What a fun toy GPS is. My dad gave me a GPS unit for the car, and, after learning how to use it (and suffering through some directions that had me going through fields, yards, and houses, and the occasional suggestion to drive the wrong way on a one-way street, not to mention the awful "GPS signal lost" comment), I decided to allow it to choose the way back from Amish country yesterday.
Shortly after I decided NOT to take a road clearly marked "No Outlet", we ended up on a gravel road (incidentally, a sign proclaimed it to be Ohio's first state road). We travelled approximately 20 miles on gravel, up and down appalachian foothills, all in THE WRONG DIRECTION from home. After more than an hour on small roads, we finally made it to the interstate...
...an interstate we could have reached in about 5 minutes had we just taken "common sense" directions.
The trip out took us 1 1/2 hours (incudling a wrong turn). The return trip took us 2 3/4 hours.
The moral of this story: uncheck "unpaved roads" on the GPS unit before taking trips to Amish country.
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Forgetting it All
In some conversations I've had with youth workers, one thing is often discussed; frequently the youth worker is the whipping boy (whipping person?) for the senior pastor. The youth person gets to do all the scut work that the pastor doesn't want to do or doesn't like to do. The senior pastor makes fun of the youth worker in public. The pastor never pays attention to the youth or the youth worker unless there is a problem. The list goes on and on and on.
But then many youth workers go on to become senior pastors... me included.
And it seems that often (we) forget it all. It reminds me of a time in fraternity life. It was during "health" week, and during one particular dinner, we pledges provided "entertainment" in which we primarily made fun of the active brothers. Now (as we expected), we got pelted with food. But what we didn't expect was later, when we had another event in which we were drenched with beer. Now, the beer wasn't supposed to be part of the event, but some of the brothers were drinking from a keg, and some of them wanted "revenge" for how we'd made fun of them earlier, so somebody threw a cup of beer. I personally got doused for lampooning a brother with a "dance" (complete with that brother's favorite shirt, stuffed with a pillow). Then we got to clean up the mess.
The next year when this event came along, it was much worse than my year had been. Whereas they had a keg available (mostly for drinking), that year there was a "dead" keg... for throwing. Each brother with a "pledge son" (including me) was given an entire pitcher of flat beer to pour on his son (I invited my pledge son "Rockhead" into the kitchen and poured mine down the drain while he watched; I told him, "That was supposed to go on you."). It was awful.
The worst part was that my class, the ones who had so hated being doused with beer the previous year, was the group who was throwing the most beer. The excuse? "They did it to me, and now it's my turn."
Eventually (possibly the next year), this practice was finally done away with.
But my thought on it is that when we've been mistreated in a church, especially by a pastor, then when we become pastors, the worst possible thing for us to do is to turn into the same miserable person who tortured us.
In some conversations I've had with youth workers, one thing is often discussed; frequently the youth worker is the whipping boy (whipping person?) for the senior pastor. The youth person gets to do all the scut work that the pastor doesn't want to do or doesn't like to do. The senior pastor makes fun of the youth worker in public. The pastor never pays attention to the youth or the youth worker unless there is a problem. The list goes on and on and on.
But then many youth workers go on to become senior pastors... me included.
And it seems that often (we) forget it all. It reminds me of a time in fraternity life. It was during "health" week, and during one particular dinner, we pledges provided "entertainment" in which we primarily made fun of the active brothers. Now (as we expected), we got pelted with food. But what we didn't expect was later, when we had another event in which we were drenched with beer. Now, the beer wasn't supposed to be part of the event, but some of the brothers were drinking from a keg, and some of them wanted "revenge" for how we'd made fun of them earlier, so somebody threw a cup of beer. I personally got doused for lampooning a brother with a "dance" (complete with that brother's favorite shirt, stuffed with a pillow). Then we got to clean up the mess.
The next year when this event came along, it was much worse than my year had been. Whereas they had a keg available (mostly for drinking), that year there was a "dead" keg... for throwing. Each brother with a "pledge son" (including me) was given an entire pitcher of flat beer to pour on his son (I invited my pledge son "Rockhead" into the kitchen and poured mine down the drain while he watched; I told him, "That was supposed to go on you."). It was awful.
The worst part was that my class, the ones who had so hated being doused with beer the previous year, was the group who was throwing the most beer. The excuse? "They did it to me, and now it's my turn."
Eventually (possibly the next year), this practice was finally done away with.
But my thought on it is that when we've been mistreated in a church, especially by a pastor, then when we become pastors, the worst possible thing for us to do is to turn into the same miserable person who tortured us.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Ministry Study
As an Ordained member of the United Methodist clergy, I receive Circuit Rider Magazine quarterly. This issue deals primarily with changes that have been adopted over the years - the big issue is about local pastors and sacramental authority.
