Doctor Of Divinity
Stories
Scenes of Glory
Subplots of God's Long Story
Object:
Emphasis or special occasion: Seminary Sunday, Ordination, or Installation of Pastor
Chapter 34
Doctor Of Divinity
1 Peter 5:1-4
"Pastors have a particularly difficult set of heartaches, because you must keep confidences, which means you can't reveal the horrible things people have said to you, or sometimes what they've done to you. I'm sure you've been instructed about confidentiality in your classes. I suggest that you maintain confidentiality even beyond the death of those whose confidences you keep."
The Reverend Alexander Curry was addressing the graduating class of his alma mater. One hundred eight seminary students sat row upon row before him. Few knew him personally. Most understood that he wasn't a particularly successful evangelist, powerful preacher, renowned scholar, or prophet for Christ's church. But over the course of his ministry he'd managed to raise more money for the seminary than almost any single person -- therefore, the honorary Doctor of Divinity Degree granted him today and his speaking to the graduates.
On the podium sat Dean Landsdorf, a psychosomatic barometer of everything that happened during the graduation ceremonies. He was a pastor before returning to teaching and his was always a pastor's heart. His head was already cocked slightly to the side as if to ask: Is this what graduates need to hear -- heartaches and confidentiality?
"Some of your parishioners will demand worship be exactly the same as or exactly the opposite of the way they imagine worship was when they were children," Alexander Curry said. "Some will request worship be a Broadway musical or a Bach recital. Some of your parishioners will expect sermons that inform them about only arcane subjects such as what happened to the Hittites. A few will demand the thinnest of moralistic broth for a sermon. Others would substitute for a sermon a chat, group therapy, drama, or dance."
The dean shifted uncomfortably in his chair as though he didn't need his entire faculty riled by a series of insults.
"I'd like you to ask yourselves," Alexander Curry said, "how do you face a congregation Sunday after Sunday when you can't please everyone, when people resist the ministry you believe you are called and gifted to do, when the heartaches accumulate? How do you make your calls when you're numb from struggling against inertia, not to mention sin, in your congregation? Sin does await you there. All kinds of neuroses wait to focus upon you as a religious authority and to punish you for how a parishioner was or wasn't treated in childhood. How will you counsel and encourage others when you're a magnet for the anger that can't be safely aimed at anyone else, because anyone else would fight back? You'll get used to hearing, 'Pastor, a few of the members are saying....'
"I ask you again, if no one has asked you before and if you haven't asked yourselves: How will you continue Lord's day after Lord's day, Easter after Christmas, living and telling the good news of Jesus Christ to people, of whom some will hurt you -- in ways that range from merely erasing a smidgen of your religious dignity to butchering your career?"
Dean Landsdorf lifted his head from his hands, as if thinking, well, maybe he's arrived at something worth saying.
"I won't answer that question," Curry said from behind the lectern, "but I'll tell you about one pastor. Although I'm much concerned with confidentiality, I'll report what happened to this pastor a long time ago and in a different denomination. We'll call him Pastor Michael."
* * *
Michael had served in his first pastorate at St. John's for six months when he walked into the sanctuary one Tuesday morning to find a parishioner standing, fists upon his hips. He swung toward Michael with a giant smile and said, "Pastor Michael, I just retired. What can I do for the church?"
As Michael put it, no loose cannon in a storm ever inflicted more damage upon the deck of a ship than did this man in this congregation. Michael felt guilty about him, because he and his wife referred to him as "Just Great Gary." Gary would meet you anytime, anywhere with a broad smile that broadcast trouble to anyone who could decode superficiality. Ask him how he was and he'd give that smile and say, "Just great. Just great." Michael's wife, Charlene, said that if Gary really was feeling good, he'd tell you three times instead of twice.
Gary told Michael that he'd owned a successful business, was an excellent administrator, and was expert at getting the most from employees. The church board made him chair of the personnel committee.
