We had to take care of two other housekeeping issues regarding the search. First, we had to conduct a background check and a credit check on Brother Rick. The same weekend as the theological interview, we got two members of the committee (myself and a member who also chaired the personnel committee) to conduct both checks and to report back to the rest of the committee. We went to http://www.securesearchpro.com/ and for a very reasonable $12.00 price got a criminal background check that covered all 50 states. (He was clean). When he was in town for his theological interview, we had him go to http://www.annualcreditreport.com/ and get a free credit report. Our purpose in generating this report was to verify that his indebtedness wasn’t too substantial. Once again he was clean.
Our second task was a bit more substantial. We had an inside candidate for the position of pastor. Our youth minister had assumed a great number of responsibilities in the absence of a pastor. In fact, he was the only full-time minister remaining on staff. He assumed preaching responsibilities for several months while the church got an interim and he blossomed in that role. He also began doing hospital visits and performing funerals and weddings and did a great job in all of these areas. A few months into the process he asked me if he could submit his name as a candidate for the position. He said “How convinced do I need to be that God is calling me to be pastor before I submit my name?” I told him that I thought he only needed to be confident (and obedient) enough that God wanted him to submit his name, not necessarily convinced that he was called to become the next pastor.
After considering his candidacy, the committee was unanimous that he was not going to be the next pastor. At this time we were also reaching the end of the interview process with brother Rick. So another committee member and I took our youth pastor out to breakfast and shared with him the committee’s decision. Part of the difficulty of our task is that we wanted to be straightforward with him as to some concerns that the committee had about him in the role of pastor, while still affirming the exceptional job he was doing during the interim. He was very receptive to our concerns and took the news well. He also shared that the fact he would not be the next pastor would make his wife extremely happy! He pledged to work hard alongside the new pastor. As we shared with him about brother Rick, he grew even more excited. Although I had some initial concerns about how the meeting would go, it turned out wonderfully.
As a post-script, the church has recently changed the job title of the youth minister to that of administration/associate pastor. He now works hand in hand with the new pastor and is doing an outstanding job.
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3 comments:
As a pastor who has had a horrible personal financial experience in part due to a church not being able to pay me my full salary...I find it amazing that you have said in earlier post that the finances of the church were "dire" and yet you want a pastor whose is not...funny a boatload of you got your church into your mess, yet you want a pastor who has not had that experience. Is there a double standard here? I am new to this blog...and want you to know I have really enjoyed reading your entries...but this caught me as a little strange...yet i see this a lot...churches looking for and desiring the perfect pastor...would the committee been willing to also print out there credit report for all to see??
Ron
Interesting (in a good way) blog. Question, from a pastor...
Why did you wait until after the vote to do the background checks?
Ron,
Great question. I'll answer it in a follow up post.
Jon,
I erred. We did the criminal background check and the credit check a few days before we voted. I've edited the original post to correct this mistake.
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