if bill hybels, rick warren and andy stanley were looking for a ministry position i wonder if they’d find one. i wonder if they would experience the struggles that so many others face while searching: the lack of communication, the no-call backs, the 6-8 month hiring timeline, the rudeness of search committees, the broken promises.
if bill, rick and andy were looking for a ministry, i wonder what they would encounter. i wonder if they would encounter the lackadaisical nature of leadership teams and their expectations that only Jesus himself could meet or if they would even make it past the resume purge without any sort of dialogue.
if bill, rick and andy were looking for a ministry i wonder if they would get so “desperate” to start looking at the tiny churches in the backwoods of america where their names meant nothing because they’ve never been heard of. i wonder if they would get a hearing and if they did and were actually hired, i wonder what their experience would be. i wonder if they would begin to truly understand the plight of the majority of pastors around the country and what they are truly facing within their leadership structure… i wonder.
i have several friends that are in the midst of ministry searching purgatory and their stories of rejection or even being brutally beaten down with words are unbelievable. one of the most overlooked parts of the church is “human resources” and how we handle/treat those that are applying for these roles. we constantly hear about how much of a shortage there is in the church for people to do ministry, but yet there are so many quality people out there that cannot seem to get hired anywhere… why is this?
it just makes you wonder how successful bill, rick and andy would be if they were looking for a ministry in a “normal” church.
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Two thoughts that may contradict each other a bit…
One, the corporate galactic empire that is the evangelical church as we know it starts right there and why the church is failing….hiring committees, this committee, that committee…not enough paper work not enough degrees, not enough books written, I have heard it all…it makes me sick…one of the best pastors I knew, was only a “Christian” a couple years and started a new kind of community in uber liberal Madison, WI. known as Mad City Church. No formal seminary, no Bible colleges, etc, etc. Just a dynamic speaker, with a true passion for following Christ, learning on his own, getting mentored by others, and plants a church that turns in a weekly gathering of 1500+ of all ages….the church is no different than corporate world, its not what you know, its who ya know.
The other part of me thinks, who cares they arent finding work. Maybe its a true sign that people like this need to buck the system and say screw the church as we know it…I know the first come back will be money and how are they supposed to provide for their family right? Well if we truly were about Jesus than those that proclaimed Jesus and were close to them would not let them go without period. I am sick of the candy coated answers to this age old issue.
If true revolution is going to happen in this country it starts in scenarios like this. What happens when people stop interviewing for positions altogether and become the church Christ intended us to be? Maybe this is a God thing in disguise?
But then again…maybe I am way off line….
it’s interesting that bill, rick and andy were all church planters themselves. maybe they also felt like they did not fit in the standard mold of their times. if that is the case, they might actually be a good model for the younger evangelicals for instead of descending into bitterness they moved forward into the “terra nova” of their time.
i realize this might just be another way of saying what jason already said, but there you go.
Since August 2006 when I start VIPMinistry, I’ve come across SO MANY people who are in a desperate search to find a home for the ministries they love to serve in. It seems a day doesn’t go by that I don’t get a request for help for those “lost” without a church home.
But the more I serve through VIP, the more I think that the answer may not be in joining ONE congregation, but maybe being a part of many. Originally, VIP was just an outsourcing ministry, but as time goes on, I think we may transition more towards being design and print missionaries than a true ministry. Isn’t that what all ministries are in terms of the bottom line? Missionaries for God’s message, in whatever form the ministry takes?
Why is it that a missionary can be supported by multiple congregations, but each congregation has to have multiplicity in terms of their ministries? I contact over 40 congregations in one area 3 months ago, and ALL of them are struggling with print and design costs and schedules. But 30 of the 40 want to keep things “in house” for whatever reason.
Then last month, I talked to a bunch of congregations I serve already, but not about print and design. I inquired into why congregations don’t merge in support of the ministries that ALWAYS need help in marketing, financing and managing — namely small groups, youth ministries, and elderly care. None of them wanted to even consider banding together to unite the body. It’s so competitive, none of them want to “lose” people to another congregation, which is a fear when you unite ministries, I guess.
Can you imagine how much more powerful the Church could be if 5 or 10 congregations in a community banded together to form one youth ministry? They could still hire 2-3 youth pastors, but the draw would be stronger.
I’m a big supporter of Catalyst here in Lake County, Illinois, but I fear they’ll end up doing more talking and less working.
Very good points Adam, and backing up what I posted about the church failing. Why is the question? Why?
Is it because the church truly is all about itself and it’s numbers?
It’s funny you mention Catalyst. What I am about to say is not fact its just speculation on my end….I know a well respected pastor in the area that went head first into supporting that cause. He was so supportive he actually pointed a lot of their “mission” monies to them for this year. I have heard through various people I trust, that those in charge in their denominational conference did not think to kindly of this act and were strongly opposed to giving “mission” money to those outside their own denomination. The result was a “reassignment” for this given person to a position within the denomination that did not exist before. Again, I am sure there were other motivating reasons, but this definitely in mine and others opinions led to this.