A few weeks later, Gary was sitting in the secretary's office doing an abbreviated time and motion study. Michael stepped in and felt the tension immediately.
"We're tightening up some work routines here, pastor," Gary said. "Straightening a few procedure lines. In a couple days, Winifred and I'll have streamlined the office into the twenty-first century."
Gary laughed toward Michael, but Michael scrutinized Winifred. He could sense annoyance and insult radiating from her. Just Great Gary came back daily for a week. Winifred began protesting to Michael the third day and by the end of the week was threatening to quit. Michael tried to ignore the severity of the situation and encouraged Winifred to try to learn from Gary, but Winifred complained to the board. The board got Gary to back off a little, but Winifred quit within a year. Michael began the difficult training of a new secretary, more difficult because Winifred quit not only as secretary but also as a church member.
Gary insisted that he take part in training the new secretary, since he could help on some "big picture stuff" about why to be a secretary. This secretary lasted four months. Michael anticipated a revolving door of secretaries, but the third secretary surprised him by staying. She was probably the most incompetent secretary ever to lick a stamp, but she was as impervious to criticism as she was to training. She was also the daughter of the church's largest donor, and no one even considered firing her. After two months of sporadic attempts, Gary gave her up as a lost cause and turned his energy in another direction: sermon critique.
Sunday at the sanctuary door after worship, Michael was shaking hands as people left. Just Great Gary came by, smiling. He shook Michael's hand a little too long saying, "Your second point was feeble. You know: 'When an argument is weak, shout like blazes.' " And he smiled. Michael was bothered, but thought he should let such things go. The following Sunday, there was Gary smiling after worship, "Your final illustration didn't quite fit the conclusion. It needed more snap."
All week, Michael dreaded Sunday. The next Sunday, however, Gary just smiled at the door and Michael thought he'd graduated from sermon boot camp. But that week Gary ambled into Michael's office, sprawled on a chair and said, "Thought maybe we'd talk about next Sunday's sermon."
"Next Sunday's sermon?"
"You need some help. Here." He handed Michael two pages, typed, single-spaced. "Here are some thoughts to consider for next Sunday's sermon."
"But Gary, I've got my texts planned three months ahead."
"Well, I'm here from the congregation to tell you to switch your plans so when you speak, your listeners don't mentally wander. See?"
At about this time Gary began, as he put it, encouraging the choir director, monitoring the treasurer's accounting system, and adjusting the janitor's schedule, and Michael realized what a bind he was in. As obnoxious as Gary seemed on the surface, something even deeper was beginning to erode the spiritual health of the St. John's congregation. Michael had been counseling Gary's wife, Doris, who over the years only attended worship when Gary did, and that wasn't often. She never talked much when Gary was around. Doris confided that she and Gary had quarreled for months. It took Michael a while, but he finally deduced that another woman he was counseling -- a much younger woman -- was having an affair with Gary.
Michael couldn't share what he knew. Except the few things he could tell Charlene about Gary's bull-in-a-china-shop management skills and his constant criticism of the sermons, Michael couldn't even hint to her why he was now edgy all the time. Michael contacted his district superintendent and acknowledged that he was in far over his head.
His district superintendent agreed that Michael didn't deal well with conflict and didn't have the skills to outmaneuver Just Great Gary. In June, the district superintendent moved Michael and Charlene to a congregation at the other end of the conference and basically gave them a chance to start over in the pastorate. The district superintendent then demonstrated that God had placed him in the right position in the church. He sent a new pastor to St. John's, a second-career pastor who'd formerly owned a business. Sparks flew in his first few months there; but, the new pastor reported that, after some initial resistance, control of the congregation was wrestled from Gary. Gary had some accompanying marital problems, but the new pastor reported that this seemed within acceptable limits. St. John's was able to turn its energy away from Gary and back into ministry.
