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When a Pastor Resigns, Then Sticks Around…
Orginally published on Thursday, September 20, 2007 at 5:26 AM
by Todd Rhoades
Great article by Bob Campbell over at the Baptist Standard website. He writes from the perspective of a pastor who has resigned his church, yet stayed on as an attender. Bob writes, "Two years ago, I retired from a large church in Houston after almost 15 years of pastoral service. The day I retired, I gave up my role as “pastor” of the church. I have elected to stay in the church with the many friends I made over the past 15 years. However, all of my friends will testify that I do not allow them to “talk” church business with me. I always refer them to the current leadership. Any member of the church will tell you that I have not said or done anything that could be construed as “pastoral” ministry in the church. I visit prospects as any member might. I never identify myself as the “former” pastor. No pastor can stay with a congregation he has pastored if he does not recognize that he no longer holds the office of pastor. I told my congregation I wanted to stay under the following self-imposed conditions:
• I will not perform any weddings or funerals of church members.
• I will not participate or criticize the business and ministries of the church or its pastoral leaders. (I do not attend any of the business meetings of our church.)
I have met our new pastor at his request and at the encouragement of the pastor-search committee. I assured him that he can count on my verbal support. I told him: “If I do not like what you are doing, I will pray. If I really, really do not like what you are doing, I will pray.” Why would anyone ever do anything else? I believe prayer is the most powerful action any Christian can ever take. Why would I resort to any other method of voicing my displeasure?
All ministers who resign must in actuality “genuinely resign” all duties and responsibilities of the position they are leaving. The new minister needs complete freedom to minister to any personal crisis in the congregation. This establishes his pastoral relationship to the membership. He will change things, because we must always look for better ways to communicate the gospel. He will cancel some programs or ministries I started. God bless him in following God’s will as he understands it.
If a former minister cannot let go, he should move far away from the church so that he will never be “tempted” to interfere. He should never go back to preach or speak, except at the personal request of the church’s current pastor.
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Predecessors are a sticking point in many churches because they just won’t/don’t let go. Yet Bob’s situation sounds at least somewhat healthy. What stories do you have to tell about good (or bad) predecessors. What worked well, and what didn’t work at all?
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There are 10 Comments:
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Posted by kent
Thursday, September 20, 2007 at 9:06 AM
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Thursday, September 20, 2007 at 9:33 AM
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Thursday, September 20, 2007 at 7:11 PM
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Posted by yellow croaker
Tuesday, April 08, 2008 at 12:25 AM
Post Your Comments:In my pervious church there was at one time 4 pastors who attended. Three of them had at one point served the church or a congregation very near us. When asked if I had a problem with that, I said no, not as long they remembered who got the pay check.
We’ve had no less than 3 previous pastors in our congregation. (1 who had been a pastor at our church)
ALL of them couldn’t seem to do this. One constantly competed to be the center of attention, to the point of even standing up and finishing off the sermon, if he got the chance… a real grand stander.
Another saw himeself as the great fixer of all things relational. Even though his own family was a mess and the rest of the church saw him as interfering and dare I say nerdy.
And the third stuck around or 6 months, telling all and sundry how he was gifted and wanted to preach too.
I think it is a rare person who can stay on at a church they have pastored and not interfere.
Ideally, we should be able to live with and learn from our retired pastors.
But we’ve already promised ourselves that when we retire (if we retire) we will move on, so as not to be a burden or interference, even unintenionally.
Our former pastor was here for over 20 years. I worked with him the last 10. He left to take a district position and the church elected me as the new pastor. While the former pastor wasn’t attending our church, he was the superintendant over it. For the first year to 18 months the former pastor had a very hard time letting go. He didn’t like some of the new methods that we as a church were using. For instance we used to be pretty formal in dress. We changed to casual and we had a banner on our church with a picture of jeans on them that said “church clothes”. The former pastor got a complaint or two and called and said I was to remove the banner or he would “come and tear it down himself”. I was so angry, but after praying about it I removed the banner. Not because I wanted to but I didn’t think this was the time to have that battle. Well I’m happy to say that after those 18 months or so passed, we were able to talk things through and we now have a good working relationship. And we are more progressive than ever!
I plan to work on a Sabbatical project called “The Fourth Quarter” which will consist of research about retiring pastors and the pastors who followed them in their ministries. With over 1300 pastors resigning the ministry each month, it tells me there’s a lot of confusion and concerns about this subject.
I’m in the “fourth quarter” of my ministry and want to finish well and leave the church with a smooth well planned transition for the future. It’s NOT my church - it belongs to GOD! I hope this can done here “decently and in order”....
Steve Keyes
I was very blessed to have the former pastor of my first church attending the church. He seems to be one of the exceptions to what we’ve seen above. He actually planted the church, pastored it for 20 years and then retired, and kept attending, along with his entire family (2 of his kids and grandkids), and a brother. If any situation was ripe for “former pastor” control, this was it - but it didn’t happen!
I was asked to be the bi-vocational interim pastor of this church (and this was my first pastoral experience) and he was a great help to me. He didn’t take over, he didn’t tell me what to do - he helped me by directing me to resources, lending advice (and it really was advice - not directives disguised as advice), and a great amount of open, public support. I was truly thankful for his presence there. He still remains an excellent example of a mentor in my memory. I know that he was the exception rather than the norm, so I wrote this to say, we all know it’s rare for this to be a good situation, but, “it can happen!!”
I served one church where two former pastors were still attending. The older of the two and his wife were wonderful friends and supporters. They went out of their way to make my wife and I feel welcomed.
I cannot say that about the other pastor and his wife. She never fully accepted the fact that she was no longer the “first lady” of the church (her words). And he loved the attention. Unlike Bob, he never turned down a funeral or wedding of a church member ... he would have never thought about deferring to me as pastor.
We tried to befriend this guy and his wife. I invited him to play golf with me. We had them in our home. But somehow someway they usually reminded us about how long they had served this church and how much they missed leading it. Our overtures of friendship were never returned.
This pastor and wife, unlike Bro Bob, would hold court with some church members and a staff member who had served with him about church matters in general and me in particular.
One issue that was a problem from day one was that two staff members who had served with this former pastor were never able to let go of this former pastor. And this former pastor never discouraged them ... he actually encouraged them!!
After I left this church, I got word that this former pastor actually lobbied to become pastor of this church again.
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It is interesting that the former pastor is so sure that he has not casued any problems, and maybe he has not. During my ministry and during my dad’s former pastor’s in the church is normally a dure way for trouble. However, these church were all under 200 and perhaps at a larger church it is easier for the former past to blend. Yet, of all my pastor friends who have had the former pastor remain the all have found it very hard to deal and all the former pastors think they are just helping.
All depends on the person who is a retired pastor they can be a blessing or a curse.
You will not perform any weddings or funerals of church members.
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