Chapter 28 - Staying in Church

Welcome to one last entry in our blog conversation around This Odd and Wondrous Calling!  Rev. Lillian Daniel and Rev. Martin Copenhaver have offered us stories from their ministries – stories of the oddness and the wonder of parish ministry – and invited us to reflect on our own stories as parish pastors and as parishioners.  I volunteered to write the last blog without remembering the subject of the last chapter.  When I flipped to page 228, I laughed.  The chapter on staying!  I have a deep affinity for staying.

                Rev. Duane Meyer, at that time an Associate Conference Minister in the Iowa Conference, offered me this advice as I prepared to begin parish ministry at Olds UCC:  “Just don’t leave.”   I didn’t leave the dear folk at Olds for 7 ½ years and then I didn’t leave the dear folk at Central City UCC for 19 years.  

                Some of you know that I am drawn to life in spiritual community.  (I’ve spoken with other ordained women in my generation who felt called in childhood to be nuns before they could imagine being called as pastors, never having seen an ordained woman or even a good movie about one!)  I’m drawn to a vow in communities following the Benedictine rule:  the vow of stability.  To vow stability is to promise to fulfill one’s vows in the same community for life. 

                But I also write to you as one who did not stay, one who is no longer a parish pastor.  I did leave, answering a call to cheer on pastors and congregations as a member of the Iowa Conference staff.  God and I continue to exchange occasional sharp words over that leaving and this calling.  I miss parish ministry very much and I have a deep, deep affection and respect for those who have taken up an odd and wondrous calling and who have stayed.

                I also write to you as one haunted by a statistic that prompts a great deal of searching conversation among folk in wider church ministry, among Committees on Ministry, and among first call pastors and their congregations:  half of new parish pastors leave parish ministry within the first five years.  Half. 

                If you’d like to join in this final blog conversation about staying in church, I have some questions for you!

·         Pastors, what makes you stay in church?  What mix of odd and wondrous call, financial and geographical reality, faith and fear, makes you stay? 

·         Pastors, what sorts of things push you at times to think of leaving parish ministry?

·         Parishioners, is your church a place where pastors stay?  Or frequently leave?  Why do you suppose this is?

                It’s been a delight to join you in this journey of shared reading and conversation.  I’ll look forward to our next conversation!

Jonna Jensen, Associate Conference Minister for Eastern Iowa

Chapters 26 & 27 – Preaching and Pastoral Care

In these two chapters from This Odd and Wondrous Calling, Lillian Daniel and Martin Copenhaver reflect on the two most obvious things a church pastor does -- preaching and pastoral care (visiting the sick). If you questioned average folks on the street about what a pastor’s work is, they’d probably be able to name these two things. For authors Martin Copenhaver and Lillian Daniel, these tasks live at the heart of their ministry.

Indeed these two ‘tasks’ are integral to pastoral ministry. They are where a pastor meets the people of a congregation in particularly intimate ways --while sick, or during a sacred conversation while worshipping God. They write about how the rest of their work informs these tasks: “In meeting with couples in crisis, I realize that my own reflections on marriage are being shaped and enriched in ways that undoubtedly will make their way into my preaching. In the administration meeting where we agonize between two important budget items, my thoughts on stewardship are being shaped. Later when I read a text for the week, all these experiences will be part of what ends up on the page,” Daniel writes on page 225.

None of what they say is particularly surprising, for those of us engaged in pastoral ministry, at least. I find it interesting that their reflections do not mention how these tasks relate to being religious leaders. By making a pastor’s work center in Sunday morning or hospital visits, Copenhaver and Daniel might have inadvertently diminished the call of the pastor and, indeed, all Christians. Jesus certainly preached and taught and healed the sick. But, none of those things were ends unto themselves. Those things were done in order to transform lives, to give people a sense of purpose and value that came from God, nowhere else.

Preaching and pastoral care are mere tools in the toolbox.  These tasks facilitate holy relationship, allowing the pastor to be both a comforting and challenging presence to members of his or her congregation. Over time, the relationships that are built allow pastor and congregant alike to grow spiritually in ways they could never do alone. Hopefully that personal growth transforms them into new people, allowing them to transform the world.

Nicole Havelka
associate conference minister for youth and young adult ministries

Chapters 24 & 25

I’ve heard rumors that clergy are human beings.  Could it be true?

In chapters 24 and 25, Martin Copenhaver and Lillian Daniel offer the reader entre into two different instances of clerical humanity.  There could hardly be more stressful moments than the unexpected death of a parent, and the diagnosis of a serious disease in one’s 8 year old child.

Important questions get begged at such moments – questions about professional boundaries and priority of purpose.  After all, it’s clear to me, at least, that clergy exist for churches and not vice versa.  It’s a prescription for trouble when a pastor begins to treat the congregation as if it existed mainly to care for (or stroke the ego of, or satisfy the financial aspirations of, or – God forbid – meet the sexual needs of) the pastor. 

The church is foundational – the office of pastor was invented for the welfare of the church – churches weren’t invented to meet the needs of clergy. 

But clergy have needs.  We are human beings who struggle with loss and sickness and relationship trials and death just like all other people do.  Should the pastor, in his or her ministerial role, function as if immune to the ordinary and troubling challenges faced by every other member of the congregation?

Of course not.  Any pastor who is so emotionally shielded from the congregation will inevitably fail to connect with them in the deep and profound way that is necessary for truly effective pastoral work to occur. 

