Following. Leading.

It never occurred to me that I wouldn't be their first pastor.  Or that their heart would be still attached to someone else.  I didn't realize that my giddy excitement over a new position meant grief and change for them.
Or rather, I knew it academically, I just didn't know what it would feel like when confronted by it.

I first felt this blow to my ego when I was a youth director.  A young 6th grade girl looked me straight in the eyes while saying to her friends, "Oh, I wish Phil was still here."  Then she turned and walked away.  I spent a good part of my pastoral energy on trying to be more loved than Phil and trying to be impressive enough that people would stop talking about Phil.  I wasn't satisfied with my work until I heard some evidence or opinion that let me know I had surpassed this poor man in reputation.
(that young girl is now married and pregnant and friends with me on FB.  I came to love her, and she, me.  I never shared with her how bloody snotty she was that first night at youth group.)

Next came Internship.  Here I was dealt a double blow as I met congregational love for the previous TWO interns along with the supervisor's attachment to his previous interns.  There was added baggage of me knowing both the interns.  I quickly out shone one of the interns and never came close to the other.  She was good at things I would never be comfortable with and I gained an acceptance of this.  I was, perhaps, maturing as well.

Then came my first call.  Where you would have thought I followed Jesus himself.  No, seriously some days I thought I might have.  My predecessor goes down in the church's history book as the first healthy pastor in over two decades.  After a string of down right crazy and unhealthy pastors, this one was not only healthy she was passionate, gifted, caring and mature.  She also had a baby while there.  Having a baby makes you REALLY popular with the congregation.

She was also friends with most of my colleagues.  I couldn't escape her fan club anywhere I went in town.  And she could sing.  (I can't sing.  It is forever a bruise on my ego.)

All of this ate at me.  She became a mythical figure in my mind.  On bad days she was this figure I would never live up to, so I tried to read between the notes and newsletter articles to find her mistakes.  Hoping a glimpse of her stumbling would ease my panic over this call.  On my better days I gave thanks for the notes she left, stood in awe over the work she had done among the congregation and was grateful to have followed such a healthy pastor.

There were more bad days than good ones in my first call.  Even now, seven years past, my time there feels twice as long as it really was.

Then one day, she returned to town.  Mythical no more, there she was, sitting across from me at a conference table during the conference text study.  In the days and weeks to follow I would learn why she was so loved.  Her grounded kindness put everyone at ease.  She chose her words slowly and thoughtfully.  She was strong and passionate and a fierce advocate for those God had given her to care for.  She was funny and didn't take herself too seriously.  She had impeccable and appropriate boundaries.

While I fretted her return to the town we lived in.  I am forever grateful to God that I met her.  This person whom I feared and ruminated over, became a friend, a mentor, a colleague.

She shaped my ministry in profound ways.  Both by her own being and also by the things I learned about myself as I fretted over her mythical presence. 

The congregation nearly broke me.  Or it did break me, in all the right ways.  Left enough cracks so that God could work on me.  Teaching me a thing or two about the size of love.  That adoration isn't the goal of ministry.  That there is enough love to go around.  That I really needed to get over myself...