As we face the financial challenges mentioned yesterday, we need to explore the alternatives for presbyteries as they face the future. As a start to our conversation, I want to suggest four alternatives that I see for our future.
1. Presbyteries can try to communicate better with the churches about the importance of their work and seek more financial support. It is important to communicate what will be lost if we weaken the connectional system or if we can no longer afford to pay for an adequate staff.
2. We can cut staff back to the minimum. In a sense we would be returning to the pre-WWII days when there was a coordinator of the presbytery work. Much of that work centered around gate keeping — bringing pastors in and helping them leave. Presbytery also had a role at times of conflict to mediate between congregation and pastor. This approach requires a significant redefinition of the roles and expectations of presbytery staff.
3. We can identify some of the small churches who cannot afford a full time pastor and work with them in a shared call between the church and the work of the presbytery. This holds some significant benefits for these small churches because they would be getting a higher quality person to serve them on a steady basis. A challenge would be to be very intentional about the blocks of time allotted to the church, the presbytery, and personal time.
4. We could build on the success of the certified lay pastor program and look for some gifted retired folk who would see their work as pastor to the connectional work of the church. One CLP might see their ministry in working with presbytery youth programs, mission trips, and multi-church workshops to strengthen the educational ministry of our churches. Another CLP might help churches explore how they can work together in disaster relief, adult mission trips, prison ministries, work on college campuses, etc. A third CLP might focus on drawing together small group support for clergy and identifying topics where they can pool their educational money to bring in experts that interest them. A fourth ClP could work on developing the potential of churches working together in evangelism. The possibilities are endless and each successful ministry builds support for the presbytery as a whole.
Are there other creative responses to our new situation?