Martin Copenhaver implies some ambivalence about his undisclosing behavior on the occasion of his father’s death.  I do not fault him for what he actually did, but I think his hindsight assessment is right.  The people we serve need to know that we are also fallible human beings who struggle with all the same human challenges as do our people.  We must allow them to offer care and support – but we must do so carefully.  It is one thing to be appropriately transparent with the people we serve – it is quite another to persistently depend on them in ways that fundamentally turn the table of ministry.  Ordinarily and appropriately the pastor exists to care for the congregation – occasionally the tables can and should be turned – but ONLY occasionally. 

If it is true that clergy will face as many life challenges as anyone else, there is an important implication in this observation – that the pastor MUST have other sources of support and care beyond the congregation.  Do I?  Do you?  I believe we can only be faithful and effective if we do.

Rich Pleva
Conference Minister

Chapter 23

Did you come away from reading Lillian Daniel’s chapter, “Money Off the Shelf”, inspired to truth-telling and tithing?  Didn’t she do a fine job of capturing the nuances and ambiguities, the attractions and repulsions, the spiritual struggles that bubble up and over in congregations as pastors and people talk (or don’t talk) about money and giving?  Some coffee and conversation about this chapter would be a great beginning for a congregation preparing for the annual gathering of pledges.

You’re welcome to practice a bit of that conversation in this space!

 

Was it easy for you to resonate with the image of offering plates hidden away on a little shelf out of view?  Rev. Daniels helped us to recognize that our resistance to conversations about money is not the simple expression of a social grace, but often the expression of painful fears, anger, and shame about money we have learned from childhood.  A congregation is a family made up of families.  Plenty of fear, anger, and shame about money to go around!  Where is it safe to tell the stories that shape our feelings about money?    

I tithe.  I understand that Jesus didn’t teach and preach using fractions like 1/10^th.  He used other sorts of numbers, like “all” and “everything”.  He invited us to a way of living that was lavishly generous. What experiences have you had as you tried to apply “Jesus math” to your earning and spending? 

Like Rev. Daniels, I experience both the pull beyond tithing and the pull toward things.  There’s plenty of tension and motion in my thoughts and prayers (more tension and motion than progress, for sure) about material comforts and things.  Do disciples buy bubble bath (I do love bubble bath)?  How many pairs of shoes should a disciple have?  What decisions have you made about possessions that bear witness to your faith?  Do you feel comfortable and welcome to talk about these sorts of questions and decisions in your congregation? 

I’ll watch for your posts as we share both our odd and our wondrous experiences with taking money off the hidden shelf.

Jonna Jensen, Associate Conference Minister for Eastern Iowa

Chapter 22 - Marriage

It’s more than a little ironic that the only single gal on the Iowa Conference UCC staff was given the chapter on marriage in This Odd and Wondrous Calling. Martin Copenhaver writes of his marriage to his wife, Karen, who they somewhat jokingly refer to as a pagan.

More accurate is that she is a doubter, a skeptic. She doesn’t take religious beliefs or ideas at face value, instead bringing good questions to the table. Copenhaver talks about how this has been both a blessing and a challenge for his ministry and his marriage. Karen is a faithful wife, attending worship at the churches Copenhaver has served over the years. Karen, who professionally is a lawyer, has even taken the bar exam in six states so that Copenhaver could answer his call. She has not been a traditional “preacher’s wife.”

I don’t think you need to be a married minister to observe that the traditional “preacher’s wife” is going away. Now we have mant “preacher’s husbands” (who don’t have the same long-standing expectation of church participation that women seem to face). Both women and men have professional lives outside the home and the church. Men can stay home to raise children while women work. The variety of ways in which marriages function can be astounding and even confusing to some.

A documentary recently aired on PBS’ Independent Lens, “The Calling,” explored the stories of six young clergy people. In one segment, a mentor coached a young rabbi NOT to tell a congregation at which he was interviewing that he wanted their part-time position because he wanted to stay home with his children. The young rabbi struggled mightily with this reality. He wanted to be faithful simultaneously to his calling, his wife and their children.

In a world where relationships and gender roles are constantly changing, Copenhaver’s transparent chapter on his own marriage is instructive. It’s best not to make assumptions about what a pastor’s spouse might think or believe. It’s best not to expect that a pastor’s spouse is going to be involved in the church in particular ways. It’s best not to think that a pastor’s marriage is going to function exactly how they did back in “the good ol’ days.” Instead let’s treat each of these people and marriages as individual entities and wonder at the many ways God reveals God’s divinity in them.

Nicole Havelka

Chapter 21 - Married to the Minister

I have a confession to make. This book has bothered me from the beginning and I have never been quite sure why. As I was reading Chapter 21, it hit me.

I know why the book really troubles me. It’s not that the book isn’t well written. Daniels and Copenhaver are gifted writers and the book bears testament to their skills. It’s not that the subject matter of the book is boring. Who among us wouldn’t be entranced by a study of what it means to be a minister of the gospel in today’s world? It’s not even that the book is boring. It’s not. It’s an easy, entertaining read. No. My disquiet has nothing to do with craftsmanship, content or readability. What really gravels me about it is that it is so depressingly, soppingly self-indulgent.

In Chapter 21 Rev. Daniels has shared with us her take on what it means to be the spouse of a pastor. As I read it, I wanted to scream “What in heaven’s name makes you think things are any different in any other two-career marriage?”

I was a lawyer for 35 years. My wife knows all about 75-hour work weeks; vacations interrupted or cancelled by the vagaries of some judge’s trial calendar; dinner dates missed because some client’s son chose the night of our anniversary to see if a six pack really screwed up his ability to drive; school events missed because a client’s plant picked the night of the 6^th-grade play to explode or catch fire. For 35 years she had to live with the fact that I could never talk about my work or even about how my day had been because to do so might betray a client’s confidences.