Michael and Charlene also did well in their new congregation and were there six or seven years, when Charlene suffered severe abdominal pains. The diagnosis of cancer was swift, as was the surgery. She was, by her own estimate, back to 80% horsepower within a few months. Nine weeks after her operation, Gary and Doris phoned Charlene that they were coming to town and wanted to stop by. Charlene was still shaky, but they agreed on a time and she phoned Michael so they could all have coffee together.
Michael was home to greet them. Gary bowed his head slightly as he walked through their front door, and he didn't give his "Just Great" answer when Michael asked how he was. "Fine," he said, and his smile wasn't as full as usual. Doris wore a bright, red dress and chattered about how splendid the weather was for a drive.
Once they were seated, Gary cleared his throat. "Pastor Michael, I ... ah, we, wanted to come when we heard that Charlene had been ill."
Fortunately, he turned toward Charlene as he spoke her name, because if Gary had spoken directly to Michael, Michael wouldn't have known what to say. Charlene spoke a polite and appreciative, "Thank you, Gary. Thank you, Doris."
"And," Gary said, turning to Michael, "I appreciate the time you spent with me at St. John's. I'm thankful you were our pastor through a season that was difficult for both of us. Doris and I are better now, and we each owe you a lot. We decided if we were grateful, we'd better come tell you, especially now. And we needed to tell you we're praying for you both."
"Thank you," Charlene said again, "but I'm afraid my condition was exaggerated when reported to St. John's."
"That's okay with us," Doris said, "Gave us good reason to stop and see you."
They stayed about 45 minutes. The good-byes were pleasant. After Gary and Doris were out the door, Michael and Charlene just stood looking at one another, smiling.
* * *
"Graduates, you are already my brothers and sisters in Christ. Most of you will soon become my colleagues in the pastoral ministry. Problems await you there that you won't be able to fix. You'll get blame and credit that you don't deserve and, if you try to get things done for our Lord Jesus instead of being custodian of a religious museum or director of a religious social club, sometimes you'll receive more blame than credit. Yet, by being faithful, by trying, by being a presence for Christ, something happens, something that after a number of years you can smile about.
"Why would anyone enter such a profession and how could anyone remain in such a profession, unless they possessed some gruesome instinct that made them enjoy suffering? It won't be the salary! You'll need more than sincere motives, good citizenship, and civilized tolerance. You'll require something beyond a solid seminary education and support from colleagues and denomination. You must believe with all your heart that our Lord Jesus suffered for us and still does and that his suffering for us and rising to new life for us is worth all our life in response. Christ's ministry wasn't easy. Our ministry on his behalf isn't easy; but in the end, serving our Lord Jesus Christ is worth more than anything else.
"Receive these words from the apostle Peter's first letter, chapter 5, verses 1-4: 'Now as an elder myself and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as one who shares in the glory to be revealed, I exhort the elders among you to tend the flock of God that is in your charge, exercising the oversight, not under compulsion but willingly, as God would have you do it -- not for sordid gain but eagerly. Do not lord it over those in your charge, but be examples to the flock. And when the chief shepherd appears, you will win the crown of glory that never fades away.' "
As the Reverend Alexander Curry, Doctor of Divinity, stepped away from the lectern, Dean Landsdorf was first on the podium to stand and join the graduates, clapping with all his might.
Discussion Questions
1. What immediate responses do you have to the story?
2. Do you identify with a character in the story? If yes, how and why do you identify with the person? If no, why don't you identify with anyone in the story?
3. Would you like to have a conversation with a character in the story? What would you say, ask, or suggest to the person? Why?
4. How does the story bring the biblical text into a clearer focus for you?
5. How would you improve or modify the story? Why?
6. Has God surprised you by bringing health into the lives of others whom you hadn't been able to help?
7. Have you experienced a failure that proved, in the long run, not to be as tragic as it first seemed?
8. If you addressed seminary graduates, what would you tell them from your experience in the Christian faith that would help them remain faithful to Jesus Christ?
9. What further depths of meaning, symbols, connections with, or applications of the biblical faith do you find in the story?
