Latest / The Church Renewal Podcast / The Tasks of the Transitional Pastor

Transcript

The Tasks of the Transitional Pastor · The Church Renewal Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Church Renewal Podcast from Flourish Coaching.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: I'm Jeremy.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: I'm Matt.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: So far in Season 3, we've talked about the theoretical reasons for using a transitional pastor, but we haven't really discussed what the transitional pastor is actually doing.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: So today I'm going to sit down with Matt and ask him to dive into the details of the job description, tasks, responsibilities and the day-to-day activities of your transitional pastor.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Church Renewal Podcast.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: I'm Jeremy Seferati and I'm Matt Bolling.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Matt Bolling is the Executive Director of Flourish Coaching.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: That's what they say, at least.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm sure that you're trying to keep that charade up as long as possible.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: As long as possible we are here, there are those taxes that need to be paid.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Oh, well, yeah, we're here talking about all things transitional pastor and process.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Today I want to get into the nitty-gritty of what the transitional pastor is actually doing.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: I almost said transactional.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: That would be bad.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: That would be bad.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: We're not looking for the transactional pastor Absolutely not what the transitional pastor is actually doing in his time working with a church.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: So I want you first to talk about your three buckets and then I'll pepper you with questions from there.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Great, I'll put my audio on.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: Alright.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: So in a transitional period, there are three big buckets that elder boards need to pay attention to the In a transitional period, there are three big buckets that elder boards need to pay attention to.
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: The buckets are preaching, care and process.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: Let me give you a little bit of detail.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: Preaching is everything about making Sunday happen the music, the bulletins, what goes on the screens, slides, music, who's staff in the nursery, who's preaching on a particular Sunday.
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: So everything related to making Sunday happen we put in the preaching bucket.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: Elders really need to pay attention to that.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: A lot of midweek programs, people in the church, leaders that are already there, they can take care of that, but a lot of the Sunday coordination, elders need to make sure it is actually happening.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: So that's preaching Care is who, in the absence of a lead pastor, who's actually caring for the congregation?
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: If it's a small church, the lead pastor was typically the person that did a lot of the individual caring for people.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: You're talking about counseling, visitation, bereavement.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: And just who's their relational glue holding things together?
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: And so how do people in the congregation go?
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: I feel cared for.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: I'm a sheep in this fold, right.
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: And in the absence of a shepherd, that there are under shepherds that are here amongst us, okay.
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: The absence of a shepherd, that there are under shepherds that are here amongst us, okay.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: So elders delivering some care themselves but making sure that everyone is cared for.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: So that's the care bucket.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: And then the process bucket is that every single church walks some process, right from when the previous pastor says his last benediction to when the next pastor stands up and gives the announcements or the call to worship or whatever right.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Every church follows a process.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: The question is how intentional and thoughtful is the process?
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: And that's what Flourish's specialty is is in the intentional and thoughtful process in the transitional period.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: So, in terms of actual Sundays, how many Sundays is your average transitional guy in the pulpit preaching?
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: You've broken down into what all falls into that preaching bucket.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: But how often should a congregation expect?
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: You know most congregations know the pastor works once a week anyway.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Just one day a week.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: One day a week, so it's easy.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: It's a great job.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: It's easy, great job it's.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: it's a great job to have, especially if you like golfing.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: You can drive a caddy and have a caddy while you're golfing, which is that's the bifecta, right there, yeah, um but how often should a church in the pulpit?
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: so if it's a small church, more than likely, uh, the pastor is going to be there, uh, 11 out of 12 weeks.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: Right, it's going to take a day.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: He's going to take a sunday off every three months, that's um, but that's probably a bit.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: In the larger church, if there are other people on staff that can preach, and that's if it's a full-time person on the ground at the church, um, if it's a part-time person, many times our transitional pastors and smaller churches that are trying to save on the cost of having a transitional pastor, we'll have a guy there three out of four Sundays a month and then the other Sunday they'll cover themselves with pulpit supply or something like that.
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: In a larger church I think it's actually a similar rhythm to that, where the guy's there three out of four Sundays.
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: He might preach a greater proponent of the time early in his time to kind of set the tone and preach through a series that's appropriate for the needs of the church, but the pastor's going to be in the pulpit, even in the larger church, three out of four Sundays.
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: Okay, so where is the majority of the pastor's time being spent?
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: Either in terms of the buckets or in terms of just day-to-day tactics?