In the first 10 years of my legal career, we moved three times, each time so that I could take a new job. With each move, my wife went to the final interview. My wife went on the tour of homes and schools. My wife had to endure the same boring chamber of commerce lecture about how “life in our fair city is just about as good as it can possibly be.” With each move we had to deal not only with my new employment but how the move would affect her career. I’m pretty confident that these moves were no easier for Julie than they have been for Daniel’s husband, Lou.

Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t mean to make light of the difficulties faced by anyone who goes into a career in the ministry. It is a difficult, emotionally draining enterprise that takes a huge toll on everyone who chooses to engage in it. I am afraid, however, that we have perpetuated a myth among ourselves that somehow our calling is more difficult or emotionally and physically costly than other careers. In so doing, we have put ourselves on our own little islands. This enislement, it seems to me, is a dangerous thing. By indulging in this kind of self-centered isolation, we hobble our ability to identify with and minister to our congregations. And it is just this sense of separation, this idea that somehow we have it worse than everyone else, that Daniel’s work encourages.

Sure, ministry is hard. But so is just about every other way of making a living that you can think of. There is, after all, a reason why they call it work.

Tony Stoik

Chapter 20 - The Twin Imposters

Ages ago the prophet Elijah came face-to-face with one of the biggest challenges of “faith work” – that it doesn’t lend itself to empirical verification.

Think about it: in the biggest showdown of his career – the contest with Jezebel’s prophets of Ba’al – he’d put them to shame.  After taunting them over their inability to evoke a response from their oh-so tangible gods, he’d drenched his sacrifice with water and stood back so Yahweh could send down a fire that not only consumed the sacrifice per se, but licked up the water and atomized the stone altar upon which it had all been arrayed.

You’d think this would suffice for validation of one’s ministry, wouldn’t you?  But it didn’t.  Elijah retreated to the wilderness where he struggled with a depressive episode of epic proportions.  I can only imagine what he might have thought had occurred out there in field with those Ba’alian prophets.  Perhaps it went something like this:  “Yeah…there’s nothing to their gods, but how do I know there’s anything to mine?  Maybe I just got lucky.  It was probably nothing more than a random bolt of lightning.”

The point is this:  there’s nothing about faith that’s empirically verifiable – whether in the affirmative OR in the negative – you can neither prove, nor disprove religion. 

This isn’t news, of course, but it’s important.  Consider this little gem, “God called me to ministry.”  Is it true?  Perhaps….   The fact is, lots of claims have been made in the name of God, and I’d vouchsafe that not all of them make God proud.  Still, nearly every clergyperson I know (including yours truly) claims to be have been called by God into pastoral work.  Does that claim make it so?

In chapter 20 of TO&WC Martin Copenhaver takes on the oh-so-common problem of approval craving in the pastoral office. 

My suspicion runs something like this – we crave approval because we aren’t so sure what we’re about.  We cover our insecurities with pious assertions (“This is God’s work I’m about [and nuts to anyone who takes issue with me]), or else we leave God entirely out of the equation and seek all our validation from those we are ostensibly called to lead.

This sword (the lack of objective criteria by which to surely measure our alignment with God’s will) cuts two ways, and both cuts can be bad:  those who boldly assert having their own private and certain Word from God make themselves unaccountable to other individuals and communities – certainly a perilous state.  But it is equally possible to despair of any certitude in this work and succumb to either depression, or else to a servile devotion to whatever the people want.  In that case, the pastor becomes either a “quivering mass of availability” or else a craven manipulator of the parish in which their affirmation becomes god (and all sense of appropriate boundaries gets lost).

Is it hopeless?  Is there no way by which to helpfully assess one’s faithfulness?  If it is not right either to arrogantly and single-handedly claim access to the infallible mind of God, but neither appropriate to grant the parish total right to assess one’s faithfulness – what is one to do?

Ah….the challenge of living in the tension between the poles of seductive extreme! 

The fact is (it seems to me) we need both.  We need a relationship with God that gives us focus and direction for the living of each day, but we also need to hear the voice of the community and its word of critique and correction.  Either one in the absence of the other is likely to lead to error.  Only as we hold both in faithful tension are we able to maximize the possibility for effective ministerial leadership.

“I believe.  Help me in my unbelief.”

Rich Pleva

Chapters 18 & 19

Ask ten people what the ritual practice, “laying on of hands” is and I bet you get ten different answers. Martin B. Copenhaver, in Chapter 18 of This Odd and Wondrous Calling enumerates a few of the ways in which we understand this practice in the Judeo-Christian tradition: Jesus laid hands on people in need of healing; Temple priests laid hands on animals about to be sacrificed; in the early church, hands were laid upon people who were assuming ministries.

The most significant of these understandings of this rite for me is the latter. Particularly as a clergy person in the United Church of Christ, you come into contact with the laying on of hands when you and colleagues are ordained into the Christian ministry. As Copenhaver points out, what actually happens in this moment is up for debate. Is there really some fundamental change that happens to the person on whom hands are being laid? Some would say yes; some no.

The moment is incredibly powerful regardless of what you believe happens. At UCC ordinations, clergy are invited to come forward and lay hands on the ordinand. As someone who has both had hands laid upon her and as someone who has laid hands upon many of my colleagues, the Holy Spirit palpably infects this moment. It’s almost like I can feel connected, through the working of the Spirit, to all those who have gone before me and all who will go after me in the call to Christian ministry.

