Pastoral Transitions

Several months ago I shared with my Calvary UMC family that I would be leaving and beginning a new season as pastor of Arden UMC in Martinsburg. The time of final transition is upon us as I have my last Sunday at Calvary this Sunday and am finishing my final day in the office today.

It has been a blessed season, these five years at Calvary. I have experienced many personal and professional highs during this time, as well as some challenges.

One of the most important things on my to-do list now is to make this transition well and to help the congregation of Calvary UMC do the same. To this end, while I have been engaged in many prepartions for my arrival at Arden, I have also been working to help in the transition here at Calvary as Rev. Matt Trussell begins his tenure as Calvary’s Associate Pastor. I have met with Matt, and have also been meeting with other staff and ministry leaders to pass files, information and materials in an attempt to provide for as smooth of a transition as possible. I have also been in regular conversation with Rev. Alice Ford about this transition—indeed, our conversations began before I had even received a new appointment, when I was merely anticipating one.

I remain the appointed associate pastor at Calvary until June 30, 2014, but my active time with the Calvary congregation ends June 8, 2014. A time of transition is suggested by the conference for the congregation to have time to step away from one pastor and prepare to welcome a new one. These three weeks will hopefully allow all of us a time to prepare for the new seasons God is calling us to.

I need to share with you the conference’s official statement of transitions, and the policy I affirm and covenant to keep with my colleagues in the Order of Elders in the Baltimore-Washington Conference. This policy essentially outlines that effective July 1, I will cease any and all pastoral relationships with members of the Calvary UMC family. While the policy says that the current pastor may at their initiative invite the previous pastor to return (and Rev. Ford has been and I know will remain gracious and open through this transition), I want to let you know myself, that it is my intention to decline any inivations even should they be extended by the new pastoral team. As much as the Calvary UMC family needs to create new and lasting bonds with Rev. Matt Trussell, I need to create and nurture my new relationships at Arden UMC. I will need to use all my time and energies to do so.

Here is the official Conference policy:

As of the effective date of a new appointment, a pastor shall immediately cease all pastoral counseling and pastoral visitation with members or member families in the previous appointment. Since appointments are generally announced several weeks in advance, each pastor has adequate time in which to affect closure and make appropriate referral to another for the pastoral care of members.
 Pastors shall have a clear understanding with former congregations that they will not return to officiate at baptisms, weddings, and funerals, or to do pastoral counseling or pastoral visitation in that parish. Pastors, active or retired, shall respectfully decline to participate in such duties when invited by members of a former congregation. Declining all such invitations is the responsibilities of the previous pastor. The present pastor, at his or her discretion, may invite the previous pastor to return for pastoral functions. However, the present pastor should never be under any pressure to invite the previous pastor.

Many of you are connected to me via social media and it is a gift that modern tools like this exist! I will not change or remove any of those connections. But I do want you to know what as I begin my ministry at Arden, I will be posting regularly and energetically about my ministry there. I will be using that tool in the same way I have used it at Calvary. If you feel it will be difficult to see me do so, please know I will understand if you feel more comfortable unfriending me. It will also be my intention to not initiate contact with Calvary UMC people once my time at Calvary is completed.

Having grown up as a United Methodist clergy child, these transitions come a bit more naturally to me than to many, and for me they remain an important part of the covenant I have taken as a United Methodist pastor. The transitions are difficult for families as well, though Chris and I have shared in much conversation around our transition and that of our girls. While it is difficult to say goodbye to all of the wonderful people we have known at Calvary, we look forward to new relationships at Arden and also eagerly anticipate the new bonds which will be formed between the Calvary UMC family and the Trussell family. We know you will bless them as much as you have blessed us by your friendship, support and encouragement!

Please do not hesitate to let me or Rev. Alice Ford know if you have any questions about this transition.

Grace and Peace.

Rev. Sarah Andrews Schlieckert

Fearless

Today my husband and I started filling out the paperwork for the girls’ new daycare/school once we make the transition to West Virginia this summer. We’re pretty stoked about the place we found. Like really.

That said, the forms ask similar questions to ones we’ve had to do previously – we’ve had several different school and childcare placements from the time Anna started in care.

Perhaps most accurate, and subsequently a basis for descriptions like the ones we had to write today was the word Chris offered when parents were asked to share one word about their child at Anna’s preschool parent orientation (I’d just had Mary so he went on his own): FEARLESS.

This little girl does, I suppose have things that freak her out, but for a three year old, doing the zipline, being comfortable at heights, hiking through mud and creeks, and all sorts of other things, it’s a joy to see her take life by the horns. Judging by our experience so far, her little sister Mary will be right there alongside.

I don’t know what part of Anna’s personality is nature, or what part is nurture. I know we have always tried to not let our fears seep out onto her (some have seen the pics of the girls at the Willis Tower in Chicago—I’m scared of heights but did my best to get out in the SkyDeck without letting it show).

Life has a way of teaching us to be anxious, scared or hesitant. It comes without effort. What takes more work is holding on to being fearless. Or at least having the courage to face fears and try new things anyway.

My daughters continue to teach me so much about living. And being fearless.

