God's Time

Two years. It has been more than two years since Pastor Rob left and almost two years since Pastor Keith arrived to serve as our interim. Surely, many of you must be thinking, we should have a new permanent pastor by now. Well, while we have continued progress to report, we also want to help you all manage your expectations.

First, while it has been two years since Rob returned to Indiana, it has only been eight months since the first meeting of the Pastor Nominating Committee in January 2012. Once a PNC is elected, it can often take several years to successfully complete a search. We are making no efforts to guess when we will be done, one way or the other, but you can always track our progress on the page at the right titled “Steps to Calling a New Teaching Elder/Head of Staff.” There are effectively seven action steps listed there, and we are knee deep in step five.

Second, we believe we have been called to do more than fill a vacant position. We want to do more than just find a person for the job; we want the right person, the one God has already chosen. Discernment takes time, as does clarifying processes and making connections. Beyond just sitting back and watching the pastor information forms roll in (nearly 90 in less than eight weeks at last count), we have been actively networking and asking others who know our church well to recommend potential teaching elder candidates to us. In many cases, these potential candidates are happy in their current calls and do not even know that they should be considering WCPC.

We are praying for patience. We are as excited about welcoming our new teaching elder as you are, but we are also committed to holding each other accountable to doing this process God’s way, bathed in prayer, and seeking unity in Christ. We are very pleased with the gifts for ministry represented in our candidate pool to date, and know of many more interested candidates who have yet to apply.

As we are now able to begin narrowing the pool into a short list of top candidates, the PNC has chosen to begin meeting as a large group weekly instead of bi-weekly so that we can move forward at a more efficient pace (and shorten our recent marathon three-plus-hour meetings to a more manageable length). We know that the most gifted people in our pool are likely to surface in other searches as well, and we want to honor the process by moving ahead with those folks who sent us their information early on.

Finally, many of you have asked us how you can help. From the beginning, we have invited you to share names of those you believe would be a good fit. In addition, we have asked for prayer, but we have not provided you much detail to guide your prayer. Here then are specific requests for prayer for your WCPC PNC:

·      Discernment. Your PNC is made up of 12 different people with very different opinions. Like-mindedness as we narrow our search is clearly a gift and product of the Holy Spirit.

·      Energy. Summer is a time for rest and renewal, yet the PNC is choosing this time to ramp up what is already a significant commitment of time. Please pray for energy and health for us.

·      Patience and perseverance. We feel pressure from many directions to complete this search. That said, this process will unfold in God’s time. Pray for patience and perseverance for the PNC, WCPC staff and the congregation.

·      Families. This process has an impact on many spouses and children as we are away from home or glued to a computer for significant extra hours each week. Please pray for our families.

·      Our next leader. God is already preparing our next teaching elder/head of staff. Please pray for her/him and her/his family and for the significant life transition that awaits them.

Bill Yakely has been sharing excerpts from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s book “Life Together” as we open our meetings. This last week’s message encouraged us to remember the abounding grace of God that allows us to live together in community. Those of us on the PNC sense to a person that we are part of a significant grace-filled community and sharing in a very special journey of discovery. Thank you for your continued trust, patience and prayer.

And now the work begins...

Not to be misleading, as we have been working hard since our first meeting in January of this year, but the work is different now, as the PNC begins processing PIFs (Pastor Information Forms) from interested candidates. So far, more than 60 people have either been matched with our stated needs by the denomination or "self-referred," sending us their information because they are interested in our position and have found it on their own. Many of them know our church and have already been tracking our progress. We are following up on leads via e-mail and phone, and are reviewing every application multiple times before discussing our top tier of applicants as a full committee.

This is meaningful and taxing work. Words on a page (or screen) can only tell part of the story, and we are seeking discernment and God's nudging as we choose where to invest the additional time needed in conversations and eventually formal interviews.

That said, we are thrilled that so many qualified people are interested in our church. There are many compelling stories within this group of early applicants, and we are steadily honing in on the kind of leader we can collectively envision for our church in the future.

Thank you for your attention, your continued prayers, and your patience.

Time to get the word out!

The WCPC PNC is now prepared and excited to begin receiving Pastor Information Forms from candidates for the position of Teaching Elder/Head of Staff, which may happen as early as next week once the PCUSA office in Louisville posts the position.

On the right hand side of this screen, you will find a list of pages. The last one, added just now, is the Church Information Form we have been working on for the past several months. We encourage you to read it, pray about it, and consider ordained pastors you might know who posseses the experience, skills and spiritual gifts we are looking for in our next head of staff.

You are certainly encouraged to share this CIF with any who might be interested, or if there is someone you think should receive a personal contact from a member of the PNC, please let one of us know or email us at whitprespnc12@googlegroups.com.

