Prayer and Preparation are Necessary Transitional Relationships.
I’ve been in a new city every Sunday so far since moving out to Iowa; but I have not allowed that to stop me from gathering with fellow believers on Sunday morning for church. In full disclaimer, I don’t enjoy finding a new church every week; and I don’t recommend it by any means because it’s easier to make it a habitual checklist item instead of a relationship building experience. As of next week, this weekly “church radar” will come to an end with a homebase more centrally located in my region. However, this morning I had the privilege to participate in a unique service that was not only powerful by its content but also by its culture and community.
This morning, I decided to attend Prairie Lake Church in Cedar Falls, Iowa; and it so happened that today was the start of a new chapter in the leadership of this church. The Senior Pastor was moving to more of a teaching role and the Executive Pastor of Leadership was stepping into the call of Senior Pastor of their network of churches. I’ve been through these types of services and transitions before so I thought it would be a standard “swearing in”; but this morning was vastly different than anything I had ever experienced. Typically, you will have the new pastor give a sermon before or after being commissioned by the elder board; and the service is typically short with at times a meal or dessert afterwards to celebrate.
In what seems like true Iowa fashion at this point, this service was everything to the contrary. The outgoing and incoming Senior Pastors jointly preached the sermon while telling the development of both the church and this transition in detail to the entire congregation. The outgoing Senior Pastor held most of the talking points to start which then morphed into a conversation between the two and then eventually transitioned fully to the incoming Senior Pastor for the last third of the sermon – a clear connection to putting our triune God at center of the transition. The service then concluded in a similar way than what I was used to with the elder board giving words of gratitude and prayer to both pastors – and their families – followed by a time of congregational prayer.
The crazy part is the entire service itself was centered in the overarching mission of the Church as a No Matter Church – “no matter who you are, where you’ve been, what you’ve done or what’s been done to you, God loves you, and you can always look for God at Prairie Lakes Church. This is a journey you can take even if you don’t have everything figured out.” They explained the very comprehensive process – both organizationally, spiritually, and missionally – with transparency around the many ups and downs they have faced and will likely face in this next chapter.
It was clear that prayer and preparation where key components of this transition; and it was clearer still that the relationship between these two men, the elder board, and entire church was stronger because of it. An amazing reminder to all of us that each transition – whether it be in leadership or season of life altogether – that prayer, preparation, and relationship building with God and others must be central to each transition. To that end, humility and wisdom must also be key components as without them chaos and division most often ensue as the guiding of the Holy Spirit is forgotten in our ego. Let us always keep pray, preparation, and God at the center of every transition and relationship of our lives.