We saw this argument at annual conference this past summer, when the recommendation came to suggest to General Conference that local pastors needed the same voice as ordained elders in the conference, especially regarding votes for General & Jurisdictional Conference delegates (and possible inclusion as delegates).
The angle of almost every article in Circuit Rider was something like this: local pastors haven't had the same amount of schooling as ordained elders. They haven't gone through the same "hoops" that we have. They aren't subject to the itinerate system like we are. One article specifically stated that "If there was anything unique about being an elder, it was totally removed by this action [inclusion of laity on Conference & district committees and giving them a vote in clergy session] of the General Conference." he goes on to complain that elders have lost identity and authority within the annual conference - and it's all the fault of those pesky local pastors.
He finishes up by asking questions that "elders are increasingly asking":
OK, I'd better not.
My take on this (as an Elder in Full Connection) is a little different.
As an Ordained member of the United Methodist clergy, I receive Circuit Rider Magazine quarterly. This issue deals primarily with changes that have been adopted over the years - the big issue is about local pastors and sacramental authority.
We saw this argument at annual conference this past summer, when the recommendation came to suggest to General Conference that local pastors needed the same voice as ordained elders in the conference, especially regarding votes for General & Jurisdictional Conference delegates (and possible inclusion as delegates).
The angle of almost every article in Circuit Rider was something like this: local pastors haven't had the same amount of schooling as ordained elders. They haven't gone through the same "hoops" that we have. They aren't subject to the itinerate system like we are. One article specifically stated that "If there was anything unique about being an elder, it was totally removed by this action [inclusion of laity on Conference & district committees and giving them a vote in clergy session] of the General Conference." he goes on to complain that elders have lost identity and authority within the annual conference - and it's all the fault of those pesky local pastors.
He finishes up by asking questions that "elders are increasingly asking":
- Why go through the educational rigors of four years of college and three years of seminary when one can be ordained as an elder after two years in the Course of Study?
- Why be ordained elder if deacons and local pastors are given the same sacramental authority as the elder?
- Why allow laypersons on a board of ordained ministry and district committee when the convenant for ministry is to an order in which laity do not participate?
- Why bother to be an elder when everything an elder does can be done by someone else in the church?
OK, I'd better not.
My take on this (as an Elder in Full Connection) is a little different.
- I didn't go through the "educational rigors" with the goal of becoming an elder. I went through education (and continue my education) with the goal of serving God to the best of my ability. I don't care what my title is, and the title certainly isn't my goal. Why go through the schooling? To learn.
- Indeed, why be ordained elder if you can do something "lesser" and still receive the glory for yourself? Why write your own sermons when you can snag someone else's off the internet? Why read original languages when you can read a translation? Why study the scriptures when someone else has written a commentary? Maybe because God asks for us to give ourselves as living sacrifices - to give our best to Him. Or, to take it a little different direction, the issue comes into play about what is guaranteed to an elder in full connection that is not guaranteed to a local pastor or to a deacon serving in a church. For one thing, the pay scale is quite different. When the annual conference recognized my credentials and accepted me as an elder in full connection, I immediately received a $2000 nudge in my pay scale. I don't do any more than my friend Greg, a local pastor who I'm in Bible study with weekly. For some reason this reminds me of when I was in the fraternity, we'd always have some active brother complaining. "When I was a pledge..." the rant would always begin, and then we'd hear how stringent and difficult their pledge period was, unlike these soft pledges we have now ("Ve haff pledges?") who aren't fit to carry the name Chi Phi...
- Oh, the comments I have about the decision to allow laity on conference boards and district committees... When United Methodism was a movement, it was lay-driven. Then laity ran the day-in-day-out show in all the local churches. Over time, our denomination has become top-heavy, led by various boards, bishops, district superintendents, and clergy (especially elders). In my mind, the issue of laity involvement is tied deeply with the direction of the church itself. Unfortunately, we clergy have built up the impression that we are indespensible - that without us, the church will fail. Jesus can rise up stones to praise Him; what makes us so egotistic to think that He can't do anything without us? Which brings me to...
- What kind of attitude says, "Why bother to follow God's calling in my life while allowing others to follow God's (different) callings in their lives?" This is essentially what the final question asks. "Wah, I have to do more work and I don't get any more accolades." Cry me a freakin' river. On the same lines, I wonder why Jesus would "bother" to leave earth and to tell His followers that they would do even greater miracles in His Name? And doesn't the Holy Spirit make Him as obsolete as an elder in a UM Church? Indeed, I wonder what drives a question like this. If ministry is all about "bothering" to follow God's call - which God could conceivably find someone else to complete anyway, why "bother" to do anything at all?
As you can probably tell, this whole issue has my blood boiling. We clergy have to get our heads out of our, er, out of the mirrors and out of the clergy huddles. We're the problem - and the fact that many of our churches are stuck in the "let the pastor do it" mentality is proof.
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