My girlfriend Maria (good luck reading it!) was telling me a story the other day. She was in a park and there was a 1.5 year old child who seemed lost and distraught who she was trying to help and console. Then, all of a sudden, another child emerged, this one was 3 years old, and was intent on taking care of the younger one. Maria told me that she thought to herself, “Here’s this 3 year old trying to take care of this 1.5 year old, but really there should be someone taking care of him.” This story relates to two things that have been present in my mind.
The first one has to do with students at Fuller. I have commented to friends on more than one occasion that as I have engaged with peers at Fuller I have been painfully aware of the way in which we are like sheep without a shepherd. So many 20-somethings being trained to be pastors and leaders, most of whom have no pastor or leader looking out for and over them. I have long missed serving in this capacity. I miss being involved in the lives of the senior high students from RiverTree in such a way that I could speak into their lives with wisdom, advice, compassion, and care. I miss being able to pray with and over a flock of young adults who are wrestling with one of the most challenging seasons of life. I miss being a pastor.
I also miss being pastored. I miss having someone older, wiser, and more experienced that me who takes initiative to share in my life to help me grow up into maturity. Peers can help here, but there is simply no replacement for seasoned wisdom. Professors also help, but they don’t step into my life in a meaningful sense. Then again, traditional pastors don’t step into the average congregation members life either, but that’s another post!
The second thing in my mind has to do with an increasingly common notion of “authentic” community. I get the impression from certain circles of people that one of the things that makes community truly authentic is humility, the kind of humility which would never dare presume that anyone comes to the table more knowledgeable, capable, or astute than anyone else. This brand of community emphasizes dialogue, discussion, and group thinking. I’ll be the first to tell you that all of these things are great, but I’d want to quickly follow it up by pointing out the need for prophets, teachers, and pastors, who, if they’re good, will never be close-minded, but who, at the same time, don’t buy into a kind of false humility which refuses to acknowledge the responsibility they bear as guides. If 10 people are hiking a trail and one of them has hiked it a bunch of times before I don’t want to have a group discussion about where to go or what to do, I want to listen to the person who knows what they are talking about. (Yes, a good trail guide can take suggestions from the rest of the group, but when push comes to shove, the experienced trail guide gets the benefit of the doubt.)
Hope that makes sense. I have to cut it off here for now, but I promise that my next post will be a more biblical/scriptural reflection of this matter. I welcome thoughts in the meantime (1.5 year olds need not apply! - kidding).
7 responses so far ↓
1 Jason Z. // Jul 11, 2006 at 2:20 pm
These are some good thoughts, JR. I too have felt the impact of both issues in my life when I left professional ministry. I enjoy the ministry that takes place among peers in our community of faith, but it lacks the dynamic you discuss — intentionally ministering to the next generation and being intentionally ministered to by the previous generation. I’ve had to “outsource” the latter, maintaining a significant friendship from within the denomination I left. I also understand the second issue as well. When we first began our experimental community of faith, we had the ambition of flattening leadership so that everyone came to the table as equals. This is still a value and we definitely learn from one another. However, we’ve also realized that everyone brings specialized gifts, talents, education, training, experience, wisdom and personality which cannot and should not be ignored. As you mentioned, humility does not refuse to acknowledge responsibility, giftedness or training. Rather, it doesn’t use these things to jostle for a dominant position or view them as a source of greater personal worth or validity.
Keep posting your great thoughts!
2 Kevin Bianchi // Jul 11, 2006 at 3:17 pm
“Then again, traditional pastors don’t step into the average congregation members life either, but that’s another post!”
This statement is ridiculously biased and lacking the humilty that you attempted to describe. There are many “traditional pastors” as you describe them, who step into the “life” of an average congregation member. Perhaps they don’t sit around for hours discussing the minute details of systematic theology and how the emergent church is replacing absolute truth in fresh ways, but they step into their lives in times of loss, times of uncertainty, and model a great deal of the strength and courage of Christ. I just think you have to stop making such overarching statements. It only makes you seem arrogant and irrelevant.
3 David // Jul 11, 2006 at 7:47 pm
Great Points!!!
4 JR Rozko // Jul 11, 2006 at 8:56 pm
Kevin, I truly would like to engage more with your comments. It would be helpful to know what you thought about my post on the “Defining Majority?”
I don’t think my statement is ridiculously biased. I think it is indicative of the majority experience. I have been an active participant in 5 church congregations during my adult life and in not one of them was any (paid or trained) pastor a significant figure in my life. That is not to say that I have never had people hwo filled pastoral roles, but either I had to seek them out or their role was an unintentional one.
Actually, I think it is your dichotomy which is “ridiculous” (and also mean-spirited)- as if being a role in ones life has to equate to sitting “around for hours discussing the minute details of systematic theology and how the emergent church is replacing absolute truth in fresh ways.” In my opinion, that doesn’t qualify either.
When I think of a biblical paradigm of pastoring I think of mature and seasoned saints who find it necessary to live and walk with those they seek to teach and lead. This doesn’t mean having to be best friends and spending every waking second together, but neither can it mean popping on the scene only when there is a problem.
I am well aware of my propensity to make overarching statements and I am also aware of how it can come across. To a degree, I regret both, but I refuse to abandon making these statements when I find them appropriate and long to find a way to do so that does not come across as either arrogant or irrelevant (if indeed that is possible, I am not convinced it is). Any constructive thoughts you have are more than welcome (and I’m not being passive agreessive - I am being sincere).
On a final note, I just want say something about your indictment against the emergent church as trying to “replace absolute truth in fresh ways.” As someone who has studied the emergent church trend and read voraciously on the topic, I’d like to defend them in saying that this is not what they are about. They are about admitting that no person or group can lay a claim to truth, they are about taking discernment seriously, and they acknowledge the grave problems with foundationalisic approaches to epistemology and theology, but abandon neither truth nor the belief in absolute truth, they simply choose not to put their faith in their ability to know it with certainly, opting instead to place their faith in a God whom they believe to be Truth.
5 gretchen // Jul 13, 2006 at 2:54 am
jr,
i also miss being led by ’seasoned wisdom’. i really liked reading this blog; thanks for the insights.
it sounds like you’re doing well. i’m still writing for your hometown newspaper (on the side), and no, i don’t have a ’seasoned’ boss, or A boss, for that matter. it’s pretty weird sending my stories in and not getting any feedback-if only ‘they’ knew that’s how we learn! check out my blog if you ever get the chance. it’s not as noteworthy as i wish, or as your’s of course, but it’s a start
6 gretchen // Jul 13, 2006 at 2:57 am
drr, i forgot…it’s gretchensnyder@blogspot
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