A Glimpse Into the Pastors Life

Over the past 5 or 6 months God has had me on a journey as a pastor and as a person. Let me set the stage for you:

Spring of 2010 the Suncoast is having Sundays with 150 plus or minus people and that Easter we had 237 people, which was our highest attended service to date. This was still not the explosive growth I thought we would have 4 years into church planting, but it was moving in the right direction even if it was slow.

Spring to summer of 2010 we start to drop almost weekly until in June we went to one Sunday service. No big issues, no church split, just poof...

Summer to fall we bottom out and despite praying, a church wide fast, and working harder than ever we can't get any momentum going back in the right direction. Financially, we almost had to shut the doors because of people who had left, the economy, and many couples who were having major marriage issues one after another.

2011 I begin to ask God if I am missing something, what was I doing wrong and if this is still what He wanted me to be doing with my life. Shared it with the staff, we prayed some more, we worked some more, and at least the financial picture started to turn a corner!

Easter of 2011 we saw our first signs of new life, 175 people. The summer was back lower, and then for the big fall launch we worked and prayed for so hard we had 131 which was about 25 more than last year, so some more new life.

BUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was to a point where I was letting my self-worth and my relationship with God be dictated by how many people were showing up or not showing up AND, what my peers thought of me and our church (our brand you could even say).This wasn't something that happened all of a sudden but over time, with some wrong expectations, some wrong advice, wrong focus, and even some wrong motives I have had to repent of.

Now, personally Cheryl and I got pregnant and our worlds are about to change forever, I was emotionally spent from church life I think, and I just decided I was by God's grace not going to be one of these guys that flames out of the ministry, or jumps into some immoral stuff that would disqualify me from leading. So, I decided to get some "preventive counseling" as I coined the phrase with my counselor. No, real agenda, and he said this was a first, but just felt I needed to get in a better place before the stress of a baby enters the mix!

Through this I will share some of the things I am learning, and some of the things that went along with it from the NewSpring Leadership Conference last week, all in some upcoming post... mainly because I have already written too much for one post and it is a really nice day out and I want to go enjoy it. Sorry to leave you hanging, but stay tuned.