SHAPE for AA's

Last week I was privileged to spend a few days in Sacramento for the first gathering of Western Area Administrators in a new SHAPE group.

As I've stated before, I am convinced that SHAPE represents a radical change in how we develop and support ministers. It is not just another "program" coming out of Anderson; it represents a complete and thorough paradigm shift. I am fortunate to be in one of the pioneering SHAPE regions.

SHAPE leadership at Church of God Ministries (Arthur Kelly, Jeannette Flynn, and Ryan Chapman) are urging and making it possible for Area Administrators to participate in their own SHAPE clusters. The conviction is that we need it as much as any pastor, and it is critical that we have our own first-hand experience of it if we are to lead our district's SHAPE ministry.

The experience in Sacramento was very positive, and I look forward to upcoming gatherings!

WARM / National Preaching Clinic

I just returned from Mountain View, California, home of this year's Western Area Regional Ministerium, an annual regional event for Church of God ministers. What is unique about this year's WARM is that it hosted the first of a new generation of National Preaching Clinics. These clinics were popular across the Church of God several decades ago, but have been revived by David Grubbs and James Earl Massey.



Preaching is a critical aspect of the church's ministry, and in light of changes happening around us in both the church and world, it is vital that we examine ways to communicate the Gospel as effectively as possible. The clinic involves listening to varied styles, participating in specific workshops, and preaching in a video lab for the sake of critique. (More of my report on this event can be obtained from my new blog for the Pacific Northwest Association).



I didn't know what to expect, never having attended one of these clinics before. But, overall, I was impressed. Obviously, three days is far from adequate for developing the skills necessary to become a better preacher, but an event like this certainly forces one to address key issues related to preaching and hopefully prompt movement out of one's homiletic comfort zone.



Watch for a National Preaching Clinic coming to your area in the next few years. (The next one is in Oklahoma City at Mid-America).

Learning about ourselves

As I have mentioned before, I am in a district that is participating in SHAPE (Sustaining Health and Pastoral Excellence), a ministry initiative between Church of God Ministries and several regions, with funding from the Lilly Endowment.



Annually, Church of God Ministries is required to submit a report of results, discoveries and lessons to Lilly. It is primarily written by an external consultant, Michael Wiese.  In reading through the 2006 report I came across two paragraphs that were particularly insightful and worth sharing here.



In a section entitled "What are we learning?" the report includes the following lessons that are being learned through SHAPE:

• One of the cultural realities of the Church of God (Anderson) is the priority placed on congregational autonomy. This value, when applied to how the pastor functions, produces isolation. Isolation undermines both health and excellence. It can also produce self-delusion about health and excellence. Pastors need to be connected to others who provide opportunity for selfassessment, camaraderie, safe-disclosure, advice, and accountability.
• The need to maintain the perception of “perfection” does not produce health. The Holiness tradition, a major theological stream for the Church of God (Anderson), may be interpreted within the culture as an expectation of perfection. There is evidence that this expectation may undermine the pastor’s freedom to be appropriately transparent, to build a relationship oriented ministry and, in the end, be healthy. (page 7)
  
  

Ouch.



But very true.