I’m glad you’re sitting down – this is a long one…
Sometimes I forget who actually reads my blog, so I start off this morning with an apology to my mother-in-law, Margie. She had to read about the hiring of the new youth minister because we hadn’t called her yet. (Me and my big mouth) We were going to call her the day after we found out, but wanted to talk to the Denver team first in case they had any answers for us. Somehow we got busy with getting ready for the winter retreat and forgot to call her at all. This wonderful lady wrote me a very encouraging email and told me to take three deep breaths and tomorrow would be fine. I am so blessed to have a good relationship with my husband’s parents! Not all of my friends have that luxury. Thank you God for Margie and Pete!
There also seems to be some confusion among a few other friends who have stopped by my blog. One thought we had already moved to Denver. So, let’s clear up the mystery. If you know me at all, you know I do my best to be forward and blunt, but with tact. I’ll do my best here too, but sometimes my feelings get the best of me and I talk before I think things through completely. If you have any questions at all, please click on my profile and it will take you to my email address.
Back in October we were asked to be part of a team that plants the Dry Bones ministry in Boulder, CO. We love this ministry and are a good fit for it, and we accepted. The next step was to tell our church and start raising our financial support. The elders immediately started their search for a new youth minister even though we told them it would probably take us a year to raise our full support, and we were hoping we could continue working for the church while raising support. Since then there have been many miscommunications and some hurt feelings on mine and Benny’s part because of how we and our situation were being handled. Before we could begin raising support, we needed a church to funnel the money we would have coming in and we asked our elders if they would do that temporarily until we get settled in Colorado, and they never said no directly, but kept telling Benny it would be better to find a church in Colorado to do that for us. The problem with that was that the churches in Boulder and Denver don’t know us yet. We felt like we were treated like we had given two weeks notice and now we needed to hurry up and move on. Meanwhile, in December, Perry, our DB Boulder team leader quit the ministry, leaving us with a closed door for going to Boulder. Here’s the kicker – we didn’t know he had quit for good until we made our trip to Colorado for a Dry Bones meeting a few weeks ago. Perry wasn’t returning our calls. We had to hear about it from the DB Denver team. We were left with no ministry to go to in Boulder and a job that was going to end soon in Kansas.
We met with the Denver team to discuss the possibility of training with them for a year so we could be the team leaders and plant DB in Boulder or some other city. That is one of the visions they have for the DB ministry and they would like us to be able to do that. But, (there’s always a but…) there are details that need to be worked out with their board of directors and the elders at the Lakewood church who oversees their work before we would be able to raise support and move there to join them in their ministry. They told us they’d try to let us know something by the end of January. The weekend before we went to Colorado, Westlink, our church here, brought in a couple to interview for our job. That’s the Sunday we had church at home, if you read that post:). The following Sunday while we were in CO, they brought in a second couple to interview. We knew it wouldn’t take them long to decide which one to hire. Last Thursday two of the elders called Benny and asked him to meet them at the church. They told him they had hired the first candidate and that he and his family would be here the middle of March, but they would pay us until the middle of May. They discussed a few other details about when Benny should have his office cleaned out so they could get it ready for the next guy, and wanted to know if we had heard anything from Denver yet, and that was it.
I have been doing my best to keep a positive attitude and trust in God, but I feel like somedays I fail miserably. One elder in particular has been pretty ugly to Benny for the past couple of months, and I was really hardening my heart toward him. I was mad and I didn’t even want to worship in the same building as him, so I decided I needed to confront him and get things worked out. I called him after church on Sunday and asked him to meet me so we could talk. He called another elder and we all met for about two hours. I was honest and forward, but I managed to remain calm and respectful. I didn’t even cry! (shocker) I told him exactly how I felt and what I thought. I asked him why he had such a problem with Benny, and the more he talked the more clear it became to me that there had been a major breakdown of communication between them a few months back. Neither one of them were listening or hearing the other one anymore even though they both thought they were. I also asked both men why the elders were in such a hurry to hire someone when we had told them how long it was going to take us to raise support. I told them people were asking us and we didn’t know what to tell them, and that it made us feel like they were in a hurry for us to move on, and we felt like they didn’t care about the position we were now in with no job anywhere after the middle of March. They said that wasn’t the case, and they felt they had to start looking for candidates because they didn’t know how long it was going to take to hire someone. But a minute later one of them said it has never taken them a long time and they’ve usually found someone within a few months, and that they pride themselves on never advertising and they do their search by word of mouth only.
I got their answer even though I don’t agree with it. I think they could have waited a couple of months before beginning the process since it doesn’t take them long to find their new youth ministers. I think the lack of a personal relationship with Benny kept them from wanting to wait to give us time to get our plans in order. I also think they view him as an employee, not as part of their flock. I feel like there should have been no hurry because we had told them we would stay until they found someone – we were not going to leave them with a huge gap of time between ministers, and we kept communicating with them about the changing plans as far as DB is concerned. Was I expecting too much from them? They had told us that they thought DB and Benny were a perfect fit for each other and that they could see the passion in Benny for DB. They told me Sunday that they want to support our ministry with DB, which I knew because the church has added us to the missionary list and pledged X amount of dollars to us per month. I don’t think I expected them to wait forever while we got our plans together, but I told them that they themselves knew that things like this take planning, prayer, and preparation, things they didn’t give us time to do. A few friends told us that our mistake was telling them so soon after making our decision, and that we should have waited until our plans were well under way. I still maintain that that would have been dishonest and we couldn’t very well be out there raising support behind the churches back! Also, we couldn’t have known that the Boulder thing was going to fall through. I was glad I met with those two elders and got things off my chest. I think I understand where they are coming from a little better and I still don’t agree with them, but I got what I came for…reconciliation with the elder I was hating, his acknowledgement of his treatment of my husband and a pledge of making the first move to try to make things right with Benny, their answer for the rush in the hiring of the new guy, and their assurance to me that they were not trying to kick us out the door.
So, we’re still waiting to hear from Denver and see where they’re at. Our job ends in March and our pay ends in May. Our townhome lease is up in April and we’re trying to decide what to do next. I remind myself daily that God promises us in His word that we don’t need to worry, He knows our needs. As we continue to make our plans for the future, we are dealing with some unhappy teens. Not only do they not want us to leave, it seems they liked the guy who didn’t get the job better than the one who did. We will do our best to encourage them to give him a chance, and to get things ready for him to take over where we left off. I hope he turns out to be exactly what this church needs. We’re moving to Colorado sometime in April, but we don’t know where or how yet. This whole daily trusting Him thing is NOT easy when things aren’t going as I’d like them to. I will continue to pray and ask for others to pray that we hear God’s voice through all of this, and that He meets our needs. That’s the scoop. Thanks for staying for the long haul!
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