ICB Annual Meeting THIS Sunday
Church business meetings can be entertaining. I remember when I was a kid. Our church got into this big fight over whether to build a gymnasium or send more money to foreign missions. It ended with name calling and a group questioning (publicly) whether or not our pastor was even a Christian. Sad.
In my first church after seminary, Church meetings were a thing to fear. The Senior Pastor and many of the lay leaders hated each other. They would fight to the point of embarrassing everyone else in the room. I remember dreading going to those meetings. Things that you had been working on for months would just get shot down in the crossfire. To the people shooting they were just plans, but to me they were plans that I'd put blood sweat and tears into. Sometimes the plans represented people who were hurting.
All this is to say that despite the fact that my last church and the International Church meetings are nothing like those, I still approach meetings with trepidation. I still get defensive when questioned. I still do and say stupid stuff and later wish I could rewind the clock and rephrase or take back something I said.
Our Annual Meeting is Sunday. We're not expecting any fireworks. There is nothing controversial. The church is running smoothly. And yet I'm still nervous. Old habits die hard.
In my first church after seminary, Church meetings were a thing to fear. The Senior Pastor and many of the lay leaders hated each other. They would fight to the point of embarrassing everyone else in the room. I remember dreading going to those meetings. Things that you had been working on for months would just get shot down in the crossfire. To the people shooting they were just plans, but to me they were plans that I'd put blood sweat and tears into. Sometimes the plans represented people who were hurting.
All this is to say that despite the fact that my last church and the International Church meetings are nothing like those, I still approach meetings with trepidation. I still get defensive when questioned. I still do and say stupid stuff and later wish I could rewind the clock and rephrase or take back something I said.
Our Annual Meeting is Sunday. We're not expecting any fireworks. There is nothing controversial. The church is running smoothly. And yet I'm still nervous. Old habits die hard.