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think so.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: If you think about those three buckets preaching, care and process the transitional pastor is going to do a fair amount of preaching and so day-to-day, week-to-week I tend to think of it in weeks is, yeah, he's got preaching prep he's doing, probably able to adapt some old stuff, but also maybe creating brand new sermons, which is depending on the pastor.
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: You know 10 to 15 hours of a work week.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: So he's got significant work in the preaching bucket in terms of sermon prep, but also liturgy and worship and those kinds of things.
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: He's coordinating all of that for the sake of the church.
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: In terms of care, the transitional pastor typically in anything but the smallest church, is spending most of his time in care with leaders.
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: So he's with the elders in their family, the deacons in their family, the women's ministry leaders in their families.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: That's where he's spending the most of his time because he's trying to develop them in preparation for the next lead pastor.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: So he's not typically not the individual carer for every person in the congregation, even in small churches, and the reason for that is he doesn't have equity with all those people.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: But the elders, the deacons, the Bible study leaders, small group leaders they've got relational equity with those people.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: He's available but he's not usually the one-on-one carer for all those people like a long-term pastor.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: And that's that relational glue that you were talking about.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: Yep, absolutely so.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: If your expectation is we have a new pastor in, I expect he's going to be going around having a meal with each of the families in the church in the next six months.
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: That expectation is one that's probably going to be disappointed.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: It could well be Now.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: The pastor may try and meet with all the people in the church, but typically what our guys will do is they'll invite somebody in to have coffee in their office or maybe meet them for a meal, but typically trying to do structured interviews with everybody, forty-five-minute interviews.
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: Just try and find out, hey, what's your assessment of the church in terms of strengths and weaknesses, and opportunities and threats, and so we'll try to get to know everybody, but not be the individual carer for everybody.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: And just to clarify those structural interviews are so that the traditional pastor and the elders can determine whether or not to continue or fire the parishioner.
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: No that is not the point of those interviews.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: It's data gathering.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: It's build relational equity, but it's also data gathering.
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: The more data that we have, the better that we can help the church.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: So a lot of the time, as you said, is spent really working with and coaching the leaders who are there and who are going to stay.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Yep, both to be good at the job that they're stepping into, but to be better at the job that they're stepping into, but to be better at the job that they're called to now.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: Right, absolutely.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: So what is the pastor doing?
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: How is he working?
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: How is he coaching with the leadership to help them bring their game up?
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: So the leaders have a more focused.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: In all of our three-phase process church health assessment, envisioning and pastor search the leaders have an emphasized role and this is important to us.
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: My background is in Presbyterianism and so we work a fair bit in Presbyterian churches and so we really try and invigorate the elders in particular to bear the kind of influence that they ought to be bearing.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: So we do church health assessment.
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: The first people that we talk to are the elders.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: We do envisioning the elders.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: We give criteria to the elders and we say you pick the team and at least one of you should be on the team that's doing the envisioning work.
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: We get to pastor search.
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: It's the elders that we come to and say hey, help us, you're the first ones we want to hear from as we would form pastor profile and as we would think about who should be in the pastor search committee.
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: Because we want those.
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: We want to put those elders in the place where they can, are equipped to lead, and that they're seen as the leaders and they're actually leading, so that when the transitional pastor gets out of the way, the elders are still leading and so that we want to develop them in that way.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, so honestly then, how messy is it?
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: um it, that's a big it depends.
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: Uh, there are situations where I'm thinking of a church that we've just started working with, where I think I've told a bit of this story before.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: They had a long-term pastor that started the church and he bowed out just before covid because of some friction with people in the church and staff, and so he bowed out just before covid.
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: They found a pastor in covid and bit of a hurried job to find him and everybody came to the conclusion that this was a misfit and that the pastor was done within 18 months.
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: That church is very happy to go slow in the transition because they know they need to well, they need a revision and that hadn't happened either.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: Under the planting pastor it should have happened.
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: He was there, I don't know 15 plus years.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: So pastor should have happened.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: He was there, I don't know 15 plus years.
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: So it should happen at least twice.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: And under the new guy, I think he tried to revision them, but too soon.
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: He didn't have their relational equity.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: So they know that they need to be in a better place, know themselves better and have a sense of where god's leading them so that they'll wisely call their next pastor.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: So it depends on how messy it was before you were there.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: We have a church that we're just talking to right now.
