I didn’t want to change.
Born and raised in the suburbs, middle-class, college educated, WASP, I found myself pastoring a church in the inner city of Chicago. The neighborhood was Catholic, blue-collar, run-down, an amalgam of white-ethnic and Mexican. Our building sat across from a housing project. I balked at calling this place home.
One weekend, I had an opportunity to get away, to preach in my home church in Bloomington, Illinois. When the last vestiges of city and suburb were in my rearview mirror, I sighed in relief. For the next two hours I soaked in the beauty of the expansive cornfields. Later, as I shook hands and conversed with old friends, one thought echoed in my mind: It’s good to be home.
Two days later, through a dirty haze, unwelcome landmarks assaulted me: gray factories, smoldering smokestacks, clogged highways.
But eight years later my name is still on the same stationery. By God’s grace I eventually adapted to foreign soil. Looking back, I see three attitudes that delayed my adaptation-and a more effective ministry.
Stay with what’s worked
I cut my ministry teeth during the body-life heyday. Accordingly, my plan was to develop the body as I had done in a previous ministry, by prayer, low-profile pasturing, and waiting for motivation and gifts to arise in the people.
Seven months after I became pastor, our pianist, who played with an energetic gospel style, moved to California. With him went our music program; we had no other musicians. Yet, for six months I refused to play my guitar. I didn’t want to discourage others from filling the void.
Later, I invited a street-ministry team for nine days of afternoon evangelism and evening rallies. The workers were enthusiastic and happy-and musical. For the first time in several months, our church enjoyed singing. When our guests motored out of town, they left behind a half-dozen converts-including a guitar-strumming pastor who now believed in motivational leadership.
I’ll be here only a short time
When I moved to the inner city, I intended to stay at least five years. But as attendance dwindled from twenty-five to fifteen, my perception of God’s will changed. God sent me here for a desert experience, for testing, I reasoned. Soon he’ll lead me elsewhere.
To my dismay, the pillar of cloud and fire never moved.
But several years ago I decided to work as if this were it-my permanent pastorate. That meant adapting for effectiveness here and now.
For example, I’d found Chicagoans tough, aloof, and hardened. But gradually, as friendships formed, I realized it was simply interaction city-style: cold with strangers, warm with friends. I learned to work within that and make the most of it.
And I’d been dwelling on the city’s blemishes and ignoring Chicago’s charms-miles of tree-dotted lakefront, large parks, ethnic restaurants, museums, zoos, libraries. As I committed myself to her, this city found a place in my heart. To my surprise, last year while riding a train, the familiar sights of skyscrapers, projects, and two-flats actually pleased me.
Never shift your philosophy of ministry
Joe Perales, a veteran of several active Latino churches in the area, would occasionally pressure me with suggestions for activities. “Larson, why don’t we have a picnic on Memorial Day?” was typical. I liked Joe a lot, but I’d invariably give some excuse. I loved preaching and its underpinnings-prayer, Bible study, and reading. The maxim “Preach the Word, and God will fill the pews” made good sense to me, so I wasn’t about to cut into my preparation for preaching by becoming a promoter.
Although my priorities were good, I came to see that the “God will fill the pews” maxim is not in the canon. It doesn’t tell the whole story. For us, conversions seemed more rare than off-street parking. “Visitors” didn’t visit.
I still put preaching first, but now I allot more time for planning, promotion, and visitation.
And so my unmalleable attitudes have softened. Before a recent Wednesday night service, I chatted with Mary, a friendly, middle-aged member who lives in the housing project and cannot read. Her relatives had invited her to attend another church, she told me, but she had declined. “This is my church,” she said, “and you are my pastor.”
Her statement gratified me, because she probably would not have felt this affinity during my first years here, nor would we have talked with such ease. It took an unchanging God to deal with an unchanging me.
-Craig Brian Larson
Central Assembly of God
Chicago, Illinois
Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.
