across very cynical, but I don’t think I’m cynical about it. 

At Faith Churchg I haven’t talked about this in years, because I haven’t needed to.  Instead, what I have seen from the family of Faith Church is many serious about discipleship to Jesus.  For example, when I went on sabbatical in 2018, people stepped out of their comfort zones, serving in ways that previously only I had served.  Hosting worship services, for example.  From 2008 until 2018, for ten years I was the host nearly every Sunday morning.  But when I was not here because I was on sabbatical from January through March of 2018, a rotation of people hosted.  They enjoyed it so much, we just kept it going after my sabbatical was over.  Having a variety of hosts with a variety of approaches, in my opinion, is a wonderful demonstration of people using their gifts.

Consider the alternative: relying on the pastor to do the work.  Historically in the American church, that pastor-reliant mindset was prevalent.  The pastor is paid to do ministry, while the people receive the ministry. That mindset is wrong.  That consumer mindset goes against what Paul teaches in the epistles. 

In 1st Corinthians 12, Paul gives us the metaphor of the church as the body of Christ, and that each part is valuable.  Each person is different, each with gifts and abilities, yet all are equally valuable and needed.  In Ephesians 4:11-12, he teaches the APEST model of ministry,

“So Christ himself gave the Apostles, the Prophets, the Evangelists, the Pastors [or Shepherds] and Teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”

What Paul is saying is that people in churches should not think that they are paying the pastors to do all the work for them.  Instead, Paul says in verses 11-12, the job description of pastors is to equip the people to do works of service.  In the church, the people are not consumers, they are producers.  In the church, there are not spectators, there are participants.  Disciples of Jesus are people who are actively practicing their gifts for the mission of the Kingdom.  I hope I am helping the people in my congregation grow as disciples of Jesus so that they can do the work of the mission. 

But have I helped them grow as disciples of Jesus?  If I said, “I have been amazing, and the people of the church have been difficult,” that is not true.  I have made plenty of mistakes. I am not and never will be a perfect pastor.  There are aspects of pastoral ministry that I will always struggle with.  I enjoy the teaching and preaching aspects of pastoral ministry far more than the shepherding parts of pastoral ministry. 

Back to that list of APEST gifts from Ephesians 4:11-12.  I am more inclined to the role of teacher and prophet than I am to the role of shepherd.  The word “pastor” comes from the role of actual shepherds who have animals, sheep.  Think about the idea of a pasture, what we would call a pastoral scene.  Think of green rolling hills, meadows, where sheep graze, and a shepherd walking around making sure all is well with the sheep.  A shepherd cares for the sheep.  That’s where we get the idea of a pastor being a shepherd to his flock, the congregation. 

Just because I favor teaching, I have still sought to faithfully fulfill the pastoral role, but I sometimes have to force myself, and that means sometimes I know I haven’t done well with it. Many of those times, it is my wife Michelle prompting me, reminding me, to check in with someone.  Michelle often asks me about a situation.  We are a team in this. 

Another part of pastoral or shepherding ministry is confrontation.  People confronting me, and me needing to confront others.  I did not know the toll that would take on my over the years. 

When it comes to all aspects of pastoral ministry, whether confronting which I think I’m terrible at, or teaching with I think I’m better at, I know I have room to grow in that area of ministry too.  Shepherding doesn’t come as naturally to me as I feel teaching does.  

What I am getting at is that some pastors are not natural extroverts.  I absolutely love people and enjoy being around people, but I often have to get up from being perfectly satisfied alone in a corner and go to people.  That doesn’t mean I don’t love the people in the church.  In fact my action of stepping out of my comfort zone is a sign that I do want to reach out because I overcome my inclination to just stay put. 

That might be part of the reason why I have been so surprised and frankly struggled with the dynamic of people leaving the church.  I have to work hard to reach out, and then people leave?

I also didn’t realize how death would feel.  Maybe 10 years ago, there was a 7 month period when 8 people died, and at least one per month. I couldn’t get away from it.  It affected me emotionally. 

All this to say, I didn’t realize how much pastoral ministry could hurt.  It is a fact that I will not always be pastor of Faith Church.  Obviously, I don’t know when that day will come.  But it will come.  And there will be a new pastor.  The same goes for your church. I encourage you, if you haven’t already, start now practicing seeing pastors as people.  Not vending machines, but people. 

