Reflections on Ministry Reviews + Upcoming Workshop

Originally in the Coconut Wireless on March 20, 2021.

At the February 1st Wednesday Conversation with Bill Lyons, Conference Minister of the Southwest Conference, we were invited to wrestle with the issue of pastor as both employee and spiritual leader of the congregation. Since then, there is an increased interest in ministry reviews. "How do we go about conducting a pastor review?" is typically how the question is expressed. With the question comes the assumption that the pastor is an employee under review and the things that are not working in the church can be made to work through a pastor review.

These assumptions about pastor reviews raise some problematic issues. On April 13, 4:30 - 6:30 p.m., I will present a workshop, "Moving Beyond Shame: An Appreciative Way Approach to Ministry Reviews." The purpose of this workshop is to help church leaders and pastors move beyond the usual attitudes behind a pastor review, as well as to engage a broader review of church mission and ministry. For example, if the "why" of your congregation is to express its core purpose as a spiritual fingerprint on the community it serves, I suspect only about half of that has to do with the timeliness of returned emails, what songs are sung, or how your pastor appears in the pulpit. The other half has to do with the congregation as a whole and how it goes about relating to the community.