One of the things that most ordination candidates now do is invite not only clergy, but all members of the congregation to lay on hands in some way –either by physically coming forward and joining the “blob” of people who are touching someone, who is touching someone who is touching the ordinand; or by extending their own hand forward to “spiritually” connect to the people doing the physical laying on of hands.

This act is a tangible reminder that ordinations are not only about a particular person’s call to ministry. It’s about ALL our calls to ministry. In the Protestant tradition in particular, we affirm, in one way or another, Luther’s notion of the “priesthood of all believers;” the understanding that God calls us all to “priestly” service. That doesn’t mean we’re all called to be the Sunday-morning type of minister. We might be called by God to live our faith by teaching, practicing law or medicine; by being a mechanic, an administrator, a cook or a parent.

God can use our many gifts in any variety of ways. It’s up to us to connect our life to the centuries-old Christian tradition that reminds us that God uses all kinds of people, with all their foibles and shortcomings, to serve God is extraordinary ways in this world.

Nicole Havelka

Recall Notice - Chapter 17

Is there really no “wrong” church? Perhaps Lillian Daniel is right in some sort of classical, universalist sense. But I’m not at all sure that a classical, universalist answer to that question is of any use to anyone. It reminds me of the old story that realtors (and others, too, I suppose) tell about lawyers.

A man sets off in a hot air balloon. Soon, a dense fog closes in and he starts to worry. As the fog gets thicker and darker, his sense of direction fails him. His location by now a complete unknown, with nothing visible except a blanket of fog, he panics. He begins to conjure up all kinds of balloonist horrors—large bodies of open water, trees, towers, mountains. Finally, the fog parts for the briefest of moments and the balloonist sees a person standing on the ground. He knows he has only an instant to find out where he is.  The balloonist shouts out, “Where am I?”  To the balloonist’s absolute horror, the person on the ground shouts back “You’re in a hot air balloon.” Just before the fog closes up for good, the balloonist thinks to himself “That must have been a lawyer. He gave me an answer that was precise, correct and…absolutely useless.”

I think Daniel’s answer is something like that given to the balloonist by the lawyer. It may be that no religion is “wrong”, but that is a far cry from the argument that every religion is “right”. I know. I’ve seen quite a few of them. I was raised a Catholic. I have worshiped with Southern Baptists, Reformed and Conservative Jews, Episcopalians. I work on a regular basis with my counterparts in the United Methodist, Presbyterian and ELCA faiths.  None of these traditions is wrong in any absolute sense. But, for me at least, there is only one that is right—the United Church of Christ.

Sure, we have our warts. But these warts are largely polity driven, not articles of faith. At times, it seems we worship Congregationalism even more than Christ. At times, moving us to consensus on any issue, much less a controversial one, can be like trying to herd cats. Through it all, however, our core values—a deep and abiding faith in Jesus, a commitment to social justice, an acknowledgement that ours is but one of many voices—outshine all the difficulties that our polity creates.

Is there no wrong faith? Perhaps. Is there a right faith? For sure.

Tony Stoik

Preachers' Kids - Chapter 16

     I’ve reflected on Martin Copenhaver’s pictures of life as a preacher’s kid from my own vantage point as a preacher’s kid’s mom. 

     It’s easy to count the blessings that came into Noah’s life because he grew up as a preacher’s kid.  He began as a child of the Olds congregation; prayed into this world by them, wrapped in blankets and quilts the women had made, bouncing in Charlie Messer’s cowboy boot during worship.   He grew up as a child of the Central City congregation, supported and nurtured by a wonderful village of moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas.   I am profoundly grateful to both congregations for their gifts of love in Noah’s life.

     Noah certainly grew up with a clear view of church from the inside.  He was very proud of being a helper at church and he was a fantastic help in hundreds of different ways.   I think it’s honest to say that I depended on his help and that the congregation grew to depend some on his help, too.  He certainly saw the darker sides of church life, too.  He saw my tears, and my anger, and my exhaustion.  Through it all, Noah has grown to manhood still on good speaking terms with God and still drawn to a life of faith lived in community.

     As I visit with the pastors on the east side of the Iowa Conference, I have another vantage point from which to reflect on preachers and their kids.  I listen to the struggles of pastors trying to balance the needs of their families with the needs of their congregations.  I listen to tough, tough choices pastors make when both a child and a parishioner need the same slice of the pastor’s time.  I listen to the frustrations about evenings full of meetings and family events postponed because of emergencies in the congregation.  I listen to the joys of being able, as Martin Copenhaver notes, to share our daily labor with our children. 

      This chapter prompts us as pastors to take a close look at how our children are both blessed and challenged by our odd and wondrous calling.  I hope the chapter also prompts the members of our congregations to think and pray carefully about how it is for the children of our pastors.

     I’ll watch for posts from the preachers’ kids in the Iowa Conference.  What was it like for you?  How are your experiences of church today shaped by your experience as a preacher’s kid?  Did you also discern a call to ministry?

     I’ll also watch for posts from those who have been both pastors and parents.  What was it like for you to be the parent of a preacher’s kid?  What were the delights and the challenges?  How can we help one another to care well for our children as we fulfill an odd and wondrous calling?

                                    Jonna Jensen, Associate Conference Minister for Eastern Iowa

Chapters 14 & 15

Martin Copenhaver reminds us that the day when the pastor was the smartest guy (and it was a guy!) in the community has long passed.  No matter what a pastor might be called upon to do, there’s probably someone around who can do it better. 

