Breaking in the new guy

Where oh where have we heard that before. Being married to a family that is of an offshoot of CoG I understand this. Only with my inlaws they don't vote they get a pasto appointed. Deacons are appointed. They believe in theocracy and exclusivity of their church being the third part left therein as Zechariah says. CoG used to believe the same thing too.

Not us
our Search committee (comprised of the 3 Board Members/Deacons + 2 additional members) interviews potential candidates. When we find one that we believe is suitable, we invite the Pastor to come in as a candidate & preach at least 2 sermons (over a weekend) & then a 2/3rds majority vote of the members (conducted by a District official) to confirm.

A/G is more like the Confederacy where the churches have more power to choose how to run things.

No nerves hit, other than I'm a nerd when it comes to things I've studied, and forms of government is one of those things.

Meeting with the new guy and the senior pastor this afternoon. Time to sort things out.

Hope things go well.

Good luck, Bruce.

Remember:

The worst that they can do to you is to bend your Dog-Tags & put a Nasty Note in your Personnel File!  

I'm back from the meeting. The first minute was good, and the last second was good. Everything in between? Tense. A lot of back-tracking on earlier promises and statements. Absolutely no support from the senior pastor. Despite telling them that another deacon and several M'nette and RR leaders were concerned, they tried to keep the focus on my wife and I. At one point, the new guy felt the need to bring up an issue from 4 months ago... the 3 strikes policy I had already told both of them I wouldn't support. He tried to get me to agree, but no dice. Neither of us would budge and the senior pastor was panicking, so I finally came up with a compromise: I wouldn't send the new guy a 3 strikes kid up through May. After that, it would be a moot issue if RR goes away. They were happy to accept it. That told me a lot right there.

I don't know, guys. I'm trying to be as graceful and respectful as possible. So much has happened in the last 6 months (actually, two years). I updated the other deacon on his concerns. I think he's still going to bring it up at tomorrow's leadership meeting, which happens to be his last. A real nice guy, retired sheriff, very level-headed and spiritually in tune. I'll miss him on the board.

3 strikes hasn't been used often but only in physical altercations. I have sent others out in order to speak to mom or dad and allowed them to return.

As stated prior, if one of my guys gets 3 strikes, it only prohibits him from the Door Prize Drawing for That Week Only.

And...

Only 1 boy has gotten 3 strikes on a Wednesday, and 1 boy got 3 strikes during a campout - - in 4 years.  Again, the only consequence was to miss a Door Prize Drawing for each.

And you know what???????????

I think that this method is Most Effective when it is used to show the boy that only he is in control of his fate. The only one who can dictate whether he gets any strikes is him.

What would you do if a boy bruised another boy with pvc pipe and was out of control angry?  Some behavioral issues run to deep to be fixed by losing a prize.

I would cross that bridge when I came to it.

I'm just telling you what my personal experience is.

And that is not to say that all of my experience with the boys who come has been pleasant. There are boys who come from dysfunctional families, and things are much easier when they are not there, but it doesn't go much beyond moderate disruption, aggravation, and finding some property damage to pens & notebooks.

I do hold the belief that no one boy is more important than the entire Program. If it absolutely comes down to one or the other, then the Program should endure, and the boy would have to sit in the sanctuary with his parents.

Royal Rangers is a Team: a Unit. In order to be in Rangers, the boys must agree to be part of that Team. If they are not willing to be part of the Team, then they do not wish to be in Rangers.

So, again, it's really the kid's choice. Isn't it?

joecool wrote:I updated the other deacon on his concerns. I think he's still going to bring it up at tomorrow's leadership meeting, which happens to be his last.

Well, he broached the topic, no one asked for details, and the pastor punted to me. Seeing that no one wanted to go there, I said that my wife was over it and moving on. Funny, no one asked about me. Other things then happened that indicated to me the board is swinging back to be a "yes-man" one. I feel that I'm now the last voice crying out in the wilderness. But, pastors come and go. This is my church and I will outlast them.

Well, apparently some on the district RR staff have already read my outpost's obituary. I'm attempting to contact my District Cdr to see how that came about. Up until now, I thought our angst was just within our church body.

joecool wrote:Well, apparently some on the district RR staff have already read my outpost's obituary. I'm attempting to contact my District Cdr to see how that came about. Up until now, I thought our angst was just within our church body.

Sounds like youth pastor has killed it and letting everyone else know first. NOT cool!

Somebody from HQ might have picked up on it from the postings here, also.

Bruce is a pretty unique guy in a sparsely populated region. It wouldn't be hard to figure out what outpost he has.

We are not the ONLY ones who use the Internet for G-2 (Intelligence Collection).

 

Actually, I don't care who reads my threads. Maybe I should put some more details in my profile to make it easier for them.

You guys have been a godsend during this tough time, giving me a chance to talk with kindred spirits. I've withheld lots of things from you, because it would only put others in a very bad light, and that's not my intent. I've withheld even more from my brothers and sisters at church, because of the potential for division. If I'm patient, things will work out exactly the way the Lord intends them to. (But, it's hard.)

If they really watched this forum I'd be off staff by now.

joecool wrote: 

Actually, I don't care who reads my threads. Maybe I should put some more details in my profile to make it easier for them.

You guys have been a godsend during this tough time, giving me a chance to talk with kindred spirits. I've withheld lots of things from you, because it would only put others in a very bad light, and that's not my intent. I've withheld even more from my brothers and sisters at church, because of the potential for division. If I'm patient, things will work out exactly the way the Lord intends them to. (But, it's hard.)  

glad we can help in some fashion.
it seems like RR always gets the short end of the stick in these Rangers vs Youth struggles. Youth has a paid Pastor to advocate for it, where rangers rarely does.   

Good points, Chris.

Many/most Youth Pastors are paid. Ranger Leaders are not.

Many Pastors did their "apprenticeship" by being Youth Pastors, and so they hold Youth Pastors as a notch above other ministries.

Some Youth Pastors see Rangers as competition for Souls, Money, and Prestige. I have seen Youth Pastors, in the past, trying to pull boys out of Rangers to attend Youth Group.

This is not a 100% rule. Our current Youth Pastor is a great Hunting & Fishing guy who loves what Rangers teaches, and his own boy remained with us, until he "discovered" Pizza & Girls at/about 14 years of age.

Our youth pastor acts much like an associate pastor who heads up the Youth dept. He likes Royal Rangers a lot. We do have a automatic policy of "promoting" kids up at 13 to youth. I don't if he got that started or what. Only other issue is one of my boys had to find another way to church when the van filled up with more youth age kids. I don't feel thats fair to a regular attender to get tossed for a Youther. Basically, says to me if you're not a youther you matter less.

ccm2361 wrote: it seems like RR always gets the short end of the stick in these Rangers vs Youth struggles. Youth has a paid Pastor to advocate for it, where rangers rarely does.   

Hadn't thought of that before. I imagine it happens. In our case, the Family Life Pastor (new guy) oversees everything that ministers to the 18 and under crowd. We do have a youth pastor, who moved into that position last year after finishing a 2-year internship. He's silently biting his tongue, chafing at being micromanaged. Since everything 18 and under was going well, we all thought the new guy was going to develop classes/small groups for parents. Six months later and still nothing in that direction.

Kind-of sounds like the sort of person who tinkles in other peoples' soup, because HE thinks that it needs salt.

It just seems that ministries that have a Pastor to represent it (paid or not) seem to get preferential treatment in many churches. Whereas ministries headed by layman are required to take a back seat.

As our previous Sr. pastor once told me, "youth Pastors live or die by numbers"

That says to me that some will do anything to pump up their numbers, even at another ministries expense.