Thanks to
the kindness of a friend, I spent the better part of the past week at a cottage,
by myself. The cottage didn’t have a radio, television, or Internet. My dog Jex
kept me company.
So I spent
several hours, each day, sitting by the window watching the Muskoka River flow
by. It was the perfect setting to give my introverted self over to reflection.
And what I found myself thinking about is how much things have changed over my
career as a pastor. I thought I’d write an occasional series on that theme. So,
for starters, some of the biggest changes are in me.
1. The
first change is easy. I often feel very tired. At first I thought this must be
because I’m getting older. But it isn’t just that. After all, I go to the gym
and exercise more regularly than I used to, years ago. I am healthy.
No, I actually
think one reason I often feel tired is that I’m working harder, but on fewer things, than I used to. When I had kids I was very focused on boundaries. And they and
their activities were the variety that gave my life spice. Now the kids are
gone and my wife works many evening
hours, so I too easily drift into the “nothing but church-work” mode. And that
steady diet of “just one thing, always,” can tire me out. I need more hobbies!
I need to work on defining better boundaries. (Of course, this is also written
in the busiest season, just before Christmas, while we’re closing out one
budget and designing a new one. Things will look different in January!)
2. I am
more distracted by media than I’ve ever been before. By media, I mean the
Internet. This is an ironic, because my wife and I have never owned a
television. We sort of fell into that at the beginning of our marriage—we
didn’t have the money for a new set. Then we decided not to get a TV until both
the boys were reading. And from there it became a matter of principle.
But now the
Internet always beckons. I’m a news-junky, I guess. People don’t phone much
anymore, but my email box is always overflowing. I follow the Blue Jays. There
are blogs to keep up with, tweets to send out, and Facebook friends to keep
track of.
I’m
experimenting with checking email and the Internet only twice a day. It’s hard
when my writing computer is also my Internet computer. But research shows that Internet
surfing can erode one’s ability and desire to engage in linear, rational, and
deep reading.
3. I’m
amazed at how much confidence I had in my early years when it came to offering
counselling and guidance about personal matters to parishioners. Unfortunately,
it was too often confidence based on complete naiveté about just how complex
and layered people’s lives, hopes, dreams, and needs are. It was also naiveté
based on not having had any education as a therapist. I saw the world in black
and white even though it had a lot of colour.
As an older
pastor, I’m more realistic about how many answers I have for pastoral
situations. Usually, the best I can do is listen, assure people of God’s love
and refer.
I’ve also learned
that one of the worst things that can happen to a pastor who ought to be
majoring in preaching and basic pastoral visitation (getting to know the sheep
and assuring them of God’s love) is to think that he or she is a therapist. I’m
not a therapist. My wife is. She went to school years to get degrees and learn
how. She’s done many, many further training courses and supervision. Me? I have
two pastoral care courses from seminary. I don’t begin to have the
understanding required to be a therapist.
I’ve also
noticed, over the years, that many pastors busy with “counselling,” really
ought to be working a lot harder to craft compelling sermons. Worse, amateur counselling often seems to be their excuse for not doing so. They’re missing out on the first
calling of a pastor--preaching--in order to do something they are educationally and absolutely unqualified to do.
4. More on
confidence. I’ve never lacked it. But looking back, I see that I should have
tempered my confidence a bit. Looking back, I see that not only did I make
pastoral errors, but I also made mistakes in council, mistakes that had to do
with defining goals, and mistakes about what I preached. Nothing horrible (I
hope). But I think that if I had listened to others a bit more, been a bit more
realistic about how much experience I had, it wouldn’t have hurt.
In a way
I’m reflecting on leadership. In the beginning I thought I could jump in with
both feet and know which way to go. Now I’ve realized that perhaps the most
important part of leadership is inspiring the congregation define its own
goals, and helping them to get there.
Another way
of putting this, perhaps, is that when I started in ministry, I believed in the
authority of the pastor. After living the role for nearly thirty years, I’ve
come to believe that authority doesn’t come with the office so much as it is
earned in the trenches.
5. On
matters of what is right or wrong, I’ve generally softened my approach. I
remember getting members of my first church to sign petitions against opening
stores on Sunday, and for toughening abortion laws. I once refused to do a wedding
for a member of the church because the groom was a nominal Roman Catholic.
But now it
seems less important to me to try to get everyone—in my church or in society at
large—to do as I say than it is important for me to try to do as I hope. I
don’t have much fight left in me for trying to bend society to my view of what
is right or wrong. It is enough to try to try to inspire people by how I live.
It is by our love for each other (and the poor, marginalized, least and last)
that people will eventually figure out that God loves them too.
6. While I
have not changed my belief that great preaching is critical for both pastoral
excellence and the success of a congregation, I’ve become much more humble
about my power as a preacher—even as I continue to strive to be a better
preacher.
I’ve come
to grips with the fact that very few people remember sermons, remember the
doctrine that you put in sermons (people learn that from what they sing!), or
even remember key themes that I return to again and again.
Sermons are
like the meals my mother fed me for years before I left home. I don’t remember
any one in particular. But without a regular diet of them I wouldn’t have
thrived.
7. I have a
marital partner that I don’t think I’ve ever taken for granted. But what has
changed is that I’ve come to realize how deeply implicated she is in most of
the positive changes in my life and ministry. Going on an adventure, hand-in-hand,
is also a lot more fun than walking around the same block that everyone else
is!
8. I’ve
become a lot more interested in the whole wide world rather than just the “theology,”
silo. My graduate studies in communication theory, my fascination with
evolution, my wife and kid’s sharing with me about their schooling has all
enriched my reading and broadened my perspective. Theology is great—but without
a great deal of worldly context, it smacks of religion rather than
spirituality, and that just doesn’t work in our world.
9. Most
important, perhaps, is my faith. I started the ministry with the faith I
learned as a child and was taught in seminary. It looks like I’ll be finishing
in ministry with a very different faith. I’d never suggest that everyone ought
to follow the exact path I did. But coming to a place where I own my own faith
as something I’ve struggled for, rather than as something just handed down, has
turned out to be a very precious journey.