10. Since Jesus Christ has risen from the dead and is alive among us through his Holy Spirit, what of this story would you like Christ to activate in your life?
Chapter 34
Doctor Of Divinity
1 Peter 5:1-4
"Pastors have a particularly difficult set of heartaches, because you must keep confidences, which means you can't reveal the horrible things people have said to you, or sometimes what they've done to you. I'm sure you've been instructed about confidentiality in your classes. I suggest that you maintain confidentiality even beyond the death of those whose confidences you keep."
The Reverend Alexander Curry was addressing the graduating class of his alma mater. One hundred eight seminary students sat row upon row before him. Few knew him personally. Most understood that he wasn't a particularly successful evangelist, powerful preacher, renowned scholar, or prophet for Christ's church. But over the course of his ministry he'd managed to raise more money for the seminary than almost any single person -- therefore, the honorary Doctor of Divinity Degree granted him today and his speaking to the graduates.
On the podium sat Dean Landsdorf, a psychosomatic barometer of everything that happened during the graduation ceremonies. He was a pastor before returning to teaching and his was always a pastor's heart. His head was already cocked slightly to the side as if to ask: Is this what graduates need to hear -- heartaches and confidentiality?
"Some of your parishioners will demand worship be exactly the same as or exactly the opposite of the way they imagine worship was when they were children," Alexander Curry said. "Some will request worship be a Broadway musical or a Bach recital. Some of your parishioners will expect sermons that inform them about only arcane subjects such as what happened to the Hittites. A few will demand the thinnest of moralistic broth for a sermon. Others would substitute for a sermon a chat, group therapy, drama, or dance."
The dean shifted uncomfortably in his chair as though he didn't need his entire faculty riled by a series of insults.
"I'd like you to ask yourselves," Alexander Curry said, "how do you face a congregation Sunday after Sunday when you can't please everyone, when people resist the ministry you believe you are called and gifted to do, when the heartaches accumulate? How do you make your calls when you're numb from struggling against inertia, not to mention sin, in your congregation? Sin does await you there. All kinds of neuroses wait to focus upon you as a religious authority and to punish you for how a parishioner was or wasn't treated in childhood. How will you counsel and encourage others when you're a magnet for the anger that can't be safely aimed at anyone else, because anyone else would fight back? You'll get used to hearing, 'Pastor, a few of the members are saying....'
"I ask you again, if no one has asked you before and if you haven't asked yourselves: How will you continue Lord's day after Lord's day, Easter after Christmas, living and telling the good news of Jesus Christ to people, of whom some will hurt you -- in ways that range from merely erasing a smidgen of your religious dignity to butchering your career?"
Dean Landsdorf lifted his head from his hands, as if thinking, well, maybe he's arrived at something worth saying.
"I won't answer that question," Curry said from behind the lectern, "but I'll tell you about one pastor. Although I'm much concerned with confidentiality, I'll report what happened to this pastor a long time ago and in a different denomination. We'll call him Pastor Michael."
* * *
Michael had served in his first pastorate at St. John's for six months when he walked into the sanctuary one Tuesday morning to find a parishioner standing, fists upon his hips. He swung toward Michael with a giant smile and said, "Pastor Michael, I just retired. What can I do for the church?"
As Michael put it, no loose cannon in a storm ever inflicted more damage upon the deck of a ship than did this man in this congregation. Michael felt guilty about him, because he and his wife referred to him as "Just Great Gary." Gary would meet you anytime, anywhere with a broad smile that broadcast trouble to anyone who could decode superficiality. Ask him how he was and he'd give that smile and say, "Just great. Just great." Michael's wife, Charlene, said that if Gary really was feeling good, he'd tell you three times instead of twice.
Gary told Michael that he'd owned a successful business, was an excellent administrator, and was expert at getting the most from employees. The church board made him chair of the personnel committee.
A few weeks later, Gary was sitting in the secretary's office doing an abbreviated time and motion study. Michael stepped in and felt the tension immediately.