Okay pastors, how do you feel about this?  Is this threatening?  Is it discouraging?  Should it motivate us to bone up on some point of esoterica so we can be the best at SOMETHING?

Copenhaver’s thesis is that the pastor in 21^st century America is not called to be an expert – she is called to a ministry of wisdom.

When I was days short of my 30^th birthday, on a January weekend of record-breaking cold and wind chill in Platteville, Wisconsin, I preached a candidating sermon (before a congregation of 31 persons – 16 of whom got up to sing when it time for the choir!), and was subsequently called as pastor of this fledging congregation I would serve for the next 8 years. 

No big deal, right?  In fact, though I was thrilled at the call, I was also scared to death.  Among the seven founding families of this congregation were seven (count ‘em!) PhD’s – and two or three more would join in the first few months.  What in the world was I thinking in accepting such a call?  I grew up in a decidedly blue collar family – was the first on either side of the family to go to college – and really knew nothing of the world of academia or professions.  My first pastoral call had been with people about whom I at least knew a little – this was utterly cross-cultural!

By God’s grace (and certainly nothing more than that), those eight years became the most formative of my pastoral career.  I can remember thinking that I faced a choice – to pretend I knew more than I did, or to lay my inexperience and ecclesiastical clumsiness right out in the open, and see what this congregation – and God, through them – might teach me.  I believe that decision – to eschew pretension – was as important as any I’ve ever made.  I had no idea what I was doing – my bag of tricks was meager – my level of sophistication was laughable.  If I possessed any wisdom at that point it was far more potential that realized.

There’s no sure-fire recipe by which to get wise – except perhaps to acknowledge one’s need for wisdom.  If there’s anything sure to sink a pastor-parish relationship, it’s for the pastor to pretend he’s something he’s not.

Martin obviously learned a lot from his father.  The story about the way his father led his congregation through the decision of UCC affiliation was instructive.  He kept his ego in check.  He gave voice to those with whom he disagreed.  He listened carefully before he ever spoke.  These are all disciplines by which wisdom may be grown.

I’m not as smart and certainly not as articulate as Copenhaver – but if asked about getting wisdom, I’d suggest this:

·         Don’t pretend you’re something you’re not.  You’ll never convince anyone anyway, so don’t try.  Humility – especially if it isn’t affected – is very becoming.  It’s honest, too!

·         Keep your eyes and ears open.  Unless you are already dead, there’s still more to learn, and sometimes the most important lessons originate from the most unlikely sources.  As soon as you or I decide there’s nothing to be learned from this person or that situation, we are on the verge of impoverishing ourselves.

I’m curious….what have YOU learned about wisdom in the course of your ministry?

Rich Pleva

Conference Minister, Iowa Conference UCC

Chapters 12 & 13 - A Ministry of Relying on Grace

To a casual observer of people in ‘professional’ ministry, it may seem like they are always the ones extending grace to other people. Most of the time it’s actually the other way around.

Martin B. Copenhaver and Lillian Daniel in Chapters 12 and 13 of This Odd and Wondrous Calling recall two instances early in their ministries of their own overwhelming need for grace as they live God’s calling.

Copenhaver recalls a time early in his ministry when he was arrogantly lecturing one of the homeless men who stayed overnight in their Westport, Connecticut church. During the “Stern Lecture,” he was interrupted by a call from the police telling him that he had “stolen” gas when he filled up at the local gas station. Although it was a mistake, the police officer initially insisted that he had to arrest him; at least until he told him that he was a minister.  The recipient of “The Stern Lecture,” who as in his office the entire time, simply said, “Well, nobody’s perfect, I guess.”

Daniel tells a story about working out her own demons while serving as a fearful intern at a mental hospital. Her demons told her that no one respected her because she was young and not ordained. Her supervisor insisted that she go out and simply talk to the people in the halls who were spewing conspiracy theories or rocking in corners. She did this reluctantly for months until she was finally able to lead a worship service. During the more than 20-minute sermon, a woman piped up and asked if they could pray to Princess Grace of Monaco. Daniel tried to redirect her without success. Daniel finally paused, realized that Jesus called her to minister to these poor and dispossessed people. She scrapped her plan and invited the group to sing hymns and tell their stories.

The practice of ministry is peppered with these kinds of moments. Moments when you realize that, as one of my favorite seminary professors always said, “It’s not about you.” The Holy Spirit undoubtedly works through these moments to keep you “walking humbly with your God.”

I remember serving as an intern with The Night Ministry in Chicago while I was in seminary. I served as a “ministry intern,” which meant that I went out with the organization’s health and outreach bus and talked to patrons who came to the bus for basic health care services, hospitality and some nonjudgmental conversation. I spent months talking with people who were homeless and lonely, sometimes even addicted to drugs or involved in sex work. These people would tell me about their simple needs – food, a safe place to live or $20 to use the bus that week to get to their new job.

In my supervision meetings each week, I’d rail about how easy it would be to fix these simple problems if people were just willing to share more of their own things. I’d wonder out loud: Why did these problems even have to exist? Why don’t people do more? Why can’t I do more?

After weeks of this rant, my supervisor, who’d been serving as a night minister for years, said to me, “These people survived before they knew you.” His words were like a splash of cold water in the face. It wasn’t about me. It was about them – about them finding their own abilities and dignity that was granted to them by God and no other. They didn’t need me or anyone else to DO anything for them. They needed me to remind them of that loving, compassionate God that was with them always.

God was the one who who was in charge of the transformation. Not me.

