10 min 41 s
Joining stands on the shoulders of farewell;
The nature of your last farewell will hugely influence how you join your next community of faith;
Joining has 5 practices:
Joining is about sharing your heart and receiving theirs.
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24 min 13 s
The trust vs. mistrust stage of pastoral ministry
A new pastor arrives in the middle of the “movie” of a congregation’s life
Avoid triangulation, not conflict;
Interim time can allow the congregation to catch its breath;
During the interim time does the congregation primarily need healing or helping?
Giving authority without responsibility invites the church monster to rear its head;
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19 min 18 s
From a 20-hour/week pastorate to a 30-hour/week one and more – how we’re doing it
Boundaries: balancing clergy self-care with the practical realities of renewal;
Success metrics, and a rhythm of communication about critical topics…
A practical step-by-step story revealing what did work and what didn’t (and why);
Instilling a spirit of experimentation into a congregation;
Helping the small congregation know that there is a larger congregation that exists that may never ever sit in a pew in our building;
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12 min 58 s
Tips for making innovation and experimentation work for a small church;
Responding innovatively to the different church participation behaviors of younger generations;
Balancing it all: engaging the congregation while also maintaining healthy boundaries;
Examples of successful collaboration with other clergy for worship, Advent, Lent, that lessen one’s work load; Collaboration should make things easier not harder;
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10 min 07 s
Innovative adaptions of governance to help engage younger generations;
Ways to make it easier for people to say, Yes, to serving;
Innovative ways to helps parishioners feel connected to the congregation and serve with joy;
The Spirit can often work through, No, not just through, Yes.
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12 min 09 s
We carry conflict in our bodies;
Intergenerational conflict;
The Ladder of Interence;
By changing yourself, you can actually help change others – it’s contagious;
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11 min 38 s
What gets missed when decisions are made quickly;
Benefits of the “How might?” question;
Framing a question for maximum engagement;
By changing yourself, you can actually help change others – it’s contagious;
We carry conflict in our bodies;
Make complexity your friend;
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13 min 49 s
How we were able to tell the truth about our reality without also predicting gloom and doom;
My own process from being one of the people in denial about the congregation’s reality, to embracing it and moving forward;
How we were able to build the trust necessary for people to listen to the truth of their reality and move forward;
What I did when I realized that the church was not going to have another full-time pastor after me.
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13 min 37 s
Simultaneously raising and lowering anxiety in the process of change;
A copy of the letter we sent to the congregation laying out our reasons and reality….
The details of our deliberative and thoughtful approach to ….
The specific steps we took to reduce the congregation’s anxiety level to allow a constructive conversation about our future;
How we named the options we had for the future;
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16 min 39s
Creative examples of using the church’s assets for the benefit of the wider community in a way that is mutually beneficial;
Instead of First Church of – name your town, if we’re a community asset, we might think about our name as the First Church for – name your town;
Rather than a “Tag Sale,” have a “Trunk Sale;”
Connecting with people in the community who might benefit from your church’s space;
Narrowing the gap between ministry and mission;
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