"We're tightening up some work routines here, pastor," Gary said. "Straightening a few procedure lines. In a couple days, Winifred and I'll have streamlined the office into the twenty-first century."
Gary laughed toward Michael, but Michael scrutinized Winifred. He could sense annoyance and insult radiating from her. Just Great Gary came back daily for a week. Winifred began protesting to Michael the third day and by the end of the week was threatening to quit. Michael tried to ignore the severity of the situation and encouraged Winifred to try to learn from Gary, but Winifred complained to the board. The board got Gary to back off a little, but Winifred quit within a year. Michael began the difficult training of a new secretary, more difficult because Winifred quit not only as secretary but also as a church member.
Gary insisted that he take part in training the new secretary, since he could help on some "big picture stuff" about why to be a secretary. This secretary lasted four months. Michael anticipated a revolving door of secretaries, but the third secretary surprised him by staying. She was probably the most incompetent secretary ever to lick a stamp, but she was as impervious to criticism as she was to training. She was also the daughter of the church's largest donor, and no one even considered firing her. After two months of sporadic attempts, Gary gave her up as a lost cause and turned his energy in another direction: sermon critique.
Sunday at the sanctuary door after worship, Michael was shaking hands as people left. Just Great Gary came by, smiling. He shook Michael's hand a little too long saying, "Your second point was feeble. You know: 'When an argument is weak, shout like blazes.' " And he smiled. Michael was bothered, but thought he should let such things go. The following Sunday, there was Gary smiling after worship, "Your final illustration didn't quite fit the conclusion. It needed more snap."
All week, Michael dreaded Sunday. The next Sunday, however, Gary just smiled at the door and Michael thought he'd graduated from sermon boot camp. But that week Gary ambled into Michael's office, sprawled on a chair and said, "Thought maybe we'd talk about next Sunday's sermon."
"Next Sunday's sermon?"
"You need some help. Here." He handed Michael two pages, typed, single-spaced. "Here are some thoughts to consider for next Sunday's sermon."
"But Gary, I've got my texts planned three months ahead."
"Well, I'm here from the congregation to tell you to switch your plans so when you speak, your listeners don't mentally wander. See?"
At about this time Gary began, as he put it, encouraging the choir director, monitoring the treasurer's accounting system, and adjusting the janitor's schedule, and Michael realized what a bind he was in. As obnoxious as Gary seemed on the surface, something even deeper was beginning to erode the spiritual health of the St. John's congregation. Michael had been counseling Gary's wife, Doris, who over the years only attended worship when Gary did, and that wasn't often. She never talked much when Gary was around. Doris confided that she and Gary had quarreled for months. It took Michael a while, but he finally deduced that another woman he was counseling -- a much younger woman -- was having an affair with Gary.
Michael couldn't share what he knew. Except the few things he could tell Charlene about Gary's bull-in-a-china-shop management skills and his constant criticism of the sermons, Michael couldn't even hint to her why he was now edgy all the time. Michael contacted his district superintendent and acknowledged that he was in far over his head.
His district superintendent agreed that Michael didn't deal well with conflict and didn't have the skills to outmaneuver Just Great Gary. In June, the district superintendent moved Michael and Charlene to a congregation at the other end of the conference and basically gave them a chance to start over in the pastorate. The district superintendent then demonstrated that God had placed him in the right position in the church. He sent a new pastor to St. John's, a second-career pastor who'd formerly owned a business. Sparks flew in his first few months there; but, the new pastor reported that, after some initial resistance, control of the congregation was wrestled from Gary. Gary had some accompanying marital problems, but the new pastor reported that this seemed within acceptable limits. St. John's was able to turn its energy away from Gary and back into ministry.
Michael and Charlene also did well in their new congregation and were there six or seven years, when Charlene suffered severe abdominal pains. The diagnosis of cancer was swift, as was the surgery. She was, by her own estimate, back to 80% horsepower within a few months. Nine weeks after her operation, Gary and Doris phoned Charlene that they were coming to town and wanted to stop by. Charlene was still shaky, but they agreed on a time and she phoned Michael so they could all have coffee together.
