Last week, my Dearly Beloved and I were interviewed by our local church council as the first part of the process of offering ourselves to the Uniting Church as candidates for ministry. This is part of the process prescribed by the church for all those wanting to offer themselves as candidates: in addition to the required paperwork, three levels of meetings: 1) the local congregation; 2) the relevant presbytery (region); and 3) by the relevant Synod (state).
Concerning the paperwork, there's certainly plenty of it! I've jokingly told a few people that I had to fill in less paperwork when I applied for my mortgage! But we figured that would be part of the gig, so we weren't too concerned. But as for being interviewed...
Well, it's not like we were scared exactly,but it's never easy talking about yourself to other people, especially about something as personal as your faith journey - and especially not to people you know. That's one of the odd things about being honest: it's not a problem with strangers, because they're people you're not likely to see again. But people who know you also have a certain picture of you; that is, they know you through a paradigm that consists of a combination of their own impressions of you as well as your direct interactions with them. So sharing something as intimate as faith experience is always a risk, because doing so might change their paradigmatic understanding of you as a person, and thereby alter the nature of your relationship.
However, I am delighted to report that, for both my Dearly Beloved and myself, the experience of being interviewed by our local congregational council has been wonderfully affirming. The council members listened with interest and generosity as we told our respective stories, and then proceeded to ask questions that demonstrated both that they had been paying careful attention, and were genuinely desirous of knowing more about us. It was an intense, but powerful and exciting, experience.
The upshot is that both my Dearly Beloved and I have the wholehearted support of the congregational council to offer ourselves as candidates to the ministry. It is impossible to express how humbling, gratifying, and quite simply joyful it is to know that we have been accepted so completely by the council; without their interest and support, and without the encouragement and wisdom of our congregational minister, we could not even have come this far.
So it is hope and anticipation that we look forward to the next stage: the presbytery.
Talk to you soon,
BB
Quote for the Day: Meetings are rather like cocktail parties: you don't want to go, but you're rather cross not to be invited. (Jilly Cooper)
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Woo-hoo! Great news indeed. And no matter how daunting this whole process may seem (especially once you get to the Synod Selection Conference) it is such a buzz - a mixture of exhilarating and daunting- to realise that there is this group of people (or, these groups of people, if you count all the levels of the process) who are all praying for you and with you, to discern God's direction for the next phase of your life.
That thought certainly blew me away, and also helped me to view the process as less of an "us and them" kind of thing, and more of a "we together" kind of thing :-)
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