conjectural navel gazing; jesus in lint form

pastoral thinking: perception and ministry

Do not wait; the time will never be "just right." Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.
- George Herbert

One of the things that I would like to use this blog for is publicly reflecting on what it's like to be a pastor. I have mused about theology and politics. I have shared some of my own spiritual struggles. I have written about things that I do that some might consider unusual for a Baptist minister in some odd attempt to break some stereotypes. A Blueirishfolkgrass band? Playing in bars? Well, aren't I the maverick. It is to laugh. But I feel like I am skirting the topic somehow.

In alluding to what it's like to be a pastor, speaking all around it but not directly to it, I am confessing my own fears of being mistaken as critical of my churches if I speak of my struggles of being a pastor. I am confessing my fears of being perceived as naive if I speak of the beauty of pastoral ministry. Perception guides the small but public sphere of this blog. It just does. I have not been able to escape that. So, I figured I should talk about my own struggles with public perception.

It's silly, really. I cannot believe that I have to think about public perception. I don't think of myself as a public personage, but I am simply because I stand in two pulpits, engage in community conversations in Rogers Park and Wilmette. I meet people in my capacity as the ecclesial representative of two congregations. What I say matters because people allow it to matter. What I say has weight because people give it weight. My representative position carries a certain weight...and as such is a burden to me. It is an expected burden, but a burden no less.

Sometimes I am simply aware that I am perceived as young in one congregation and older in another congregation. I am aware that my hair is long. Yes, I have received some comments about my hair, but nothing horrible or convincing. It's just the lay of the land. Ask a female preacher about how she wrestles with other people's opinions about her appearance. It's really embarrassing stuff. Imagined and real public perception dictates much of how people live as Christians and participate in church life. And small things can have large consequences for some people.

Ministry is influenced by public perception. I am one of those people who is perhaps too sensitive to the perception of others. I can be a people pleaser. I can sometimes react to that aspect of myself by being contrary for the sake of mere shock value. It's absurd. And it is more complicated than that. I am aware, also, more and more that by accepting the mantle of pastoral ministry I have begun a "second conversion."

I know that is a strange thing to say. But I am aware that my own spiritual journey has shifted. I do pray that this is not the spiritual mirror to my other struggles. I pray that it is instead God working in me in spite of my struggles with aspects of ministry that can be unpleasant, in spite of the various iterations of public perception. God is asking me to reach deeper, to sit still longer, to pray more, to lean more on the Word, and to love more...to love all God loves as fiercely as God loves it.

Conversion, as I understand it, is continuous. It is not the fruit of a single moment. But there are moments, periods in life that suggest a more dramatic spiritual geography. "I have decided to follow Jesus." Those moments of decision, of revelation, of great intention or struggle are the geography of conversion. This shift for me, the last few years, have coalessed into what I am calling a second conversion.

I am being converted all over again. I am having to shift my own perception of what it means to follow Christ. The Spirit has compelled me to take another hard look at myself. I am a public person suffering under the "burden of perception." But, it seems, the only perception that matters is what God's. Does the Spirit perceive Gospel truth in my life?

I pray that the Spirit does. I need the Spirit's forgiveness when I fail. Scripture says I have it. And scripture says that I need forgiveness...the forgiveness of the Spirit and the continual forgiveness of the community if my salvation, my conversion, is to continue rightly. We are called to forgive one another, that without such a grace, God's grace is stymied.

I struggle with perception. I just want people to be happy. Sometimes I even want people to like me. Sometimes. But mostly, I cannot bear the disappointment of others, the sadness of others when their hopes are not actualized. I pray that God will give me the strength for those moments when I fail. I am assured that those moments will be frequent. I pray for forgiveness. I pray for patience. I pray for conversion.

Posted by tripp at July 25, 2007 07:02 AM