It’s a great idea, but doomed I believe. I saw this first hand with Carefest a few years back. The idea was to unite local churches together to care for those around us. What happened was the bitter taste of pride and church as we know for me. Can we pass out tracts, can we lay hands on them and heal them, etc, etc…in other words can we slam our definition of Christianity down their throats.
The “me church” was a parody done a while back, but as people laugh at it, it is so true…can you imagine a well to do church that has excess of income, and has all their bills paid, actually helping out another congregation in their own community pay bills, pay staff, etc?
As I heard in a recent sermon, the whole idea of “missionary” and “missional church” makes me sick. The church is the mission folks, and we are all missionaries.
Dada, you ask the question what would it look like if people came together for certain things? It’s called outside agencies that are doing the work the church has failed at. Why is One.org one of the most popular organizations to help end poverty? Why isn’t it a church or a group of believers leading this cause? And not just them, across the board.
It just makes my head spin to think congregation struggling to make ends meet, wont even accept a free service such as VIP because of what pride? Or maybe its oh, they already print for a few churches in the area, we dont want to be associated with them? Honestly, I think that is going through their heads. I don’t know what the end solution looks like, but it’s got to start sometime and somewhere…
Honestly I think you guys have taken a discussion into an entirely different direction.
Gentry, that was a very interesting insight.
The issue I have seen first hand are that some ministry positions are looked at as second class citizens. Because of this staff and leadership aren’t always interested in the best candidate, just the easiest or political decision.
I have witnessed first hand the silence after sending 50+ resumes all over the country to churches of all size, only to receive the party line, “you do not posess the qualities we are looking for.” Which is a typical phrase and seems harmless, but when you are on the receiving end it cuts like a knife.
The worst is the silence. They tell you they are going to make a decision in the next week and two weeks later you call them and they inform you they went into another direction. I don’t know if it is because they don’t have a personal relationship with the candidates, if they are sometimes merely viewed as another resume, but church leadership needs to be aware of the lonliness and the self doubt so many go through in ministry and their actions or lack of actions are only compounding it.
Churches often are only looking out for themselves and don’t always realize the consequences of their actions. Telling a person they are interested and go ahead and tell their church, then that person tells their church they are in the process, only to have the interviewing church come back and say, “well never mind, we decided to go another direction and we won’t be pursuing you any longer.”
So it isn’t the ills of churches not working together. It is the ills of leadership forgetting that their actions bring direct consequence to REAL people, REAL families and not just a piece of paper.
Welcome to Corporate America Tracy!
This is exactly how things work in the corporate world and I think goes hand in hand with what I was saying. The church has become a huge corporation in more ways than one. Which comes down to why churches dont work together. Just as Abbott and Merk are rivals, as are the Church of Christ and the First Baptist Church.
Let’s to go back to the original issue, it isn’t really poor response times (even though that is a HUGE problem), or church competition (still I feel irrelevent to this conversation, sorry Jason!) it is churches with unrealistic expectations (job descriptions that only Jesus would qualify) that compounds the issue, which is why no one “possesses the qualities we are looking for” and why churches spend forever and a lifetime trying to find this “perfect” individual when fantastic people that would have taken the church to the next level, are overlooked because they can’t walk on water. Or worse, I have seen churches hire someone because they “liked them as a person” even though they didn’t even posses the basic qualifications! And those bad hires can bring a church or ministry down quickly sometimes to a point beyond repair.
So how do churches develop more realistic job descriptions? Where do the churches draw their ideas for the job descriptions? I’m sure a lot of it is that a group of people draw up what they want in a position and what 10 different people want gets drawn up into one gigantic, unrealistic job description! So how do we remedy this?
As someone in HR it disgusts me to see how churches run searches, because you have a room full of people who haven’t the foggiest on how to recruit, interview, or even create a job description. I think leadership as well as lay ministers and ministry staff who will assist in hiring functions should be required to attend training of some sort to learn handle this. A bad hire in the corporate world typically costs the company money, but they can usually rebound. A bad hire in a church, can destroy a church, sometimes for good.
Those are good points, Tracy. A couple reponses…
1. I think we make the hiring process too complex with the number of people typically involved in church hiring. Trying to please a committee of 10 plus other sub-groups is very difficult. Simplify this to a group of 3 or 4, who have skills in interviewing and discernment.
2. Most pastoral job descriptions are fuzzy at best. I’ve tried to keep them simple as well and try to leave ‘perfection’ off the list. I forget who taught me this, but I like looking for character, competency and chemistry. (I think it may have been Hybels that I first heard it from) I want someone of integrity that honestly knows themself and their areas of struggles. I want someone who possesses the basic skills of the job or can learn them. I want someone I like. I know that last one sounds selfish, but as you know ministry is difficult enough if you don’t have some affinity with those you’re serving with.
And finally…
I’m not sure there is any good way to take the sting out of rejection. However, being timely and honest with people is a great start. I still hate telling people that I just don’t think we’d work well together despite all your great qualities. So I’ve lied and said “you don’t have the qualities we’re looking for.” Sigh… should I be more honest next time???