What will we be doing?

The purpose of my call is to fully prepare me to pastor a church in New England. This is really important because it shows that both the leadership of the church and I have a bigger vision for my ministry in New England than my time at 2nd Congregational. New England has become a virtually unreached mission field where the vast majority of churches have ceased to preach the Gospel. So our goal is to minister in New England by eventually planting a church or revitalizing a church. The goal of this calling is to prepare me for that.

In order to do that the church has called me for a minimum of 2 years and tasked me with doing pretty much everything that Bill, the senior pastor, does. So by the end of the 2 years I will have had some experience in every area of pastoral ministry and, depending on my progress and the growth of the church, I will have the option of leaving to plant a church or seek a calling as a senior pastor or of staying at 2nd Congo (this is what everybody calls it, by the way).

Here's what my job will look like over the next two years: Right away I'll jump into pastoral counseling and visitation. These are two of the areas where there is simply more need than Bill can meet on his own. I'll also start a small group Bible study and may do some teaching in Sunday school, depending on where the needs are. I'll be preaching about once a month and may occasionally be able to preach a short series and I'll be helping lead (aka emcee) the worship service and working with the worship team on developing the music. I'll also chair the deacon board and the elder board for about a year each. In addition I'll be doing funeral services in the area and other miscellaneous pastoral stuff that pastors do. And yes, you heard right, we might be living above a funeral home.