Michael was home to greet them. Gary bowed his head slightly as he walked through their front door, and he didn't give his "Just Great" answer when Michael asked how he was. "Fine," he said, and his smile wasn't as full as usual. Doris wore a bright, red dress and chattered about how splendid the weather was for a drive.
Once they were seated, Gary cleared his throat. "Pastor Michael, I ... ah, we, wanted to come when we heard that Charlene had been ill."
Fortunately, he turned toward Charlene as he spoke her name, because if Gary had spoken directly to Michael, Michael wouldn't have known what to say. Charlene spoke a polite and appreciative, "Thank you, Gary. Thank you, Doris."
"And," Gary said, turning to Michael, "I appreciate the time you spent with me at St. John's. I'm thankful you were our pastor through a season that was difficult for both of us. Doris and I are better now, and we each owe you a lot. We decided if we were grateful, we'd better come tell you, especially now. And we needed to tell you we're praying for you both."
"Thank you," Charlene said again, "but I'm afraid my condition was exaggerated when reported to St. John's."
"That's okay with us," Doris said, "Gave us good reason to stop and see you."
They stayed about 45 minutes. The good-byes were pleasant. After Gary and Doris were out the door, Michael and Charlene just stood looking at one another, smiling.
* * *
"Graduates, you are already my brothers and sisters in Christ. Most of you will soon become my colleagues in the pastoral ministry. Problems await you there that you won't be able to fix. You'll get blame and credit that you don't deserve and, if you try to get things done for our Lord Jesus instead of being custodian of a religious museum or director of a religious social club, sometimes you'll receive more blame than credit. Yet, by being faithful, by trying, by being a presence for Christ, something happens, something that after a number of years you can smile about.
"Why would anyone enter such a profession and how could anyone remain in such a profession, unless they possessed some gruesome instinct that made them enjoy suffering? It won't be the salary! You'll need more than sincere motives, good citizenship, and civilized tolerance. You'll require something beyond a solid seminary education and support from colleagues and denomination. You must believe with all your heart that our Lord Jesus suffered for us and still does and that his suffering for us and rising to new life for us is worth all our life in response. Christ's ministry wasn't easy. Our ministry on his behalf isn't easy; but in the end, serving our Lord Jesus Christ is worth more than anything else.
"Receive these words from the apostle Peter's first letter, chapter 5, verses 1-4: 'Now as an elder myself and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as one who shares in the glory to be revealed, I exhort the elders among you to tend the flock of God that is in your charge, exercising the oversight, not under compulsion but willingly, as God would have you do it -- not for sordid gain but eagerly. Do not lord it over those in your charge, but be examples to the flock. And when the chief shepherd appears, you will win the crown of glory that never fades away.' "
As the Reverend Alexander Curry, Doctor of Divinity, stepped away from the lectern, Dean Landsdorf was first on the podium to stand and join the graduates, clapping with all his might.
Discussion Questions
1. What immediate responses do you have to the story?
2. Do you identify with a character in the story? If yes, how and why do you identify with the person? If no, why don't you identify with anyone in the story?
3. Would you like to have a conversation with a character in the story? What would you say, ask, or suggest to the person? Why?
4. How does the story bring the biblical text into a clearer focus for you?
5. How would you improve or modify the story? Why?
6. Has God surprised you by bringing health into the lives of others whom you hadn't been able to help?
7. Have you experienced a failure that proved, in the long run, not to be as tragic as it first seemed?
8. If you addressed seminary graduates, what would you tell them from your experience in the Christian faith that would help them remain faithful to Jesus Christ?
9. What further depths of meaning, symbols, connections with, or applications of the biblical faith do you find in the story?
10. Since Jesus Christ has risen from the dead and is alive among us through his Holy Spirit, what of this story would you like Christ to activate in your life?
