Diary of a Young Pastor

Ugh.  Politics.  An anonymous individual mailed this to select individuals:

To those interested in the future welfare of our District.  We have been made aware that Rev. David Emery now seems willing and open to be considered and nominated as a candidate for the open DS position.

Rev. Emery is greatly admired and we thought his willingness to serve would be of interest to many pastors and delegates in our district.

We want to make Pastors and delegates aware of his availability in order to let them know there is an alternative to the person that will be nominated by the DBA.

Rev. Emery has not asked for this endorsement and he is not aware that this mailing will be sent. Our desire is to have a level playing field for the election at District Conference.

This is a tragedy.  Here’s my reply that I attempted to send the address stated above:

To: ncwd4change,

I am extremely disappointed by the e-mail that was sent to many people in the West District for multiple reasons:

1st - your unwillingness to sign your name to your ideas.  A grass roots movement happens from time to time, and that is ok.  But, mass mailing people with a personal agenda needs to be just that - personal.  I think that sending an anonymous e-mail of this nature is extremely rude and inconsiderate of everyone involved - the recipients, David, and especially Jerry.  Be a man (or woman), and stand behind what you are saying instead of hiding behind an address.

2nd - sending this type of mail is unfair for Jerry.  David has every right to allow his name to come up from the floor and delegates have the right to nominate him, and vote for him.  However, Jerry is the only one of the nominees who has gone through the process, and an attempt to undermine him in this manner is despicable.

3rd - sending this e-mail is unfair to David.  What was said, overheard, or assumed by you or your colleagues was obviously not intended for public consumption as David has not made any of these feelings public.  You’ve already undermined the trust of the one you are trying to get into office.

4th - this type of politicking is only destructive to the district.  We need to be men and women of God who are holding ourselves to the highest level of integrity.  Already, other pastors and districts are aware of this “campaign”, and I can only imagine what it makes them think of us (hint: not good things).

Let’s be a people of God, not of politics.  Step up.  Shape up.  If you really want to change this district - please, let it begin with you.

Matthew D. Tietje

5763 Rainhill Church Rd.
Morganton, NC
h: 828.584.8444
c: 828.403.8705

To add to the cowardice, the address was not accepting incoming mail.  Here’s what I received:

ncwd4change@gmail.com, it’s time to shape up. Seriously.

~pastor matt

One Memorial that had me concerned was number 325 - Executive Session for Local, District and General Boards and Committees.  It can be summarized by this direct quote from the memorial:

All meetings and sessions of boards and committees elected or appointed by the local church conference or by the local board of administration are executive session, except for non-members or guests who are specifically invited by the chair to attend as observers or as resource persons to provide information or expert advice helpful to the consideration or conduct of church business.

I wasn’t quite sure why this Memorial was even discussed, let alone recommended…we are already allowed to call an “Executive Session” under the current ruling of the Discipline.  Why promote more secrecy, and take away the ability for the people to be informed about the decisions and rulings of the church?  And should our church’s “celebration committee” (a committee established by the Local Church Conference) be sworn to total secrecy (I can see it now…”If I told you what activities we were having at our harvest festival…I’d have to kill you…”)?

~pastor matt

What an interesting week this has been - it is the first time in my life I haven’t been at the Wesleyan General Conference.  It is also the first time that General conference has been held while I am an acting pastor in the Wesleyan Church.  This week, some interesting things happened:

• Joanne Lyon elected GS - I am so excited about this!  With as much emphasis as our district puts on women in ministry, I can only see this as a good thing.  I’m thankful for her work for the church in the past, and am excited to see how her work as GS goes.  I have no doubt that she will do a great job and raise the bar for our other GS’s.

• Memorial 567 passed giving the Wesleyan Church a historic stand on an extremely important social issue: immigration.  I believe I called this during my sermon at the Mountain Area Camp Meeting.  Sadly, I don’t have an official copy of what the memorial says, but I believe the gist of it is that we now take a stand in defense of an illegal immigrant seeking to become legalized, and that the process for legalization, with its waiting periods and huge financial setbacks, are immoral.  I call this “historic” because we haven’t taken a stand on a social issue of this magnitude since our stance as abolitionists during the civil war.

UPDATE: Thanks to Darrin (see: comments), I’m pleased to give you the actual immigration statement:

• Memorial 103 passed which will “demote” a church from “established” to “developing” if the church has no evangelistic program and/or has failed to report a convert in the past 2 years.  I have mixed feelings about this one.  I like it because it pushes me as a pastor to seek evangelism, and encourages the people to be involved…but I’m worried about the “measuring rod” of salvation.  What is considered a convert?  A new convert?  A restored convert?  I’ll probably write an entire post addressing my feelings on this later — to much to say right now.