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: They're still in the beginning process of dialogue with them.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: I'm not sure if we'll end up working with them or not, but the pastor's been there for 30 years and I don't know at this point how messy it's going to be, because you don't know what kind of challenges are there yet.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: But I can almost always say that the time that it takes to separate relationally, emotionally, spiritually separate from a pastor who's there for 30 years, that's substantive.
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: Even if there aren't big issues in the church, it's just challenging to say goodbye and figure out who we are as a church on our own, distinct from that pastor that used to lead us.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: So it's a big, it depends.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: You may have the stats on this.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: This is calling to mind some stats that I can't pull up to the front of my mind right now, but it's something along the lines of for every year that a pastor has been with a church.
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: For every year that a pastor has been with a church, you should expect it's going to take at least one month before a new pastor can actually be successful.
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: Are you familiar with that statistic?
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: I'm actually not, but it does resonate as true.
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: So the pastor that's been there for 30 years, it's going to take the next guy 30 months to get some relational equity.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: And that's if you walk through that process.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: Well, the first time?
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, which is why this church that I mentioned just a little bit earlier.
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: I think that it was unsuccessful.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: The guy was there for 15 plus years and the new guy comes in and tries to make changes right off the bat.
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: They might have been the right changes.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: It sounds like, from what I can, that he had good insights, but it was too soon.
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: He didn't have the equity yet.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: So what either have you experienced or have you heard from other transitional pastors or have you seen is the hardest task or the most challenging aspect of being a transitional pastor?
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: I think that's oh oath of being a transitional pastor.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: That's a good question, Thank you.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: I would say I want you to know I worked hard on these questions.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: I mean I worked hard on these questions, I appreciate you, jer.
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: So here's what I would say.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: I was thinking you were going to ask the question.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: You know what's the hardest for the congregation, and I think they're related.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: Actually I think they're the same activities, but they're the hardest for the transitional pastor and the hardest for the congregation is they're correlated.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: So I think that the hardest is to receive and act on.
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: Well, receive and own, so that you are willing to act on the church health assessment report.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: So in counseling we call that readiness for change.
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and we actually measure that in our church health assessment report what's the attitudes toward change in the congregation?
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: But I think that when that report comes in, I'm thinking of a congregation right now where we've delivered the executive summary to an elder board and the final version, the big report, is in editing and the pastor emailed this week and he just said this is a fair take, but it's a hard take, and now we've got to lean into the work that's indicated here, and so I think that that's a hard spot because the transitional pastor is trying to put hard truth diplomatically.
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: He's trying to do grace and truth.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: He's trying to do truth and love.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: But you're there.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: One of Matt's sort of stock lines is people tell me, pay me to tell them the truth, and they typically pay us good money to tell them the truth.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: Your best typically pay us good money to tell them the truth.
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: Your best friends tell you the truth about yourself, and so the transitional pastor is trying to do that diplomatically but forthrightly, and that's challenging.
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: It can be really hard.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: So that's one part that's really really difficult.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: I think the second is envisioning is as a process is by far the most difficult of the three, because it's a muscle that people don't even know that they have and they've never exercised it before, and it's brand new, lord.
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: What direction should we go as a church Is a terrifying question for many people to ask, because they've never even tried to answer it before.
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: They've assumed that the lead guy is the one who answers that for them, and then they decide whether they're in or out.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: And the scariest part of all is probably that they're afraid God will actually answer it.
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: You may be right.
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so we try to put them in the spot where God can, right and with a lot of prayer and a good process, but it's the most wiggly thing that we do and that's actually.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: It certainly is for Presbyterians, but I think it is for anybody, because they're not practiced in.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: Well, I guess I'll just say it.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: They're not practicing listening to the Lord.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: Paul says keep in step with the Spirit, and that Jesus has a design for a healthy church.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: He has a design for a local congregation to be a missionary to its community.
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: And if they say, lord, what would you have us do?
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: As we would glorify you and we would try to bring the gospel here to these people.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: Jesus has a vested interest in those people.
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: God says to Paul in Corinth when he's feeling pushed on every side and whatever he says, stay, I got more people here, you're going to be all right.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: And every local congregation needs to hear that from Jesus' heart.
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: I got more people here, it's all right.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: Stay, follow me, go, move towards them.
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: And the how to move towards them to whom has God sent us?
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: Is the question we're trying to answer in envisioning.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: To whom has God sent us?
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: And then how are we to go towards them?
