By Maureen Wright
This week, the Synod of the Trinity hosted a Committee on Ministry/Committee on Preparation for Ministry gathering over two days. Three staff members from the Office of the General Assembly and the Church Consultant from the Board of Pensions who serves most of the Synod led workshops designed to help presbytery leaders. Each day began with a devotion. This morning, the Synod Stated Clerk, Michael Wilson, reflected on Luke 10: 1-11 and 17-20. This passage focuses on Jesus’ appointing and sending out 70 leaders. In the story, we overhear Jesus training the leaders, offering them instruction. Jesus tells the 70 to say to those they encounter, “The kingdom of God has come near to you.” (See verse nine.) Later, the 70 return with joy. Dr. Wilson considered the experience of sessions and Presbyteries who do not know from where their leaders will come and our shared experience of praying and asking God to send leaders – ruling elders and pastors.
Jihyun Oh, Director of Mid Council Ministries for the Office of the General Assembly, led the group to think about Options for Congregational Leadership. She started with the question what does congregational leadership look like now? This question challenged us to expand our thinking. I am pleased to say that the Presbytery of West Virginia is engaged in nearly all of the models of leadership presented. While many of us still struggle to leave behind the assumption that the “best” model of pastoral leadership is a minister for each church, there is a richness and depth to matching the pastoral leadership model to the needs of churches, including installed pastors, temporary pastors, commissioned pastors, and ministers of other denominations, including full communion partners. There is strength in merged congregations, federated congregations, congregations sharing pastoral leadership, and parishes. The one thing needed for all congregational leadership is… leaders. One of the slides of the presentation asked, “How are you identifying leaders within your presbytery?”
As those gathered discussed the challenges of finding pastoral leaders both within congregations and within the Presbytery, Synod of the Trinity Executive Forrest Claassen shared the story of his grandfather’s small rural church. The church chose its leader from among its ruling elders by lots. “They drew straws every year, and the one who was chosen was elder of the year.” (Whether it is a result of drawing straws or not, I think that many of you in small churches can identify with this.)
All of this has left me thinking about how the Presbytery of West Virginia identifies leaders. The Presbytery offers training for Authorized Lay Preachers and Commissioned Pastors through its ALP/CP Training Program and Presby Prep. Susan Sharp Campbell, Associate for Educational Ministry, works with several of the Presbytery committees to offer Officer Training and training for those seeking to be authorized to serve communion in their churches of membership. One-day events to deepen leadership skills are offered through the Ministry Toolbox courses on topics such as church vitality, preaching, and pastoral care. An annual retreat is planned for pastoral leaders. The Committee on Ministry and the Vocations Committee work to assist churches with pastoral leadership. The Committee on Representation seeks to identify leaders who are willing to serve on Presbytery committees as well as representatives to the Synod of the Trinity and General Assembly.
All of these opportunities have a single common denominator: people – people who confess Christ as Lord and Savior and are joyfully committed to leading the people of God in our presbyterian community. As I have written in other newsletter articles, the Presbytery of West Virginia is in transition. The Presbytery is on a journey from where it has been and what we know to the unknown. Our work is to leave behind our old ways of doing and being the church, to reflect on the deeper questions of our identity, purpose, and future. In other words, we are seeking to discern who God is calling us to be and what God is calling us to do now. An important part of this transition is to think about how we identify leaders in our Presbytery. Who will lead us to be what God is calling us to be and who will steer us to what God is calling us to do? I invite all of us to spend some time with the passage from Luke. Are there people in the Presbytery who need you to ask, “Have you thought about serving on a Presbytery committee?” Is there someone who needs you to say, “I think you have the gifts needed to serve as a Commissioned Pastor”? Who needs to be invited to step into a leadership position so that they may grow into the person God is calling them to be? Who needs you to share that the kingdom of God has come near? I encourage all of us to be a part of identifying Presbytery leaders. I would love to have so many leaders that we wonder how we will use all of them to do God’s good work in the Presbytery of West Virginia!