Nicole Havelka
Associate Conference Minister Youth and Young Adult Ministries

Chapters 10 & 11 - What Shall I Call You?

In a classic comedy routine entitled “Seventy-Five Dollar Car” Bill Cosby, the physical education major, tells the story of his super-intelligent philosophy major girl friend who goes around asking questions like “Why is there air?” The years may have dulled my memory of the routine, but I remember that his answer went something like this: “I’m a jock. Every jock knows why there’s air. There’s air to blow up volleyballs and basketballs.”

I was reminded of this routine when reading Chapter 10. Martin Copenhaver asks the question “What shall I call you?” On the surface, it seems almost as silly a question as the one posed by Bill Cosby’s girl friend.  Unfortunately, it seems just as silly a question when you scratch beneath the surface.

I don’t mean to be crass or overly simplistic, but as ministers we are providers of personal services. Those to whom we provide those serves are, in a very real sense, our customers. To me, that is the end of the analysis. “What shall I call you?” is the same question as “Why is there air?” My response is like Cosby’s, simple, direct and completely prosaic. “I provide a service. What you should call me is whatever makes you most comfortable in consuming that service.”

How I react to what you call me is my problem, not yours.

I Was Looking for a Pastor, but You’ll Do.

Lillian Daniel is really clever. Her essay seems to be aimed at those who are thinking about taking the plunge into assistant pastor-ship. But is it really? I think not. I think she’s really looking through the other end of the telescope. She is talking to senior pastors, and not just to senior pastors, but to all of us who spend any part of our day supervising employees. What she has to say about treatment of newly minted seminarians is just as true about the treatment of secretaries, custodians and organists. They’re people too.

As I travel around the western part of the conference, I seem to spend a lot of my time trying to put out fires caused by my colleagues who temporarily lose sight of this simple fact. In his seminal work  A Hierarchy of Needs, Abraham Maslow argued that human behavior is influenced by the desire to satisfy various physical and psychological needs. This hierarchy  of needs is often represented as a pyramid. At the bottom of his pyramid of needs are the most basic physical needs, the ones upon which our actual physical survival depends: air to breath, food to eat, water to drink.  Once these needs are satisfied, however, behavior is influenced by “higher” hungers: the need for self-esteem, achievement, respect by others.

Whether we are senior pastors in large churches or sole pastors in churches with only part-time employees, we are all managers. One of our jobs, whether we like it or not, is to motivate those we manage. We need to influence their behavior in ways that maximize their performance. We need to remember Maslow.

An “attaboy” or an “attagirl” is a much stronger motivator than telling those we supervise that “The floggings will continue until morale improves.”

Tony Stoik, Associate Conference Minister Western Iowa

Chapters 7 & 8

What do ministers do? 

Lillian Daniel suggests they “play in the band.”   It’s hard to disagree – the New Testament image of the church as the “body of Christ” plainly asserts that the church isn’t supposed to be the realm of superstars – no, it’s a organic system that works best when an assortment of various characters play coordinated roles to accomplish a God-driven outcome.

But a lot of time it doesn’t work that way.  Instead of being an orchestrated symphony of many players working together for a common end, many churches seem to be textbook examples of systemic under-function/over-function.  It’s a solo act, masquerading as a band concert.

In too many congregations, clergy run themselves ragged while the folk in the pews can’t quite figure out whether they have a part to play.  It’s as if all but one of the band members are standing to the side while one hyperkinetic person desperately moves from guitar to bass to drums trying to produce something resembling music. 

It doesn’t work very well.  The temptation, of course (for clergy), is to blame lazy lay folk.  But as often as not, someone DID try picking up an instrument once upon a time.  Upon hitting the first poorly tuned note, however, the “professional” stepped in, politely took over the “axe” and has been playing it (and all the other instruments) ever since. 

Not only that, but in her spare time, the pastor can be heard to complain about her uncommitted people.  Hmmmm…….

Martin Copenhaver’s essay just may suggest a way out of this sorry state of affairs.  Copenhaver assumes that the act of praying can produce prayerfulness – that choosing to care can make one caring – that acknowledging failure can produce humility.

Sometimes we clergy fall into the trap of approaching our work as if its essence were a technical thing which if done with technical excellence will produce….well……excellent ministry.

But I doubt it.  For all of my pastoral life I’ve been inspired (and more than a bit chagrined), by Paul’s admonition in Philippians 4:9 – “Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me – put it into practice.”  On the whole, Paul didn’t lack for self-confidence, but I don’t think Paul was extolling his own virtuous piety when he wrote this stunning line – I think he was endorsing a remarkable kind of transparency and acknowledging that humans mostly grow and are transformed not so much by wonderful and lofty ideas, as by genuine and transparent relationships.  Paul lived his life – the good and the bad (and there was both), for all to see. 

I work hard to be honestly transparent – in good times and bad; on days of admirable achievement and on days of embarrassing failure – in the doing of my pastoral ministry.  It’s easy to do so when things go well, but when they don’t, rather than trying to hide my failure, I ask for forgiveness and seek grace to do better next time. 

I’m a member of the band – trying to play the bass (I think Daniel is exactly right about that) in a way that sets direction and invites cohesion.  I try not to usurp the role of the other players, and when I get my line wrong – I try not to cover it up, or pretend it didn’t happen, but to acknowledge my screw-up and ask the band’s help in getting it right next time.  In so doing, I’ve often found that I’m made better than I am.

Amazing!

