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The church held it’s meeting tonight. At that meeting, they made the decision on whether or not to retain the pastor. The meeting was moderated by the Associate Regional Pastor of South Jersey. She oversees about 80 churches.
I was impressed with how seriously she took the proceedings. She said the church is over 100 years old. She says God loves all of us. He is on everyone's side. (Editor’s note – “I'm not sure that last sentence is true.”)
At the meeting, she made it clear that anyone could speak, but they would be limited to three minutes. I thought three minutes was certainly reasonable. In toastmasters, all our speeches are timed and they typically run five to seven minutes. After the discussion, the voting would be limited to members only. That seemed logical to me.
The meeting started with someone reading a statement written by the pastor about the situation. The pastor has been with this church about eight months. It seems he felt that one lady had been “a thorn in his side” since his arrival. One day he lost it and blew up at her. A few people witnessed the incident and the conflagration quickly grew.
This is a very small church. It takes just 20 people to sign a petition to call for a meeting to decide the pastor’s fate. Since many people have been members for many years, the 20 signatures were easy to get and this meeting was the result.
After the pastor’s statement was read, the aggrieved party stood up and read her blow-by-blow coverage of the incident – as they called it. It thought calling it an “incident” made it sound like a nuclear explosion. One-by-one the prosecution presented its case. All had copiously prepared statements.
After a bit, the prosecution seemed to have run its course. Then the pastor’s defenders took the floor. One thing I noticed was the defenders statements were typically greeting with applause and the prosecutors with silence.
Things seemed to be dwindling down so I felt it was time to make my move. I volunteered to speak. I stood before them and surveyed my audience. I attempted to look each one in the eye. I purposely waited about 10 to 15 seconds before I spoke. I did this for two reasons. I wanted to put myself in the right mood and I wanted to build some drama. Have someone stand for 10-15 seconds before a group and not speak and it really builds the tension.
Then I launched into my message. I asked them what they were doing. I told them to look at what the outside world was trying to do to destroy the church and here they were tearing it down from the inside. I used a tone of voice that was a cross between anger and weeping. I asked them if this was the end of this church. I admonished them that if they left the church, they would discover that finding another church would not be as easy as they thought.
I had not prepared a specific speech, but rather the thoughts I wanted to convey. Once I started talking, I just put myself in the zone and what happened, happened.
I spontaneously grabbed a Bible from under one of the seats and held it in the air. I told them this is God’s word. It is our responsibility to read it. Then I told them follow it. As I said this, slammed the Bible down on one of the chairs and walked back to my seat. Unfortunately, the seats are padded, so it made silent impact and some drama was lost.
I had really wanted to bring them to tears. I wanted them in as much emotional pain as I could develop. My hope was, if I could push them far enough and put them in enough pain, they might come together to comfort each other.
Alas, three minutes is not enough time to move people that far that fast. Although Karol said, she was in tears.
A little later Karol spoke. She had meant to remind the people how much physical pain the pastor was in and that may have contributed to his going ballistic. The pastor was suffering from restricted circulation in this right leg and he was in a lot of pain. Unfortunately, when she stood before the audience, the message left her mind. It was an emotional night and that’s understandable.
When the speeches were over, they called for the vote. The bylaws said they needed 50 members present for a quorum. They only had 46. The Associate Regional Pastor led a vote to reduce the quorum requirements to 46. I mildly objected as I thought that made the rules seem superfluous. She replied that they were close to 50 and she wanted to resolve the situation tonight.
That seemed a reasonable response. The vote was taken. I and another individual counted the votes. The prosecution needed more than 1/3 of the votes to remove the pastor. Out of the 45 votes counted, the prosecution received 13 votes.
They failed and the pastor stays.
Afterward, the Associate Regional Pastor said she said this went up like a brush fire. She said this church has issues. She said this church has gone through nine pastors in 20 years. She said if this pastor had been turned out, she had no replacement.
I wonder how many of the 13 that voted against the pastor will leave the church.
Posted by Ted at March 29, 2004 9:13 PM