On Entering a Liminal Phase

The past few weeks have been full of a rush of “lasts,” a plethora of endings and reminders of endings, and the beginning of a season of, well, beginnings.

In reality, the past two years have been a time of great transition—and of endings and beginnings—for me, both personally and professionally. This time last year, we were rounding the corner on a time of transition at Calvary as our senior pastor, Rev. Ken Dunnington, prepared to retire. I foolishly thought that would be the most significant transition I’d experience for a while! I say July 1 as a breather, a chance to get back into the groove (albeit new groove) of things.

In reality, July 1 would merely be a respite before a rush of much more. My father’s sudden passing July 3, Mary’s (two weeks late!) arrival August 30, maternity leave, my grandfather’s brief illness and death, Advent, Christmas—all of it at a break-neck pace. And just when things could’ve quieted down, after careful discernment, Chris and I decided it was time God was calling us to take on a new church and seek a new appointment for me, and really, for our family. None of these things have been easy, but in all, we have perhaps never more powerfully felt God’s presence and guidance than these past months.

So now, I find myself fully entering transition time. My first transition workshop was last Monday, and this Saturday I will gather with folks from Arden along with other pastoral and congregations experiencing transition in the Frederick and Cumberland-Hagerstown districts. Our new Administrative Assistant at Calvary begins tomorrow, and my schedule has been cleared to help get her up to speed in the limited time I have left between conference meetings in my last month here. Our new associate will be named shortly, and I will be soon tasked with helping that person get up to speed as well.

So, this is without a doubt a liminal phase. And this time of transition is rife with possibility. So I’m excited. A bit anxious—it’s easy to forget, when leaving one place, how anxious you were upon arriving, and only how settled you eventually became.

I hope to be more intentional about blogging through this time of transition. If you have blog post suggestions, whether about the transition or about me, or about being a UM pastor, let me know!

Appointment Announcement

It is with both excitement and sadness that I share that effective July 1, 2014, the bishop and cabinet of the Baltimore-Washington Conference have appointed me as pastor of Arden United Methodist Church in Martinsburg, West Virginia.

While I am excited about this new opportunity in ministry and am deeply convinced that God is calling me to be in ministry with the people of Arden UMC, these past four and a half years at Calvary UMC have been an immense blessing to me and my family—and they have also been years of fruitful ministry and as we were able to be a part of the exciting things God is doing in downtown Frederick through the ministry of Calvary.

I also want to let you know that this past December, after much prayer and discernment, I shared with my district superintendent that I felt this would be a good year for me to change appointments. It has been a blessing to serve with Rev. Ken Dunnington and Rev. Alice Ford. I look forward to seeing all that God has in store for the congregation at Calvary under Rev. Ford’s leadership and through the ministry of whoever will fill the position I am leaving. While this appointment was only made in the past week, Rev. Ford and I have been in conversation for many weeks in anticipation of such a move. She remains gracious and supportive—though she would have loved for me to stay, she has understood my discernment and been encouraging throughout.

Calvary UMC will always be the congregations our girls were born into, and the place Chris and I were able to connect with each of you in powerful, Spirit-filled ways. You have sustained us through the sleepless nights of early parenthood, embraced us when we have suffered pain and loss as we did when my father passed away last summer, and marked the celebrations of our shared lives together. You have been our family in more ways than I can list. While Chris and I were confident through our discernment that God was calling us to a new appointment, we knew that saying goodbye would be incredibly difficult. You have all been the very presence of Christ to us.

In the coming months, I will continue to work closely with Rev. Ford and whoever will follow me to assure for a smooth transition. I will need your help making sure ministry areas are prepared for transition and that the process goes smoothly. My last Sunday will be in June, though I am working with Rev. Ford and the SPRC to finalize those details.

I hope you will keep Chris, Anna, Mary and me in your prayers in the coming months. This will be a major change for our family. I will continue to keep Calvary in my prayers both as we continue together in ministry for these next few months, and as you receive a new associate pastor. I rejoice that the God who has so blessed me by bringing me to Calvary for this season remains at work in the ministry of Calvary and in my ministry, wherever those paths take us.

Grace and Peace.

Rev. Sarah Andrews Schlieckert

On Holiness (Leviticus 19:1-18)

Today’s daily reading from the American Bible Society is Leviticus 19:1-18. The mediation ABS offers focuses on how this passages talks about holiness.  Holiness is definitely a topic appropriate for United Methodists to reflect on. It relates quite directly to personal holiness and perfection in love, both terms we are well acquainted with.

What I like about this Leviticus passage, as it restates some of the ten commandments and outlines new ways we are to treat one another. When Jesus says we are to love God and love neighbor, surely the former is of highest importance, but it is in the latter that we often see evidences of our love for God. We cannot separate the two. What both largely seem to have in common is (1) a focus outside self and (2) a proper orientation to God’s ways.

What would it look like to consistently lay aside out won self-interests and seek to do God’s will in all our relationships? This has surely been on my mind lately. At times this calls us to love, at other times (though I don’t think this stands in opposition to love) to having healthy boundaries and expectations. Sometimes we have to speak up for those who are oppressed, and other times, we have to be honest about tendencies to favor those without in ways that create injustice. That is probably very difficult to do honestly.

