Hi everyone,
In my few days on this list, I've noticed that there is
some talk of people
leaving positions due to what I would call bad
church
leadership/administration situations. Basically, people leaving
because of
trouble with the pastor or other staff rather than problems with
the
congregation. I find this interesting.
I've been in the same
situation. I left a church because of a problem with
the pastor (no
need to elaborate), and I may be on the verge of doing the
same thing
again. Basically, I'm in a United Methodist Church that is
very
traditional, yet has been offering a contemporary service for over a
year
now. Our associate pastor was the one who was really behind the
service,
and he has moved to another church (this happens ALL THE TIME in
UMC's) and
so now I am the one carrying the bulk of the work for the
service. I'm a
volunteer, and our full-time music minister pretty much
sticks with the
traditional service stuff. So I program music, handle
the projector for
lyrics, photocopy music [with permission ;-)], rehearse the
band, set up for
service (sound, etc) and lead worship with my wife... did I
leave anything
out?!?
Anyway, here's my thought/question/thread
beginning: I always struggle with
the fact that I am not called to
serve my pastor or church staff, but to
serve God, and the
congregation. I see my job as a worship leader as
bringing the people
to the throne of God and preparing them to hear the
message the pastor
delivers. So as I think about leaving, I get a guilt
thing going on
about leaving the people. I think it makes sense to say that
I
shouldn't feel bad because there are others on the staff who need to
be
loving and caring about these people (there's only a core of about 50
people
at this service). But they're not. And I can not (read should
not) be
everything here. If the church is not taking the
responsibility, that
doesn't mean I need to carry it all on my shoulders,
right?
So my question to throw out there is when we are faced with the
problem of
feeling like it's time to go due to pastor problems, etc., how do
we
reconcile the problem of leaving the people to be in the care of those
who
we can no longer work with? I'm not talking about emotional ties
here, I'm
talking about our responsibilities as leaders of some sort in our
churches.
Any Biblical examples?
Just a thought!!! Maybe this
has been covered here over and over again, but
I'm new... sorry!!
Joe
Mazza
jmazza@flash.net