Explaining The Decision To Move On

I announced to my congregation this past Sunday that after more than 10 years the time has come for a move. I've accepted a call to Pickering Village United Church in Ajax. I have very mixed emotions about the decision. A new and fresh start is exciting, and a new congregation will be challenging, but 10 years is a long time and Port Colborne and Central United Church feel very much like home to me and to my family, and the thought of living somewhere else and being in relationship with a new community of faith is, frankly, strange. This time in Port Colborne is the longest my wife and I have ever lived in one place, and Port Colborne is the only home my daughter has ever known, so the idea of starting over in a new place is also a bit sad. But it's what the ministry is. A journey; a progression of comings and goings. Establishing deep roots, but then having to move on - the better for the experiences one has had in a particular place. Central and Port Colborne have helped me to grow as a pastor, and I've learned a great deal from my time here. But there's always a time to move on. I start at Pickering Village in July, so I have three and a half months to finish well here. Part of finishing well is explaining the decision to move on.

I've had folks ask me since my announcement "why are you leaving?" Some seem to think I'm upset about something. I'm not. Some seem to think that those who don't care for either me and/or my ministry have finally pushed me out. They haven't. Am I aware of criticism? Yes, I am. It goes with the territory. Frankly, no one should go into ministry unless they have a very thick skin, because you'll always hear far more criticism than commendation. As churches decline in numbers it's inevitable that some people will blame the minister for not preaching well enough or not visiting enough people or not working hard enough or not being available enough. Overall, Central has held its own in numbers. There's been some decline, but relatively speaking we've done not badly. Still, we're not in the congregation's glory days anymore, and people who've been around for a while realize that and a few do choose to pointedly mention it from time to time. But, as I said, that goes with the territory. You have to let that bounce off you. Thick skin and all. And the simple truth is that once you preach your first sermon someone isn't going to like it and will say so. I've been here for 10+ years, so there's been lots of time for people to decide they don't like me or my style or my preaching or my priorities or my wardrobe or my haircut or whatever. And they've had more than enough time to get tired of my faults and weaknesses and mistakes, which are more than a few in all honesty. But those who don't like me or who are just tired of me seem to be a small minority and there's no move to push me out that I know of. Just normal background criticism from time to time. And in fact, our Council have been tremendously loyal to me and to the rest of our staff. And I like it here and my family likes it here. So, why move?

One always looks for signs of God's call. Without going into detail, those have been there on a variety of fronts for the last year or two and so I've been testing the waters as appropriate opportunities have arisen. Pickering Village seemed a fit for me - and I seemed a fit for them. So we sat down together and we made it work.

But the real question was whether my ministry here was complete. (1) Had I accomplished the things that I felt needed to be accomplished? I felt I had. (2) Do I have a vision of what I want to accomplish in the next 2 or 3 years? That was getting murky. I wasn't sure what more I could do, given my gifts and skills and talents and given the needs of the congregation. If you can't come up with some sort of plan, then you risk starting to simply spin your wheels, and that doesn't help either you or the congregation. In this case, I think my ministry will be more effective in a new surrounding, and I think my departure will help the congregation avoid its own wheel-spinning by requiring that they do some serious thinking about the future. And Central has had a very long tenured staff (and not just the ministry staff but the support/admin staff as well.) That, I think, is a positive thing and it says something about the congregation that staff choose to stay on. It's a good place to be. Still, every now and then some new blood might be appropriate. I could have kept on keeping on for another year or two or three, but I'm not sure that would have been productive for anyone.

Finally, I've always told newer ministers that your goal in terms of longevity has to be to stay long enough to do what you're called to do, but it also has to be to leave before the congregation wants you to leave. (Wheel spinning comes after the former and before the latter.) I've seen congregations force ministers out because they perceive that the time has come for a change but the minister disagrees. In that situation the hammer is always with the congregation quite frankly, but the process of pushing a minister out is not pretty and it does a lot of damage and it causes a lot of hurt both ways. You definitely don't want to get to that point. I had dropped a few hints to a few people over the last year or so but, still, after I announced this decision on Sunday, there were a lot of gasps and a lot of tears. That was touching. There were also a couple of people who seemed angry with me for leaving. That's also touching in its own way. And there was no applause and no cries of "Hallelujah!" All that makes me believe that I pulled off the "leave before they want you to leave" part effectively.

So, that's my story and my decision making process, surrounded by a lot of prayer from me and from people who knew I was looking at options.

One thing I want to stress is that it's not that I think I'm going someplace "better." I love this place and the people and the community. It doesn't get "better" than this, quite honestly. But it is time. It's just time for a change if I wanted to continue to do meaningful ministry rather than settling into wheel-spinning just because I'm too comfortable to move on.

Eventually in every ministry the time comes. By the end of June I'll have served Central for just short of 10 and a half years. That makes me the second longest serving minister in the 160 year history of the congregation. That's kind of mind-boggling. To make it to Number One I'd have to be here 10 more years! That's mind-boggling too. And not realistic. No. The time has come. It's nothing more than that.