Rich Pleva

"So, You're a Minister?" Chapters 5 & 6

The first time I got a taste of the reality of being a minister was when I hadn’t even started seminary. I was talking with the group of women with whom I went to a step aerobics class. While standing in our sweaty workout gear, talking as we often did after class, I confessed that I was planning to attend seminary and become a minister. One of these women (one who I knew to be a college-educated professional), said immediately, “Oh, I don’t believe in women being ministers.” I was so stunned by her comment that I had no snappy comeback. The group just stood staring at each other for an awkward moment and the conversation moved onto something else.

After several of these kinds of conversations (most of which are far more benign), I learned, like Martin Copenhaver in Chapter 6 of This Odd and Wondrous Calling, to avoid telling people what I “do” – particularly on an airplane or other similarly confined spaces. The minute that cat is out of the bag, you can almost guarantee that you’ll be involved in a protracted conversation about the church (and your companion’s uncensored feelings about it) that you’d generally rather avoid.

What I dislike more than the often annoying conversations that erupt from this revelation is the fact that I have to be “on.” I am no longer Nicole Havelka, average airline passenger; I am Rev. Nicole Havelka, representative of church and God and all things holy. I can’t roll my eyes at the passengers who just can’t seem to find a place for their baggage in the overhead bin. I can’t mutter swear words under my breath when I can’t get a connection to the in-flight Wi-Fi.

In Chapter 5, Lillian Daniel tells a version of this story when her neighbor, with whom she used to share beers on her porch, became a member of her church. The friendship (appropriately) went away. She became his minister, which gave her access to her former friend’s spiritual and religious life in new and amazing ways. But, she lost the times of “talking about nothing” on her porch while enjoying a bottle of beer.

Even with all this griping about the loss of “normal” relationships when you’re a minister, I wouldn’t go back. There are few other professions that would give you opportunities to witness to the wonders of the divine in random public places. Not many other people get to talk very often about how their faith is different than the ones people typically hear about on cable news networks. I get to tell people that it’s OK to swear in front of me; that I think that God has more important things to worry about than a few “bad” words that slip out of our mouths. I get to hear people struggle honestly with their faith, trying to make sense of God and the world.

This reality of living a minister’s life simply makes me appreciate even more the people who allow me to just be “me.” Those people are the friends and family who knew me before I was a minister and the colleagues I know through work in the church. They keep me honest and engaged; they tell me if I’m straying from my core values; they tell me quite simply when I’m being a jerk.  Having these supportive relationships are not only good for a minister’s soul; recently, they’ve been found to actually grow the church. In an article published recently by Duke Divinity School’s Leadership Education program, Dave Odom writes about how effective minister leaders are the ones who have vibrant peer relationships.  He writes, “Congregations are more robust, growing communities of faith if the pastor is a part of a robust community of faith. By practicing the essential elements of Christian community, pastors are likely to nurture such practices in others.”

Isn’t this true of everyone? We are at our best when we have the right kind of support, when we take the time to nurture our spirits.

For me, this means that I am more likely to shut my book and have a conversation on the next plane I step onto, opening to the possibility of a holy conversation.

Nicole Havelka
Associate Conference Minister for Youth and Young Adult Ministries

Chapters 3 and 4

Chapter 3

Entertaining Angels Unawares

            So much has been written about church growth, but so little of it with the charm, grace and warmth of Entertaining Angels Unaware. I can’t remember the last time I read something that made me cry, and it may simply be that I am turning to mush in my old age. But Lillian Daniels’ description of her experiences trying to grow her congregation in New Haven did just that. The real beauty of it all is the tears were not tears of frustration or sadness, but tears of joy, joy at the way the folks at Church of the Redeemer were able to employ the tools of friendliness, hospitality and a simple sense of welcome. For many of our congregations, this story has to be an optimistic one, for these are qualities that we possess in spades.

            At the same time, however, we need to hear the rest of the story. Many of us are straddling the third rail as the demographic express comes roaring through the subway station. As folks stare at empty pews and wonder where Ward and June Cleaver have gone, they need to face the sobering reality that Ward and June aren’t coming back. All the friendliness in the world isn’t going to help a congregation whose idea of growth is to put more butts in the pews that look just like ours. As Rev. Daniels’s tale powerfully illustrates, if we are to grow, the folks who will be joining us are going to look a lot more like Tim and Jack than Ward and June. And I, for one, think that is a good thing.

Chapter 4

Learning to Pray

            A couple of days ago, I attended a meeting that was chaired by a good friend and colleague of mine who opened the meeting with a prayer. What a prayer it was! It was warm and human. It was lyrical. It just made you feel good about yourself and your relationship to God. In fact, I am sure that if you were to look up “prayer” in the dictionary, there would be a picture of this prayer right next to the definition.

            Later, I was called on to close the meeting with a prayer and as I stumbled my awkward way through something formulaic and graceless, I thought of an old cartoon. It featured a Native American sitting on a hilltop sending smoke signals. As a few pitiful puffs of smoke rise from his blanket, you can see, off in the distance, the immense mushroom clout of a nuclear explosion. I have long sense forgotten the exact words of the caption, but my sense of it was something like “Gee, I wish I’d have said that.” Well, that’s how I felt as I compared our prayers. Thus it was with sympathy and a sense of identification that I read of Martin Copenhaver’s first halting experiences with prayer as an intentional discipline.

            I’m not sure what the overriding lesson of the essay is, or even if it has anything like an overriding lesson. But here is what I took from it: Prayer is at its best when it comes from the heart.