Over the next several weeks we will continue refining the process through which we will consider every applicant, as we work toward discerning the individual who will next serve our congregation as WCPC's Head of staff.

"I AM"

PNC member Bill Yakely shared a helpful word with us at tonight's meeting. It is a wonderful encouragement to live in the moment. As the PNC continues to make progress at a deliberate, but perhaps not blistering pace, it is easy to think that nothing is happening, and we begin fretting about the future over which we hold no control. Rest assured, "I AM" is in charge of this process, and we are regularly seeking his presence, moment by moment. Perhaps you will find this piece by Helen Malicoat helpful as well.

I was regretting the past
and fearing the future.
Suddenly, my Lord was speaking.
"My name is I Am."

He paused. I waited. He continued.

"When you live in the past,
with its mistakes and regrets,
it is hard. I am not there.
My name is not "I was."

When you live in the future,
with its problems and fears,
it is hard. I am not there.
My name is not "I will be."

When you live in this moment
it is not hard. I am here.
My name is "I AM."

Exciting hurdle cleared

I just took the liberty of updating the page on the right hand side of this blog that outlines the eight steps we must take to call our next head of staff. I was able to mark number three as "complete" and list number four as "in process," which might not seem like such a huge thing, unless you realize that the Church Information Form (CIF), the primary document we provide to the denomination and any potential candidates, is now complete.

The PNC and session met a few weeks ago to discuss the draft and shared a meaningful time of conversation and unity around the direction we are heading as a church.

Then, last Monday night, the CIF was formally approved by Session at its monthly meeting and has been sent on to the Presbytery of the Inland Northwest Committee on Ministry for their approval in early June. Once approved there it will be sent to Louisville to be posted as an open position (and posted here for your consideration).  At that point candidates may start applying for the job.

We know there are a lot of people interested in this position, as we are already hearing from them in various ways, but the formal start to the search phase will begin when potential candidates are officially able to send us their Pastor Information Forms (PIFs) and we are also able to begin making contact with our network of friends, Presbyterian pastors, and others in the denomination, encouraging them to consider the opportunity or help connect us with other pastors who might be a good fit for our church.

This is a very exciting time for our church and we give thanks for your continued support and prayer.

Progress, Prayer and Patience

While this post could easily be a quick report of great progress, since we will soon be sending the Church Information Form to the WCPC elders for their input and eventual approval at a session meeting in the near future, it is important for those of us on the PNC that you understand something even more significant to us.

Bill Yakely is a member of the PNC who has been tabbed by chair Gary Carlsen to serve as our "spiritual guidepost" and he begins each of our bi-weekly meetings with a short devotion and prayer time. Last week,  Bill shared a prayer, inspired by Thomas Merton, that he wrote several years ago: "Let me abandon my way, Lord, seeking the course you have set before me through your still and quiet voice. You move in mysteriuous ways with a kind and gentle way. Lord, in my wandering circles, help me to come to you each and every day....Lord, thank you for your direction, answer to prayer, glimpses of your kingdom, direction and path and the peace that transcends all my mortal ambiguous flailing about in the ashes of life."

If there is one thing we are about collectively as a PNC, it is prayer. We are committed to the concept that as we are prayerful, lifting up our church, our journey, and the leader for our church that God has already chosen, we will be given direction.

While we are hopeful, there are no guarantees that our recent progress is anything more than an incremental step in the right general direction, and believe us, we are every bit as anxious to be making progress on this search as you are. But our God is a God of long journeys, stories that are still being written, and plans that conform to a much larger set of needs than our own.

We covet your prayer and thank you for your continued patience and participation on this journey.

10 Skills

As part of the process of creating the Church Information Form (CIF), the PCUSA's primary document to be shared on our behalf with potential candidates, we were provided with a list of more than 60 potential skills that our new teaching elder/head of staff might possess. Then we were asked to select no more than 10. It is at this point that many of us on the PNC were checking off 20, 30, even 40 or more...and were forced to acknowledge that the only person who could conceivably possess all of these skills was celebrated a few days ago on Easter Sunday.

"Preaching" was one skill that we pretty quickly agreed on, but the rest of the process, a conversation that helped us eventually arrive at 10 (at least for now), was a rich one and really helped the PNC arrive at a better understanding of how we are approaching this discernment process as individuals, and how we can come to consensus as a committee.

This is all part of sharing the news that the CIF does now exist in a draft form, and while it still has quite a lot of revision ahead before it can be sent to session, approved by session, sent to the Presbytery Committee on Ministry and approved by them so that it can be shared with potential candidates, we have reached one more milestone on WCPC's journey of discovery.

Thanks for your continued prayers.