Most of the instructions in this passage conclude with “I am the Lord.” In some ways, doesn’t this sound like “Because I said so!” Which is a good point. But I’m often confronted in my daily life and ministry with the question for myself from the provisional and full member exams, “What is your understanding of Jesus as Lord?” (rephrased)

It is probably a helpful question to reflect on in all times and situations. The Lordship of Jesus calls us to submit all our lives—including our relationships with others, to his care and guidance. It means we don’t get to be self-righteous or proud. We don’t get to hold onto anger or bitterness. Because all of that is really about us, our need and desire to control things.

Living with Jesus as our Lord means we will make lots of choices differently than otherwise. I am sure of it. But it is difficult. Sometimes our very religious sensibilities seem to urge us to draw lines in the sand. Sometimes our own hurts and past make it difficult to be open to God in new times. Sometimes we simply cannot see our way forward and gripping so tightly at trying to control that which we cannot, we fail to come before God (and in relationship to one another) in our brokenness and vulnerabilities.

I am glad that we are reminded here that holiness begins with our relationship with God, but also heavily involves how we relate to others. Sometimes in my life and in my ministry I find myself bogged down and drowning in interpersonal issues, brokenness in lives and relationships, and painful questions about why things happen and how to walk alongside each other. I an encouraged that all that work in holiness work. All that work is indeed God’s work. And most of all, I am glad I don’t have to do it on my own, but rather have a Christian community to walk the journey with me, and a God who has never and will never leave me along the way.

On Uncreative Preaching (and why we should all be less creative sometimes)

I’ve been following along with the American Bible Society’s daily Bible readings this year. Having a toddler and an infant makes it difficult to keep up with pretty much anything, so it’s been nice to be able to get it via email or website.

Today’s reading comes from Matthew 22:15-40, and includes the religious leaders trying to trick Jesus with questions (like should they pay taxes and what is the greatest commandment).  The truth is the latter question especially is a pretty bad question to trick Jesus. You don’t have to be all that familiar with scripture and the words of Jewish teachers, including those who preceded Jesus) to be able to answer as he does: (1) Love God and (2) Love neighbor. That’s it. Not flashy, not requiring deep theological knowledge, just basic.

The bar for preachers seems to be raised year after year. We often fall into the trap laid out by Ecclesiastes, that there is nothing new under the sun, and everything that can be said has already been said. We seem to reply with, “But…wait…wait till you hear my sermon THIS Sunday!” While it is a good and honorable goal to keep the Gospel fresh, to adapt the message to new people in new times, the reality is it’s really just the same message(s). Sometimes we just need to be okay with that. Sometimes it really is not only enough, but also preferable to stop trying to out preach ourselves or others and just say the same, abiding things.

This past Sunday, I’d struggled with a week that left little mental and emotional energy left. I need both of those to get my creative juices flowing. Faced with having to preach, and frustrated I couldn’t rock some great illustration or innovative interpretation I finally asked myself what the basic elements and illustrations are that I use all the time. All pastors have these. Most of us also have go to sermons as well.

For me, those go to elements include reflection on the Dana Carvey “Church Lady” sketch, and how the Pharisees missed the point…the latter piece I hadn’t even realized I used so much till a member at my last church quoted it back to me once!

This week, I will go to one of our local churches to preach as part of an ecumenical pulpit swap. The Gospel continues the themes of this past week, and I have to say, there was something very powerful in just saying what is so central to my own thinking. To use the tried and true ways to talk about who we are called to be as Christians. So, with some adaptations for the different passage, I’m working on some similar illustrations and points. Sometimes God doesn’t call us to be innovative, creative or unique. Sometimes we’re just called to share God’s message in ways that touch and connect with people. More often than not, that is not only “enough,” but is precise the very thing called for.

Stamps: Who Knew?

In the midst of the passing of my father last month, we received so many gestures and glimpse of graciousness and generosity. Friends, family, church members, colleagues, etc. who travelled, some great distances, to be with us at the visitation and/or service. Generous gifts in Dad's memory to the ASP work of Mill Creek Parish. Food, flowers, etc. And cards--oh the cards! Each was such a loving reminder of all whose lives Dad touched, but also of the love and support we have as well.

One of the more random things I received, tucked in a card from someone whose paths I've crossed in conference work, was a sheet of stamps. Forever stamps, to be exact. I was very grateful, and knew they would be used, but I'd never heard of sending someone stamps before. But you know what, I'm now convinced this is a brilliant idea, probably for lots of situations, but esp. for someone who has experienced a loss.

Here's the thing. I didn't feel up to doing thank you notes at first. There was so much going on, and to be honest, once the busy-ness of the service passed, I was worn out and needed a break. I knew I needed to get to the notes, but I just just couldn't make myself sit down and do it. Then today, I finally got the cards I needed and decided to tackle the list--this also included cards I needed to send for other reasons as well. 

And you know what? Those stamps came in so handy. One less things to have to track down, pick up, etc. to finish the task. A small thing, but such a thoughtful one.

So yeah. Stamps. Who knew? 

I may start sending some myself though. What a cool idea.