Fourth
Sunday of Easter
April
17,
2016
1
Corinthians 12:28
The
Lord Calls Pastors for His Church
In
the name of the Father and of the ☩
Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen!
I
got the phone call on a Wednesday night. It was Norm and he was
calling to tell me that this congregation, Gethsemane Lutheran
Church, was calling me to be her next pastor. Several weeks later on
a Sunday morning I announced to my congregation in Michigan and I
believe Norm announced to you that I had decided to accept the Call
to serve as Gethsemane's pastor.
What
happened in those weeks between that Wednesday night and that
Sunday morning? How does a pastor decide whether to stay at
his current congregation or leave to shepherd another flock?
First
of all, the Lord is the One who gives pastors to His congregations.
Secondly, the pastor has the responsibility to decide what to
do. And finally, the Lord will bless whatever decision is
made. That is His promise.
So
first of all, Jesus is the One who gives us pastors. Paul lays out
why Jesus sends out preachers clearly in Romans 10:
“Everyone
who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” How, then, can
they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they
believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear
without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless
they are sent? (Romans 10:13-15a NIV)
God
has placed in the church first of all apostles, second prophets,
third teachers. (1 Corinthians 12:28a NIV)
Jesus
places into His church apostles, prophets, and teachers. The apostles
and prophets speak to us still in the New and Old Testaments, which
collectively is Holy Scripture. Teachers in this context are the
pastors sent into the churches to explain that these Scriptures are
all about death and resurrection, above all, Christ's death and His
rising from death.
In
these days the Lord still creates life and little baby boys are born.
He gives them a family to take care of them and somewhere along the
way that boy grows up, after considering being a submariner, a
journalist, an electrician, settles on pursuing the office of holy
ministry. He wants to be a pastor.
In
our circles that young man goes to college, learns about people
through the study of history and philosophy, reading and discussing
literature. He studies foreign languages, bonds with his future
pastors, and through it all, receives the Lord's true body and blood
for the forgiveness of his many sins.
He
is graduated from college and moves on to the seminary, the school
for pastors. (Our seminary is in a town just north of Milwaukee.) He
learns more about the order Jesus gives to His pastors: to preach His
cross as the cause of salvation and the crosses of their
future parishioners as the results of salvation. He learns how
to teach, which is very different from preaching, but these two
skills are two sides of the same “hearing the message” that Jesus
gives through His pastors. Paul wrote:
Consequently,
faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard
through the word about Christ. (Romans 10:17 NIV)
The young man is graduated from the seminary and sent out by our national
church body to serve as a pastor of a congregation.
The
seen part of this sending is the calling body of our national
church body, the Wisconsin Synod. A group of 12 pastors who serve the
12 different regions of the United States gather every spring to pick
places to send these new pastors. And this year, on May 19, 2,000
people will gather in the seminary auditorium (with many more live
streaming) and hear where these men will be sent.
The
unseen part of this process is the work of God the Holy
Spirit. Our dear Lord, who is in control of all things for the
benefit of His baptized children, guides this calling process and the
Church trusts that the decisions made will be blessed by Him.
After
being sent out by the Holy Spirit through His Church, that summer
these new pastors and their families will move into their new homes
and new congregations. These men will be ordained as pastors in a
special church service, usually in July. Then they will begin
preaching and teaching.
For
a few pastors this new home is where they will spend 40 years taking
care of the souls of his people. Then he will retire and move away.
Then what?
The
church has to ask for a new pastor. The pastor who serves their
region of the country drives over and a special meeting is held. The
pastor has a list of four or five pastors in other parts of the
country, who are currently serving other churches. At the end of the
meeting, the men vote to call one of these pastors to be their new
pastor. Then someone from the congregation calls him and tells him
about their decision.
So
then the pastor has the responsibility to decide what to do. He has
to decide to stay or go. He will pray for guidance from the Lord, but
in the end, the decision is the pastor's.
Take
note: Just because something happens doesn't mean we can
say that it was “the Lord's will”. The Lord's will is revealed in
Scripture and the Scripture says nothing about the specifics of
Pastor Kookabura deciding to take a Call to Kokomo. The pastor should
not try to climb into God's brain to find out what God wants him to
do; rather the pastor will simply try to make the best decision
possible.
How
does he decide? What factors should he consider?
He
will look at his current Call to his current congregation and compare
that with the new Call to his potentially new congregation. Does he
have unfinished business in the current church, for example, a
building project that they are in the middle of? Will he be a pastor
working with another pastor at the new church? How often do the
different churches offer Services and Communion and Bible Study? How
do they bring new souls into the spiritual care of the congregation?
Is prayer in the home a priority or does more teaching need to take
place? Do they understand a broad understand of “evangelism” or a
narrow one? Is the church mindset interested in fitting in with the
culture or to the Lutheran Confessions? Do they even know what that
means?
But
along with these doctrinal and practical questions, there are other
questions that are just as important. Where would his kids go to
school? Where would his family live? How far away is the hospital,
dentist, grocery store, library, and post office? What does his wife
think he should do? His kids? His current members?
There
are hundreds of other questions to consider, but you can see that
deciding whether to take a Call to a new church is in many ways
similar to most other job offers. There are many practical questions
that need to be answered, many of the same questions that you'd ask
when weighing job opportunities.
One
difference is that with most jobs, you have to put your CV or resume
out to employers and then go and interview before they'll make you
an offer. And secondly, once the Call is sent to you, it's yours if
you want it. So in a way, you do the interview with the congregation,
the pastor, the president, the elders, and others after you
have the job. When you have a Call, you really have two jobs
simultaneously.
But
there is one question that makes this process, not more special, but
certainly unique: “Where can I do the most good for the Church, by
staying where I am or by accepting the Call that I have received?”
(Irwin Habeck, The Divine Call, 1974)
And
so after a period of conversation with those at the current
congregation and the new congregation (as a rule of thumb, usually
three to five weeks), the pastor makes his decision. As he announces
his decision, he is wise, as noted above, to leave out any talk of
his decision being the Lord's will. God did not whisper into his ear
and tell him what to do.
God
did, however, give him trust in the promises of Scripture and a sound
mind to make wise decisions. It can be tempting for a pastor who has
decided to move to the new congregation to place the emphasis that he
thinks this is what God wants him to do; it is wiser to simply make a
decision and take responsibility for it.
And
finally, the Lord will bless whatever decision is made. That is His
promise to His congregations and pastors.
This
unique process is something I am working through now. I have accepted
the Call to serve as your shepherd here at Gethsemane. I also have
the Call to serve as a pastor of Morrison Zion Lutheran Church in
Morrison, Wisconsin, a little south of Green Bay.
Trust
that our dear Lord will bless whatever decision I make, whether I
stay or go. I invite your questions and comments about this matter
and invite you to pray to the Lord to bless both Gethsemane and Zion congregations, their people, and their pastors.
One
last thing: at times congregations can think when a pastor says no to
the offered Call that they have done something wrong. Nothing could
be further from the truth! The pastor simply judged that his decision
was the best thing for him, his family, and his congregations.
No
matter what decision I make, I trust the Gospel will continue to
preached among you and the Lord's Supper offered for your comfort,
especially if I decide to stay.
God
made Him who had no sin to be sin for us,
so
that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. Alleluia! Amen!
2
Corinthians 5:21
