The Vulnerable Pastor by Mandy Smith

Author:Mandy Smith [Smith, Mandy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780830898879
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
Published: 2015-10-19T00:00:00+00:00

No longer need Christian communities anxiously glance over their shoulder, lest they make a terrible mistake that betrays their performance of the script. Instead they can trust the practices and patterns of their common life and have confidence that God joins in their faithful improvisation.

Sam Wells4

These improvisation lessons found new application when I began to be considered for the lead pastor role. As I rehearsed my résumé and a feeble five-year plan, my heart, after worshiping with this community for years, looked on all my posturing and simply thought, I just love this place. A reassurance, which I believe was from above, replied, Go with that. So I did. And I do. There are still plans to be made, meetings to be led, budgets to be balanced and sermons to be written. But I’m learning not to let their blankness taunt. That question Will it be good? If not, why bother even starting? turns me inward, makes me focus on what others think of me, makes my congregation the enemy to protect myself from, the audience to perform for. How can that possibly be a place of generosity or service? Instead I’m learning to look at any blankness before me—any unwritten sermon, any unanswered question, any unresolved problem, any unknowable or uncontrollable thing—and turn inward just long enough to see what I have there to share. It may be as simple and unimpressive as love or hope or faith. It feels childish and vulnerable and unprofessional. But it’s how Jesus led. He invited people into his joy, and we can too.5

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