• Memorial 102, which changes the amount of covenant members needed to be considered an “established” church from 12 to 25, passed. And, in doing so, my church at its current state with 17 covenant members will drop from “established” to “developing”.  I see this as a mostly good thing.  In my eyes, this is the Wesleyan Church moving away from a “small-church” model to a “big-church” model, which - in this pastor’s humble opinion - is a good thing.  However, I’m not sure about how my people will feel on this one.

When it is all said and done, I believe that biblical based decisions were made at General Conference ‘08.  And, as a pastor, how can I argue with that?

More later.

~pastor matt

p.s. - here’s to hoping that I will be a delegate in 4 years….:)

Every year, pastors in the Wesleyan church are asked to fill out a minister’s report.  One question that always gets me is, “How do you rate your loyalty to your district?”  Many of you already know, I’m a pastor in the NC West District, and for the past 3-6 years, I have not felt very loyal to my district.  I addressed this with the following remarks.  For some of you, this may not be very interesting, but I want to post it anyways.

Last year (2006-07 district year) I stated in my Minister’s Report that it was frightening to be a pastor in this district because this district is quite unsupportive to its pastors.  I was somewhat encouraged last year when I received a call from the District Superintendent who, during the phone conversation, addressed this remark.  He reassured me that, indeed, the district was supportive of its pastors, but as the 2007-2008 church year has come and gone, I have continued to see my fellow pastors treated wrongly by this district and its leadership.

I’ve seen the people of some congregations become hostile towards their pastor and force him out the doors with many months of the church year left.  In doing so, this church (and it isn’t limited to one) has left not just the pastor, but the pastor’s spouse and even his children without a place to go, a place to live, or any means of support.  And meanwhile, our leadership seems to throw up their clean hands - much like Pontius Pilate - unwilling to step in and defend their pastors because of the risk of becoming unpopular among the people.

This criticism may sound harsh - and, I do realize that I don’t know every intricate detail of every situation in the district - but when my criticisms are confirmed year after year, I feel I have the responsibility to answer the question of district loyalty as honestly as possible.  And, honestly, I am not comfortable being a married pastor in a district were I risk my (and my family’s) safety and livelihood at the drop of my congregation’s proverbial “hat”.

I think that this could, one day, be a great district in which to be a pastor, but until there is leadership that refuses to sit at the sidelines while its pastors are fighting a battle - it is a frightening place for me to be.

I had the pleasure of going to see The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspain with my brothers today, and I want to share my thoughts on the movie by sharing my likes and dislikes.

Likes:

• First, I liked the fact that this film was quite a bit more gritty and dark than the first.  This, in my opinion, made the story seem more “real”.
• I liked the fact that this movie dealt with the nature of humanity and incorporated fantasy, instead of dealing with fantasy and incorporating humanity.  Does that make sense?  It could just be the differences in the subject matter of the books.
• I liked the fact that this movie is based on one of the “non-defining” books.  Meaning, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the defining classic of all things Narnia.  Fans of the series (me) know that book from front to back.  Its story is legendary in our minds - and as a result, you are not allowed (in the minds of the fans) to mess with it.  During L,W&W, I cringed every time the story deviated from the story line in the book.  But in Caspian, I was much more tolerant and forgiving of the liberties taken in the story.  I can only assume that this is because the story is not as cemented in my brain.  It was enjoyable to be able to think, “Well, that wasn’t in the book….but I can see why they put it in the movie,” instead of, “WHY DID THEY DO THAT!!”
• The three older Pevensie’s were allowed to act more grown up.  In L,W&W, Skandar Keynes grew up a lot from the beginning of production to the end, but his character (Edmund) wasn’t allowed to.  There were some scenes where it was obvious that we were watching an older Keynes playing a younger Edmund.  In Caspian, his character was allowed to be older, which made the acting much more believable.
• I applaud Andrew Adamson’s decision to give Susan a much more active role in the movie.  Her character was tough, and to re-use some adjectives, gritty and “real”.  This may be my “Wesleyan-ness” coming out.

Dislikes:

• Caspian’s character development could have been better.  This is a Disney movie, after all, and don’t they like to play up characters whose parents have died (see: Cinderella, Bambi, Nemo & every other movie…).
• The “Lucy sees Aslan” scenario was always vital for me in the book.  I feel like they severely underplayed that part.
• William Moseley looks freakishly like Keira Knightley.  That was a bit of a distraction.

Conclusion:

In my opinion, the likes dramatically outweighed the dislikes.  I really, really enjoyed Caspian and left with a completely different feeling than when I left L,W&W.

Your thoughts?

~Pastor Matt