Tony Stoik

Associate Conference Minister – Western Iowa

Chapter 2

     I imagine the rueful laughter as pastors read Rev. Copenhaver’s heart-pounding, palm-sweating description of trying to greet (and remember the name of!) a new member in the odd and wondrous commotion of shaking hands following worship.

     I remember saying that if I ever bought a new alb, I was going to have great big Captain Kangaroo pockets sewn onto the front – to hold a big tablet for writing down all the “Pastor Jonna, don’t forgets” that came with handshakes after worship and to capture all the notes and scraps and clippings and drawings and single gloves and earrings handed to me after the benediction.    

    

     When I had read nothing more than the title, I remembered a saint from my last parish, Virgil McArthur.  He was faithful in worship (and in life) and always came dressed in his Sunday best.  Each Sunday, it was a gift to shake hands with him and to hear him say – simply, always, “Thank you, Pastor.”  If you will be shaking hands with your pastor this Sunday, I commend to you dear Virgil’s gift!

   Shaking hands.  I never know how much belief to invest in reference pieces explaining the origins of long-practiced customs.  But sometimes even when the explanations are uncertain, they point us toward other truths.  A common explanation for handshaking is that it began as a way for two men to show one another that they were unarmed.  A picture from days of swords and daggers is not quaint in these days as we Iowans find our way through our state’s new gun laws and as we begin to talk to one another about what we feel and think as we take in the horrible news of shootings in Tucson.     

     A plain and earthy thing – shaking hands – that can be so filled with holy grace in church doorways.  We haven’t seen one another in too long awhile, and we begin our way back to one another with a handshake after worship.  We’ve disagreed with one other.  We’ve ruffled one another’s feathers – both unintentionally and very intentionally.  We don’t see eye to eye and yet we offer one another a moment of hand to hand.  And say in this plain and earthy way that we are – in all ways - unarmed.  We say in this plain and earthy way that we are – beyond all ruffling – brothers and sisters in Christ. 

   

      I expect that as we read Pastor Copenhaver’s stories of profound griefs and joys shared in the doorway, we began to recall such doorway moments of our own when heights and depths of human life passed from hand to hand.

     I was especially moved by Martin Copenhaver’s reminder to pastors that the doorway is not the pulpit; that it is the space for more listening than speaking.  If you will be shaking hands with worshippers this Sunday, I commend to you the holy work of listening as hard as you can through all the commotion.

     I’ll watch for you this week to send in your own experiences – odd and wondrous – in the sacred space at the doorway, in the sacred practice of shaking hands.

Jonna Jensen
Associate Conference Minister - Eastern Iowa

Minute 54

Can Lillian Daniel possibly have it right?  Can it really happen in minute 54 of a committee meeting apparently lost to arcane deliberations on preparations for a chili mac dinner that grace can break through?

I suppose it depends on what one looks for – or even what one plans for.

It’s no secret that I chafe at the mind numbing minutia that often passes for important business at church meetings.  It must be evidence of God’s perverse sense of humor (or else punishment – plain and simple!) that one as impatient as I should end up as a church bureaucrat.  Meetings are my professional destiny and it rarely occurs to me to expect to encounter grace in those places.

But it does happen.  A couple years back, toward the beginning of what has seemed an eternal assignment to work on the governance structures of the national settings of our church, I found myself in the middle of an experience of grace.  There was an elephant in the room – at least it seemed so to me.  I struggled – the easy and habitual thing to do was to merely keep my mouth shut and wait until the awkward situation passed.  But for reasons not entirely clear to me, I spoke up.  Maybe it was something as mundane as the awareness that precious OCWM money was being expended for me to be in that meeting room.  Whatever it was, I swallowed hard and named the elephant I was sensing. 

I don’t claim for a moment that my perceptions were “right” or even particularly insightful.  They were, however, honest.  I said what I really felt and perceived, and that (together with others who took similar steps) precipitated ongoing conversations that broached issues of race and privilege that are rare even in a church so committed to diversity and inclusivity as is ours.

Lillian makes clear that she had pretty much checked out of that particular Trustee committee meeting.  I’m not faulting her for that – I’ve checked out of plenty meetings in my life – probably more than she has.  I’ve also no doubt that grace comes unbidden – that the unanticipated moment she describes toward the end of that chili mac conversation is the way grace – and perhaps insight – often comes.

But I’m not content to passively acquiesce to the hope that grace might intrude on boring meetings.  Lillian’s point is well taken and I affirm the reality that God does not abandon us to graceless life even when we participate (and sometimes take the lead!) in the artless and poorly constructed realities of life in the institutional church.  Nonetheless, I do wish to strike a blow for pastoral courage and deliberate intention in the midst of the sloppiness that too often characterizes the way we do church. 

If God is powerful enough – and GOOD enough – to intervene into chili mac conversations, isn’t it even more likely that God might intervene into a Trustee meeting that was intentionally organized with a gentle but firm intention to do the work of the divine? 

Lillian Daniel helpfully reminds us that much of the work of the pastor is situational and resistant to intentional structure.  Even then God’s grace breaks through.  She is playfully reminding us of the prospect of finding joy even in the most unlikely place.  But I hope we don’t abdicate to sloppiness (whether in worship or in committee meetings) in those areas where we do have influence.  After all, if God’s grace won’t be precluded even in the absence of thoughtful intention, think how much it might be experienced in the presence of the same.

How and when have you and your people experienced grace in the ordinary rhythms of parish life?  Does it matter if those rhythms are practiced and intentional or not?  I’m curious about your experience and about your practices. Do you have a “minute 54” experience to share?

In Joyful hope!

Rich Pleva