Photo by Victoriano Izquierdo on Unsplash

Preaching is like packing apples & Church competition can be brutal – What I wish I would have known before becoming a pastor, Part 3

In high school I worked at Hess Bros Fruit Company, packing bags of apples into boxes. Bags come down the conveyor, and I would gently place the bags in boxes, close the box lid, and send it down the line to the box-taping machine.  Then I would do it again.  And again.  And again.  For hours. Endless boxes of apples.  I love apples, and Hess Bros apples are delicious, but it got to a point where I grew to hate the nonstop deluge. If you’ve worked a conveyor line, maybe you know the feeling.

I did not expect the same feeling grow would inside me about preaching.

Preaching isn’t about me and what I have to say.  It’s about God speaking through his word.  My goal is to present the teaching of God’s inspired word week in, week out.  A particular sermon might not speak to some people.  That’s normal.  But I hope many sermons do minister to most people. 

When it comes to preaching, though, I didn’t realize how preaching and teaching can sometimes feel like a factory job.  I love preaching, I love studying the Bible.  But there are weeks it feels like a factory job, cranking out yet another sermon.  I didn’t expect that.  And it is why I am deeply grateful for my church’s Pastoral Relations Committee years ago giving me one Sunday per month off from preaching.  I’m super thankful for the people, mostly from Faith Church, who fill in for me. It’s amazingly refreshing to have that monthly week off from preaching. I believe the week off has made my preaching better, and it has been wonderful for the church family to hear other voices on a regular basis.

Something else I knew growing up in Lancaster, but that I didn’t expect, was how it would feel that Lancaster County has so many churches.  Some estimate we have 700 churches in our county. I never imagined how picky people can be about church. 

But it’s not just all the churches in Lancaster.  We also live in a connected world.  Local churches are competing with television church, internet church, YouTube preachers.  I didn’t realize how it would feel to be in competition with other churches and pastors, and especially one of the consequences of competition: losing.

I didn’t realize how it will feel when you invest in peoples’ lives, and they move on from the church.  People will come and go.  Again, that’s basic humanity.  Before I became pastor I could have told you intellectually that, yes, of course people will leave the church.  What I could not have told you is how it will feel.  It can hurt.  It happens so many times, you can get PTSD from it, which is what my counselor said I was experiencing in 2015.  You can grow cold and callous.  You can pretend it doesn’t hurt, it doesn’t affect you.  But it does. 

Because our church family is a massive part of our lives, my wife, Michelle, and I have tried to invest ourselves in their lives.  Some moreso, some less.  But the result is that it hurts when someone leaves the church, especially for a reason we disagree with.  That feels hard.  When they leave without talking, without giving a reason, without conversing, it is particularly unsettling. 

Before I became pastor I also didn’t realize that some people will look at you mostly as their pastor, and less so as a person.  In other words, in some people’s eyes, you are fulfilling a role in their lives. You are their pastor.  They can have all sorts of expectations for how you are to fulfill that role.  Some expectations they never tell you, some you disagree with, some you cannot possibly fulfill. Sometimes we only learn what those expectations are when a person tells us we didn’t fulfill the expectation, and they are upset.

One way these expectations manifest themselves that I wasn’t prepared for is that people sometimes think they pay the pastor to perform a role.  Those persons expect it to be a one-directional transactional relationship.  They pay you to care for them.  You are not paying them to care for you. Thus some people view their pastor as a role, not a relationship.  I didn’t expect that.

From their point of view, then, it’s usually not personal when they leave the church.  But from the perspective of the pastor, it can still really feel personal, hurtful. 

Photo by Arno Senoner on Unsplash

How The Matrix taught me people are difficult (me included) – What I wish I would have known before becoming a pastor, Part 2

In my first year as senior pastor of Faith Church, I showed a video clip from the R-rated movie The Matrix, attempting to illustrate a sermon. I could have shown a brief clip from the film that was relatively tame, but, no, I had the great idea of showing a ten-minute clip, including then scene where a totally naked (though you never see his private parts) Neo is awakened to see the real world in which robots have enslaved humans in pods, harvesting human energy to run the world.  I was about to learn a tough lesson about pastoral ministry.