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: So that's just difficult, because it's an unused muscle.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: It's kind of like you go skiing and you're just like, and the next day you're just like I had no idea, I had something there that could hurt, right.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: And that's what envisioning is like for a lot of congregations, and so for the transitional pastor himself, based on his personality, his own characteristics.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: Any one of these can be a bigger or a smaller challenge.
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: Just his personality, just to the way that he.
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: Sure His strengths and weaknesses, his experiences.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: Sure Absolutely.
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: And then you have the challenges that he's walking into with the church that are dynamic, that are historical, that have longevity, all those things going on.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: So, okay, there's a lot there.
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: So how does a church know that they're getting their money's worth from a transitional pastor?
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: So no church hires a transitional pastor unless they know they've got stuff they need to work on.
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: If they're not convinced they don't have stuff to work on, typically they're not calling us.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: Or when we tell them what all this is involved, they're like oh, no, no, no, no, we were just looking for somebody to help us find a pastor.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: Right, and we'll.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: We will help a church just find a pastor.
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: But we will also pretty forthrightly tell a church hey, I mean, we can do that for you, but you'd be, you'd be way better to take more time and try and deal with your stuff.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: And sometimes that means that they'll go at it on their own or they'll hire somebody else and that's just fine with me.
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: I would rather be.
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: I don't want to be working with the church.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: I don't want flourish to be working with the church, where the spirit hasn't preceded us.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: If the spirit's not already there at work, I don't want to be there.
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: But if the spirit's there at work and he's producing humility in people and they want to deal with their stuff, then I want to be right there with them and help them do it.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: Does it bother you that someone might hear you give that answer and say wow, matt, you're such a sanctimonious, pompous?
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Jared thinks I am.
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: No, I was really challenged.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: I had a congregate in my church in West Seattle who had a very big client.
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: He did fine woodworking and he had a big client who's very difficult and so he's doing this work a large contract and he depended on the money from this contract to pay his mortgage.
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: And we met for coffee one morning and I asked him about this client and he goes oh, I fired that client.
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: And I said what?
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: Because I knew how tight they were financially and and he was just like nah, hey, it wasn't worth working with them, there wasn't anything worth that money.
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: So I fired them.
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: Wow, and I was blown away.
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: I had never heard of that idea of firing a client and, honestly, it was a new concept for me.
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: It was important for me to learn, obviously, it it also showed me he had more faith than I did.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: I knew he needed that contract in order to pay his mortgage but, he knew that the Lord would provide for him, as he trusted in him and worked hard, and indeed the Lord did provide for him.
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: So I would rather pre-fire a client, a potential client, where the Spirit's not at work than to have somebody there beating their head against the wall, because that's not good for anybody I hear that those are challenging words, those are possibly hard words to hear, but if they resonate with what scripture says, um go grace where god's calling.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: Yes, grace to the humble jesus only spoke what he heard the father saying when peter said hey, if you call me, I'll step out of the boat.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: Jesus hadn't called and Peter stepped out of the boat.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: The chapter would have been very short.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: That's good as it was.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: It was pretty short Anyway.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: Thank you guys for coming along with us.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: This has been a fun conversation.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: We have more coming up.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: Please stay tuned.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: Share this with someone that you think it could be helpful to.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: We're doing this in order not just to give you a better idea of what a transitional pastor can do and can do for you and your church, but also that you would be encouraged in the gospel.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: We will talk to you soon.
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Church Renewal Podcast from Flourish Coaching.
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: Flourish exists to set ministry leaders free to be effective wherever God has called them.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: We believe that there's only one fully sufficient reason that, this day dawned, jesus is still gathering his people and he's using his church to do it.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: When pastors or churches feel stuck, our team of coaches refresh their hope in the gospel and help them clarify their strategy.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: If you have questions or a need, we'd love to hear from you.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: You can find us at flourishcoachingorg and you can reach us by email at info at flourishcoachingorg.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: You can also connect with us on Facebook, twitter and YouTube and we would love it if you would like subscribe, rate or review the podcast wherever you're listening.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: Please share this podcast with anyone you think it'll help and if we get a client because of a recommendation you make, we'll send you a small gift.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Just to say thanks, and a special thanks to Bay Ridge Christian Church in Annapolis, maryland, for the use of their building to record today's episode.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: All music for this show has been licensed and was composed and created by artists.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: The Church Renewal Podcast was produced by me, jeremy Seferati, in association with Flourish Coaching, with the goal of equipping and encouraging your church to flourish wherever God has called you.