Priority Pastor

Are You Being True To Yourself?

November 23, 2020 by Admin

We’ve come to the end of another transitional role in the community after being here almost two years. We’ll have been here 23 months when all is said and done. In preparation for a move we’ve been shedding, whatever we can shed and I’ve been continuing to scan documents. I’ve dropped another file box worth of documents just in the last weekend.

I came across a file of documents which I’d actually already scanned, but hadn’t tossed out because I wanted to read them through again. These are documents from conferences and sermon notes I’ve done, but they were so good I didn’t want to chuck them out yet, so I’ve been reading them through again and taking more notes as I think about them.

Ministry Amnesty: Your Window Is Closing

October 26, 2020October 21, 2020 by Admin

It is time to get back to business. We figured out how to do ministry online and offline and with various restrictions. We figured out new systems and new tactics, and we’re looking at new software, new hardware, cameras and all kinds of things. But I need to tell you that the amnesty period is pretty much over.

We’ve had this window of time to figure it all out. It is now time to get back to business and revisit our reason for existence. Revisit our purpose and move beyond maintenance mode and move beyond learning new software, new toys, and those kinds of things.

Memo to a New Pastor

October 13, 2020 by Admin

Today I’ve got a short memo to a new pastor. I’m in a transitional role right now as a transitional pastor and we’ve had a successful candidating event, and have a called pastor who is starting in just a few weeks. As we typically do in a transitional role, I will overlap with him for about a month, although it’s not a full time month. Usually it works out to about a week of work handing off documents, having meetings, and giving him a heads up about all the crazy people in the neighborhood, that kind of thing.

I’m thinking of this incoming pastor, and there’s something I often tell young leaders which I think will be relevant for new pastors as well as us older pastors. I want you to think of three different ways of approaching challenges and problems in the church. I want to think in terms of teaching and leading and praying. Teaching, leading and praying. I realize this is a simplification, but just bear with me and you’ll get the point.

How to Use a Time Windfall

August 17, 2020 by Admin

Let’s think for a couple of minutes about what to do if you get a time windfall. If all of a sudden due to some circumstances, job change, a move, a pandemic or something, you all of a sudden have more free time.

One of the principles I want to bring to bear is what to do if you have a financial windfall. One of the things that you ought to do, for instance, if you get a raise of 5% is don’t raise your standard of living by 5%. You should raise your standard living by 2.5% and save or invest the surplus. So you never increase to the same level of your financial gain. You try to always save a portion of that gain.

The Surprising Trait that Wins Over Pastoral Search Teams

August 10, 2020 by Admin

I have learned a lot about how churches search teams and elders boards look for new lead pastors. In my role as a transitional pastor and transitional coach, I’ve been able to see the other side, not just the side of the pastor applying, but the side of the search teams, boards of elders and the churches and how they deal with applicants.

Sometimes it’s a little scary to see how they process applications and kind of exegete what they think the person is saying, and not always accurately. There’s a language it seems that pastors have, a ministry language that is more like a code that we use which are not fully understood by people who aren’t pastors. It’s kind of left me, in some cases, wondering how does search even happen when a pastor is not involved on the receiving end of the process?

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