Today I wanted to reflect on transition, which is something I have been dealing with heavily at the moment. It is with great sorrow and excitement, at the same time, that I will be leaving my two churches in Greensboro and will be appointed to a new church in Middle Tennessee. It is sorrowful because I love my churches here; the congregations at Moriah UMC and Holmes Grove UMC have taught me very much about God, ministry and the kingdom of heaven. It is exciting because I have been appointed to a wonderful church in Manchester, Bell Springs UMC, where God is clearly on the move in exciting ways, and the congregation has been cordial and welcoming.
I wanted to speak on some of the ways God has been at work as I begin to transition out of my current appointment. This is both to serve as a witness to God's magnificent graces and to uplift my brothers and sisters who are clergypeople who may be having a difficult time in their transitions. It is also so that my congregants at my current appointment know that even though we are going to miss one another dearly, that God is yet with us more than ever and will continue to sustain us as we move forward in time.
First, I have learned that there is no magical transition formula that we can follow as we transition out. Even though I have yet to fully experience even one pastoral departure, I can tell already that my experience will be very different from that of others around me. In fact, my departure will be different from my predecessors' departure, and the way that I need to respond to our churches' environment will be different from that of my successors' transitions in the future. We received, for example, a book from the conference on some best practices for transition. While it has served as great food for thought, there are many items in the book which either do not pertain to my unique environment, or would even be unadvisable. One critical distinction is that my churches have known the date of my departure since before my appointment, as I am a student pastor here serving one and two years at my two churches.
We must not think of transition as a recipe or formula because transitioning out of a congregation as pastor is not purely a bureaucratic or organizational event; United Methodist polity has deeply embedded within it a connectionalism that is tied directly to the concept that the church is the body of Christ. Transition is primarily God's doing, not our own doing, and is evidence of God's grace upon us and our churches. Transition can almost be considered a sacrament in that the transition is a unique opportunity for us to experience another dimension of God's grace, certainly in a way we do not experience when we are not planning or intending a pastoral transition. While we are deeply saddened by the departure of a pastor we love, or excited about the pastor we are receiving into the congregational life, God is allowed the unique opportunity to impact our lives in new ways. Through transition, we come to experience God's presence as we mourn, God's assurance as we are anxious, and God's grace as we turn a new page. Churches who do not experience pastoral transitions more than once per two generations are missing out on so much of God's graces brought to us by the change of the ecclesial environment. We miss out on all of the gifts our current pastors do not offer (as none of us has all of the gifts of the Spirit).
So this leads into my second point, that since transition is a unique time in which we have access to God's grace, transition must be given great attention both by the pastor and the congregation--not because we desire to maintain stability, but because we desire to focus on how God is moving and changing our direction before our very eyes. The books and articles that I have read on transitions get this terribly wrong--in fact, I have had both professors and mentors who insist that bringing change to a congregation in the first year is a particularly bad move. I argue that this is misled in that we are focusing too much on the activity of the pastor and not enough on the activity of God who reigns in our churches. Just like we claim to do in other times of the church, during a period of transition we must be open to the redemptive change the Holy Spirit is bringing about in our lives. If we were convinced that human beings had no need to be changed, no need to be sanctified and made holy through repentance, or "turning around", then we would claim a need for great stability and preservation of the status quo. But God has already determined that change is needed in the local church!! Why else would we need to experience transition?! So why do we freak out and insist on keeping everything the same for a year after arriving to a new church placement? Or have we cultivated churches who believe that "the way we do things around here" is the highest echelon of human evolution?!
Transition can "feel" bad, particularly when we love a church or a pastor deeply and do not want the transition to take place. Transition generates all sorts of anxieties, confusion, and other powerful feelings. As much as this is normal and healthy, we are capable of recognizing that sometimes God works through painful emotions to create even stronger, healthier Christians. It is not as if transition is inherently a "bad thing"; again, we Methodists believe in itinerancy as critical to maintaining a healthy connection of churches. In the same way as we do not always prefer to exercise, live within our financial means or endure a root canal, doing so almost always results in growth that strengthens us for the rest of our lives. In the same way, healthy transition can strengthen our church!!
So what would I call a "healthy" transition? To begin, recognizing the above facts about transition and focusing on God's activity in our midst is absolutely primary. My third point about transition is that, as God is using transition to initiate positive change in our churches, we must receive transition as a gift which we must properly steward in order to conform to God's purposes for it. I have never experienced transition discussed as a gift connected to stewardship, but I believe that it is the only natural conclusion we may draw that can help us handle our transitions in our churches, both exiting and arriving. Just as we have already affirmed that no two transitions are alike, and no "recipe" for transition exists that can be followed in all churches, we can use the theological concept of "stewardship" as a guideline for all of our transitions.
We Methodists live in covenant with one another that we will offer our "prayers, presence, gifts, service and witness" as a life offering to God and one another, stewarding our lives for the glory of God and the coming of the kingdom of heaven. Using stewardship language around transition will only help guide our actions properly as we interpret the specific situations we encounter in our localities. We will then think about how to properly administer our time and presence surrounding the transition; we will consider the role of vigorous and intentional prayer; we will not deny the use of financial and non-financial, tangible resources to guarantee smoothness in the move.
You might be reading this thinking, "we already do consider these issues around transition in our church/ministry!" I do not deny this! This article is not here to scold United Methodists for poor transition skills!! In fact, few denominations are as skilled as we are in ensuring faithful transitions, since we simply have a lot of experience in this area. But my prayer for this article is to provide more theological and practical language around the issue to help churches and pastors who are struggling in their current transitions. I know that for me, it can be daunting--if not frustrating--to find the perfect "formula" regarding the issue. I find peace when I consider that my transition is located in a particular time and space in God's creation, and that God has indeed already provided the tools for me to interpret God's activity, inviting me to faithfully respond in God's love and graces.
What is it about transition that makes it difficult for you to interpret the last two or three months you live out in a pastoral transition, whether you are clergy or laity? What is the most difficult part of experiencing transition for you, and what do you find most rewarding? Most importantly of all--and never let us forget to consider--where is God moving in this transition, and how can we plug into God's activity so that all of us are more faithfully responding in sync with the dance of the Holy Trinity, our God who is one in three and three in one?
