Church and Ministry Part 2
After a short interim ministry, we were invited to come to this town and for my dh to be pastor at the local church here. At first, I resisted due to a number of reasons but on the day we agreed to be interviewed, we took mum with us so she could look after our 4 year old son and things were better than I could have imagined.
The town is near the beach - hooray, an oasis! The congregation was made up of a variety of age groups, had Christians at all walks in their life and even had a couple of people who I had grown up with. As we drove home, I was bursting forth with ideas and my mum remarked how good it was to see me "back to my ol' self", again. We had been completely honest with the pastoral interview committee since we didn't see any reason to cover up where we were coming from. One of my key questions was, "What are your expectations for your pastor's wife?" My response was that I would take my time finding out where God wanted me and in His time, I would take up the ministries He wanted me to be part of. I was not willing to fit into a stereotype and would not (because I could not) play the piano during church services.
Our first years were great and I even helped co-lead a ladies' Bible study, started up practice for the worship team and occasionally took my guitar along to music. I love worship leading - it's a big part of my heart and who I am and I had even done a subject at Bible college with regards to worship. I also helped run high school aged youth group. On top of all this, I returned to CRT (casual relief teaching) work where my son was at school.
People change and move on and that affects the dynamics of church. New people come in and add another dimension that wasn't there previously. While there, in 1999, my mum passed away - that was a huge HUGE!! impact on my life with lots of grieving and pain and feeling a loss so great. In 2002, I became full-time teacher at a Christian school (see a previous post) and again that was another huge change.
Time goes on and at the end of 7 years, we needed to move on. Eighty percent of the congregation did not want us to move on and again, it was a struggle. The denomination heads, (well their representative), could have dealt with issues a little differently. Of course, there is still some hurt there at the way things were seemingly mishandled.
It was a different departure to our first full-time ministry interstate although some say I handled it better because of what I'd been through there. Sometimes, I don't know. I do feel the den.heads were remiss in providing good care and support for their pastor and his family.
We chose to stay in the rural town and after 4 months, my dh found another job and he appreciates the change but does have to travel an hour each way to work. I am still teaching and love my job and my son is doing well at his school in year 8. It was difficult staying here, in some ways. It means that sometimes when we go shopping, we will see church people - some we are happy to see but others........
We were invited to attend at least 4 other local churches and chose one in the next town where our son attends school and where we have some good friends. It takes 30 minutes to get there but we weren't comfortable with attending a church in this small town. Up until about May this year we were attending a Bible study but that is in recess now. I am part of the music team and do that every fortnight and Russell teaches Sunday school for 5 weeks on, 5 weeks off (or thereabouts). Nathan enjoys attending the youth group with his school (and church) friends.
I guess that ends the church andhistory lesson and brings you up to date with how we got to be where we are now. I will perhaps bring myself to write a part 3 in the next week or so.
The town is near the beach - hooray, an oasis! The congregation was made up of a variety of age groups, had Christians at all walks in their life and even had a couple of people who I had grown up with. As we drove home, I was bursting forth with ideas and my mum remarked how good it was to see me "back to my ol' self", again. We had been completely honest with the pastoral interview committee since we didn't see any reason to cover up where we were coming from. One of my key questions was, "What are your expectations for your pastor's wife?" My response was that I would take my time finding out where God wanted me and in His time, I would take up the ministries He wanted me to be part of. I was not willing to fit into a stereotype and would not (because I could not) play the piano during church services.
Our first years were great and I even helped co-lead a ladies' Bible study, started up practice for the worship team and occasionally took my guitar along to music. I love worship leading - it's a big part of my heart and who I am and I had even done a subject at Bible college with regards to worship. I also helped run high school aged youth group. On top of all this, I returned to CRT (casual relief teaching) work where my son was at school.
People change and move on and that affects the dynamics of church. New people come in and add another dimension that wasn't there previously. While there, in 1999, my mum passed away - that was a huge HUGE!! impact on my life with lots of grieving and pain and feeling a loss so great. In 2002, I became full-time teacher at a Christian school (see a previous post) and again that was another huge change.
Time goes on and at the end of 7 years, we needed to move on. Eighty percent of the congregation did not want us to move on and again, it was a struggle. The denomination heads, (well their representative), could have dealt with issues a little differently. Of course, there is still some hurt there at the way things were seemingly mishandled.
It was a different departure to our first full-time ministry interstate although some say I handled it better because of what I'd been through there. Sometimes, I don't know. I do feel the den.heads were remiss in providing good care and support for their pastor and his family.
We chose to stay in the rural town and after 4 months, my dh found another job and he appreciates the change but does have to travel an hour each way to work. I am still teaching and love my job and my son is doing well at his school in year 8. It was difficult staying here, in some ways. It means that sometimes when we go shopping, we will see church people - some we are happy to see but others........
We were invited to attend at least 4 other local churches and chose one in the next town where our son attends school and where we have some good friends. It takes 30 minutes to get there but we weren't comfortable with attending a church in this small town. Up until about May this year we were attending a Bible study but that is in recess now. I am part of the music team and do that every fortnight and Russell teaches Sunday school for 5 weeks on, 5 weeks off (or thereabouts). Nathan enjoys attending the youth group with his school (and church) friends.
I guess that ends the church andhistory lesson and brings you up to date with how we got to be where we are now. I will perhaps bring myself to write a part 3 in the next week or so.
posted by Carolanne @ 9:19 pm
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