nakedpastor

Pastors burn out. Communities of faith disintegrate.

So… pastors relax! It is wise for pastors to resist pressures to be something they are not. Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest! Pastors: rest! No longer comply to what others think you should be or what you yourself think you should be. You’ve been called just as you are to be exactly who you are. Relax. Rest in that.

Pastors, conversely: let your people relax. Let them rest. Do not ask them to be something they are not. Resist shaping them. Relieve them of all expectations. Let them come in and go out and find pasture. Do not make them more weary than they are. Do not lay one demand on their shoulders. They have divine permission to gather just as they are. Do not try to manipulate them into what you think they should be or what your tradition thinks they should be. Let them relax.

People, resist all pressures to become something you are not. Even if you are weary and heavy laden, still find the strength to be exactly who you are. Do not be condemned. Do not even judge yourself! You’ve been called just as you are to be exactly who you are. It is you that is loved, not the ideal you, but you… right now. Rest in that reality.

People, resist all temptations to wish your pastor to be something she is not. You’ve been brought together. Let your pastor rest. Do not try to shape him. Do not lay expectations or demands on her shoulders. Let him discover what it means for him to be a pastor in this particular situation. She may be weary or heavy laden. Do not pressure her. Enjoy the gift of each other’s company.

I am convinced that if we lift our expectations off of one another, our faith communities will become healthier places, composed of healthy pastors and healthy members. Burn out and disintegration will decrease.

Let me think out loud for a minute. When people gather together in community around a commonality*, the potential for it to be overtaken by the principalities and powers is immediate. This is what we must constantly wrestle against. There is the temptation for my community identified as Rothesay Vineyard identifying with the principality called “Rothesay Vineyard”, which is the composite of all human and angelic desires, wishes, agendas and expectations for Rothesay Vineyard. There is the even broader danger of us identifying with the principalities called “Vineyard”, “Church” and “Christian”. It is most difficult for a community to simply be a gathering of people without the pressure of ideals being pressed upon it. I consider it injurious to our community to imagine what this community should be. I regard it toxic to communal life to impose upon it my plans or goals. Vision corrupts the community that is. To even talk in passionately imaginative ways about what our community could be feels adulterous to me. It perverts love into fantasy. The principalities and powers, like in every other age, are presently in full swing. These things need to be discerned. Why? Because they appear brilliant and good to the contemporary mind. But they have one purpose, and that is first to oppress, then to possess, then to ultimately deliver death to the person and to the people.

*I realize this isn’t a word, but I invented it to describe something around which a community agrees, whether it be marriage, family, religion, belief, faith, politic, capitalism, etc., etc..

The other day I received an email from someone asking how I would recommend incorporating the arts into the church and what steps could be taken. While I believe the question is one motivated by genuine concern, the only intelligible answer that might satisfy is one that must be given within the programatic and institutional paradigm within which the question was asked. This is the problem. The question exposes the paradigm and presses for an answer that conforms to that paradigm. We must realize that the question rarely reaches beyond itself. The question normally asserts its present paradigm and is usually a dogmatic statement seeking confirmation disguised as intellectual interest. The questioner may be trapped inside a paradigm that the mind hasn’t dreamed must perish.

So the normal way to answer the question would be something like this:

First of all, get permission from the leadership to start encouraging the arts. Then maybe start an art appreciation class. Then maybe an art instruction class. Ask the pastor if creative elements can be added to the church service. This will involve some “creative types”. Request that the leaders allow art to be displayed in the lobby. Set up an editorial committee that determines which art is appropriate for church. Etc., etc..

Just shoot me! Let me show you a better way. The church is generally a censorious community. In this environment art is sanitized, tame and conformist. It is still art, but functions as a reinforcement of the system. Expression is controlled and edited from start to finish. This kills art because it kills creativity because it kills freedom. Instead, allow people to be free without scrutiny. (I even hate the word “allow” because it assumes it needs to be given when it is already ours.) In due time, after people begin to realize that they are loved and accepted unconditionally, the creative spirit will surface and artistic diversity will abound. This is the harder but more genuine way. It means taking care of the roots. If the root is unfettered freedom, then fruitful and artistic living happens. It is the diversity of human expression of personality that makes the artful life. Until this is nurtured art will be repressed.

The fine art photograph titled “Fusion” is the creation of my friend Howard Nowlan.

This is a watercolor piece I did: 20″x30″. It is Illustration Friday’s submission this week for the theme: “electricity”.

I take no credit or praise for my community. Any credit or praise belongs to the community itself. I have built nothing. I have constructed nothing. I have succeeded in doing nothing. I have grown nothing. In fact, I make it my purpose to not build anything with these people. What I have around me is a community of people who willingly and voluntarily desire to be in relationship with each other and to gather together. Ephesians 4: 3 says to “keep the unity of the Spirit“. Unity, or community, is not something we have to build, but keep. I therefore see my primary task as preventing obstacles and barriers from interfering in this reality. I’m a weeder. When I think of it, my activity as a pastor is negative, as non-activity. It is to prevent interference, remove obstacles, clear impediments and reject deterrents to unity and community. It is so popular now to have the excessive baggage of plans, visions, goals, renewal, and programmed growth, that true authenticity and true community is difficult if not impossible. What I try to nurture is an environment free of restrictions to the unity that is already ours. This means free people gathering freely in the reality of freedom. Why complicate it?

I am confident that as the weeds are kept at bay, fruit will grow in individuals and in the community. But this is not my doing. We could go further with the analogy to say that good teaching and life experience is fertilizer, but I wanted to try to communicate what my strategy is for pastoring a healthy community. It is anti-strategy. It is to not include, assimilate or integrate strategies to create, erect, build or grow something. It is free, I hope, of my ambitions, goals, visions or desires for these people and this community. My only desire is for them to be free, and free to experience the unity that is theirs. And in that freedom is their possibility for a fruitful life. This is not radical. It is anti-radical. Perhaps you can see this? It is difficult to articulate.