As I mentioned in the previous post, before becoming pastor, I knew that we humans, myself included, can sometimes be difficult. What I didn’t know is how it would feel being a pastor to 100+ people for 22 years.  There is a messiness in being paid to pastor people, even when those people are lovely.  It can get especially messy when you are being paid to pastor people whom you think are sometimes difficult.   

It goes both ways.  There is a messiness of being paid to pastor people who think you, the pastor, are difficult, because I am difficult sometimes.  I have made mistakes, I have failed my congregation sometimes, I have my tendencies that are sometimes frustrating. 

Needless to say, the clip I showed from The Matrix was not appropriate for worship. 

At the time, though, while I knew it was edgy, I didn’t think deeply about how it would come across to the congregation as a whole.  By the end of the clip, about 15-20 people had gotten up and walked out of the service.  The next week of my life was awful, and I learned a lot.  So many phone calls, emails, meetings because of my mistake.  I started the very next worship service with an apology. 

Since that sermon, which was in January 2009, I don’t believe I’ve had anyone walk out of a sermon again, except one time.  A few years ago I was preaching a sermon in a series entitled “False Ideas Christians Believe,” (blog posts on the series starts here) and a first time visitor walked out of the sermon, after I made the suggestion that God is not obligated to bless us when we sacrificially give our lives and money to him (blog post with that specific sermon here). 

My point in all this is to say that I had no idea before becoming pastor what it would feel like to be messy people together.  I have been messy together with some of them for 22 years.  Frankly, it is exhausting.  You can’t get away from it.  As pastor you are paid to do it, whether you like the mess or not.

So how do you make it 22 years?  Many pastors don’t.  Average pastoral tenure is 5-7 years.  One way, among many, that pastors can increase longevity is the importance of learning nuance when it comes to people.  No person is simply one way.  No person is totally great, or totally difficult.  We humans are filled with nuance.  The person we typically characterize as difficult will do something gracious and loving and caring.  The person we typically see as so much fun and interesting will say something hurtful and painful. 

In my first few years of being senior pastor, I would stand up to preach, looking the congregation in front of me smiling, Bibles open, paying attention, not sleeping or dozing off at all ever (ha!), and I would think, “What could I possibly have to say to them?  They already know all this.  Look how godly and together they are.” 

It’s been many years now since I thought that way.  I know the church family better than I did in 2008, and we all have issues.  We all need to hear God’s word on a regular basis.  I don’t say that because I now know about all the issues of my congregation, and thus I feel more confident that they need to hear what God says. 

Instead, I know we always all need to hear God’s word on a regular basis because all humans, me included, do not have life all figured out.  We always need God to speak to us.  We all need humble teachable hearts, so that we can learn to grow the Fruit of Spirit more in our lives.

Photo by Dan LeFebvre on Unsplash

Pastoral Ministry is not only a job, it is a life – What I wish I would have known before becoming a pastor, Part 1

“What do you wish you would’ve known before becoming a pastor?”

We pastors talk about it all the time amongst ourselves.  We rarely if ever talk about it with the people we pastor. Yet that’s what I did this past Sunday at Faith Church. Why? Once per quarter I pause my sermon series and have a current events sermon or a Q & A sermon, and one of the people in my church family asked that question.

It felt risky. I was nervous. It felt risky to answer the question, “What do you wish you would’ve known before becoming a pastor?” with the people that I pastor because by far the most significant aspect of pastoral ministry is the people I pastor. 

In other words, in answering this question, much of how I was going to answer that question is what I think about my congregation.  What has it been like to be their pastor? I’ll be blogging about it in this and the next four posts.

Here goes!

First of all, my wife, Michelle, and I did not realize how being pastor is a life for the pastor’s whole family.  It’s not as if it is my thing alone, and Michelle and our kids are uninvolved.  It is a family venture.  Obviously, Michelle and I are the most significantly involved in hands on ways.  But I don’t think I realized how much being a pastor automatically affects the whole family.  In many ways that is a good thing.  It is sometimes a difficult thing. 

