The Difference a Year Makes
May 8th, 2008 | by Scott |I realized earlier today that it was a year ago this week that I posted what would turn out to be my most controversial post ever on this blog. It was a post that was trying to deal with my own depression and frustrations. I internalize a lot and was using this space as my ventilation system. The post resonated with several fellow minister types as it was vulnerable and transparent. Ministry can be frustrating, lonely and difficult at times.
I didn’t know it at the time but it would kick-start the process that would bring my tenure in Waco to an end. I would announce my resignation within two months of that post primarily because of this excerpt:
I want to scream at all that I feel is wrong in this world and I want to comfort those who have been wronged.
I want to yell at injustice while I often remain silent.
I want to run from ministry and do something else and I want to invest myself further in ministry.
I want friends and I want to wall myself off to the world.
I want to feel that this church has some life in it while feeling it’s so dead.
I want to cuss and I want to praise.
I wrestle with doubt and I am overcome by belief.
I want to change everything about the way we do church and I want to remain comfortable.
I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders and insurpassable joy.
I want to smile and laugh and I want to weep.
I want to tear everything down so I can build something new.
I want to blow tradition apart while clinging to my own heritage and rituals.
I want to be more like Christ while remaining so amazingly human.
I’ve learned a lot since that post and experienced some ministerial lows that I didn’t anticipate. During that time our daughter would be diagnosed with a potentially crippling illness. It seemed that grace was absent.
I was encouraged to take a sabbatical from ministry altogether. I did not do that, but there are times when I still feel the rawness of those wounds that I think it might have been a good idea. I am still very gun-shy, overly sensitive and given to short bouts of depression. And all in all, I still feel a lot of those things.
But, much has changed as well. I am in an environment where transparency, brokenness and honesty is treasured and valued. I feel supported in spite of my deficiencies and truly a part of a family.
Looking back on that time a year ago there was a lot of hurt and pain. But, it brought me here. And for that I am thankful. God bless this new church family. My home.
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Now playing: Gus Black - Don’t Go Tellin’ The Whole World
via FoxyTunes
4 Responses to “The Difference a Year Makes”
By Jim MacKenzie on May 8, 2008 | Reply
Praise to the one who uses earthly, broken vessels to do his work…
By Dan on May 8, 2008 | Reply
If yours is different, then more power to you, but on the whole, churches - and especially “elders” - don’t want a human in the pulpit; they want a god. They don’t want someone who evinces the same emotions and struggles that you did. If he does (’cause it for sure won’t be a woman, at least among the fundies), he better dang well keep it to himself. Interestingly, churches always preach a Jesus who was “tempted in all things as we are,” but they do not want a preacher who is. There’s too much preacher-worship in most modern churches; they want someone more Christ-like than Christ himself.
By len on May 8, 2008 | Reply
Maybe I have been blessed in the churches where I have served, but my experience is the exact opposite of what Dan has experienced. The people I have pastored are looking for someone who is authentic in the struggles, doubts, and temptations of life. I am happy for you, Scott, that you have a church family where you feel at home. Outside of immediate family there is no better place on earth than a church that is genuinely trying to be what God wants it to be.
By Scott on May 9, 2008 | Reply
I think Dan’s point is well taken, though. The churches that truly want a fallen, broken individual to be public and open about that are very few and far between. And even then that probably works up to a point. There is a line, explicit or not, that the “paid guy” must not cross.