It wasn't that long ago (15 years) that I was struggling with my commitment to the ministry that God had called me to as a 17 year old kid. I was fed up with the attractional attitude of many churches. It just seemed to me that many of our churches were so focused on doing things to draw people to their building that they had lost sight of the call to take Christ to the world.
The story of God leading me from a point in my life that I wanted nothing to do with the ministry of the local church to leaving my coaching/teaching career to be on a church staff is a different story that I may share at a later time, but I find myself still struggling with the competitive, attractional attitude of some churches. As a pastor, the example we should be setting for our congregations is one of relationship and community; loving people as God has loved us; staying focused on the mission at hand....using our gifts and abilities to draw people into a relationship with Christ. This will almost certainly include people that are not ever going to walk through the doors of our buildings.
I was told by a pastor recently that when God calls you from one church to another, it means you cut off communication with the church you leave and focus solely on the church in which you currently serve. He credited and "unwritten code" with that rule. Maybe I am wrong, but I just can't buy into that philosophy. God brings people into our lives throughout our journey. As I read through Paul's letters, I see a man who had many meaningful relationships in those cities, and he stayed in communication with them. Granted, social networking 2000 years ago was not what it is today, but had the churches of Philippi, Ephesus, Galatia, Colosse, or Thessalonica been worried that communication with Paul would somehow hinder the ministry of Timothy, Tychicus, or any other pastors that followed him into these cities, what might have happened to these churches? Or had Timothy, Tychicus, or any of those pastors spent more time whining about Paul communicating with the people of "their" church than they did with doing what God called them to do there...what might they have missed?
As pastors, you form deep, loving relationships with the people of the local church. These relationships are not squelched with a geographical move. I am in no way supporting or condoning allowing bitterness, or anger of an ugly breakup become a divisive tool on your way out. What I am saying, is that when you leave a place on a good note, you leave people that you love, and God moves you to a new local body, it does not mean you stop pastoring those that are still at the church you left.
God has led me on an incredible journey, loved me through a lot of things, and used me in spite of my best efforts to mess things up. There are a lot of people that God has given me the privilege of meeting, and partnering with in ministry. And I realize that some people have the capacity to maintain relationships and others do not, but to drop communication with those people does not reflect the kind of love God has called us too in our walk with Him. It is not a competition between pastors or churches, it is about a calling to minister to people.
I love hearing stories of what is going on in the churches in my area. I love hearing people talk with excitement about what's going on in their walk. We should celebrate with each other what is happening in the local church; partner with other pastors; maintain relationships with those God has led our way; and continue to encourage people, even when God leads us elsewhere.
I thank God for allowing me to do what I do, and for leading so many incredible people through my life. He has used so many people to speak into my life, and help shape and form me that I cannot count them all. He continues to use people to teach me and I am grateful for each of them. When my time is done here, I hope that the relationships left behind would not just be relationships of years passed, but of relationships that remained current and active through communication and ministry over the span of my time here on earth.
I'm out.