For example, Michelle and I talk about how saying “Yes” to church functions often means saying “No” to family functions.  We learned in our missionary year in Jamaica that you do not sacrifice family on the altar of ministry.  But scheduling ministry doesn’t always fit nicely into a schedule.  You sometimes have to sacrifice.  There are only 24 hours in the day, and many times “Yes” to church is a “No” to something else.  Pastoral ministry in a church our church’s size (110 people) is not a clock in, clock out job. We didn’t expect how difficult it could be sometimes to have a healthy work/life balance. Often it is imbalanced.

But it is not all bad. Pastoral ministry can also be very joyful for our family.  The church building has been a second home in some ways, and the church family a second family, for us for our kids.  Our Faith Church family has loved us and our kids.

When it comes to pastoral ministry, I also don’t think I realized how much it is US.  It is Joel and Michelle.  I don’t think we realized how much Michelle would give to the life of the church, to the people of the church.  This is not a complaint, but a reality.  Because pastoral ministry is a life, we live church, we talk about it, discussing it frequently.  Michelle is involved in nearly every way, yet my name is the only one on the paycheck.  

When I say that pastoral ministry is a life, as I said, a pastoral couple doesn’t clock out.  There have been moments when we clock out: vacations in state parks with no internet or cell service, and during sabbatical.  But for the vast majority of our 22 years, because we live in a connected world, we are on.  In the office, at meetings, and at home, phone calls, email, and texting and social media.  We didn’t realize how it would feel for us to be connected to 110 people.  We are always on yellow alert.  We are often unable to disengage, waiting for what is next, what needs to be done, what is going on in someone’s world.  This is not a complaint.  Just a description of a reality that I didn’t fully understand before becoming a pastor.

And that brings to me back the people.

On the one hand, unless I say “Pastoral ministry has been perfect, amazing, wonderful, joyful, and fulfilling,” because I will have to talk about the ways pastoral ministry is difficult, this week’s posts could come across as complaining or ungrateful or self-serving.  But on the other hand, if all I said was “It’s been amazing,” you would know right away that I am not telling the truth.  So I need to tell the truth, and that means I need to talk about the people I pastor.

Sometimes people are difficult, sometimes very difficult.  But you might respond, “Didn’t you already know that?”

Of course I knew that before becoming a pastor.  It’s Humanity 101.  We all know that people can be difficult.  Difficult people are a part of our families, our neighborhoods, our schools, our workplaces, and we sometimes have lifelong close friends who are difficult.  Difficult people are part of church families too. 

You know the people in your life you think are difficult.  Before you start naming names in your head, remember that someone can likely name you as difficult sometimes too.  My wife will tell you that I can be really difficult sometimes.  I will tell you that she can be difficult too.  My guess is that all spouses would be able to share ways their spouse is difficult.  All kids would be able to share how their parents are difficult.  All parents would be able to tell us how their kids are difficult. 

This is humanity.  

So how did I not know this about being a pastor of people?  I’ll answer that in the next post.

Photo by Heather Marie

I’m nervous about the next Q & A week on the blog – Preview

For the past few years at Faith Church, one Sunday per quarter, I take a break from the sermon series, and I have a Current Events sermon.  In those sermons, I scour the headlines, and study Scripture to try to help us think Christianly about the headlines. As always, I’ve blogged those sermons here. We’ve talked about war, Covid, politics, artificial intelligence, and even lawn care.

What I have been surprised to learn is how much the headlines are the same…quarter after quarter after quarter. Last quarter, in place of a Current Events sermon, I did a Question and Answer sermon.  I invited my congregation to submit questions, and I tried to do the same as I do for Current Events sermons: study the Scripture to help us think Christianity in answering those questions.

This quarter, though, I did not receive any questions.  But I still have one left over from last quarter, one that I didn’t have time for in the previous Q & A week.  I started working on answering the question, thinking it would be brief, and then I thought I would tackle a current events issue as well.  As I typed my answer the question, more and more and more came out.  Frankly, entire books and seminary courses are about this.

The question I didn’t answer last quarter? “What do you wish you would’ve known before becoming a pastor?”

It feels very risky to answer that question in a sermon.  Why?  Join me on the blog next week to find out!

Photo by Hadija on Unsplash