"How Two Congregations Became One" A Faith & Leadership interview with Eugene ChoThe pastor of a church plant in Seattle explains the nuts and bolts of how his congregation merged with an established church in a way that honored both organizations. The key, he says, was a friendship between the two pastors and a shared belief that the assets of the church belong to the kingdom.
In 2007, Quest Church took over the property of Interbay Covenant Church in Seattle, absorbing 30 of its members and its staff. Interbay ceased to exist.
The process was surprisingly amicable, and the resulting church is stronger for it, said the Rev. Eugene Cho (link is external), who founded Quest in 2000.
Cho also is the founder of the Q Café(link is external), a coffeeshop and music venue, and One Day’s Wages(link is external), an organization dedicated to raising money to alleviate extreme global poverty. He also is a blogger, speaker and author; his first book, “Overrated: Are we More in Love with the Idea of Changing the World, Than Actually Changing the World (link is external)?”(link is external) is set to release on Sept. 1.
In this interview, Cho explains how this remarkable transformation took place, and why he largely credits the Rev. Ray Bartel, Interbay’s former pastor who now serves as one of Cho’s associate pastors. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: How did Quest Church(link is external) develop the relationship you have today with the former Interbay Covenant Church?
You know, every now and then someone contacts me and they’ll say, “Hey, Eugene, how did you get a church to give you their land and assets and building?”
And for me, it just seems like a really distorted question, because it was never the intent when we began a relationship with this church -- nor is this, obviously, what you’re asking.
But I know, from some people’s perspective, that’s the most important question. And for us, it’s not the most important question; it was just something that happened organically as a result of building the relationship.
Quest Church received the property of Interbay Covenant
Church, which included a church building and a
When we drove to this church the first time, I actually did not stop -- it was such the antithesis of what I wanted for a location for our church. Even though we were desperate, we didn’t stop, just drove by, because it was in a more industrial zone. And we were meeting in an area called the University District.
And when it got to a point where we were so desperate we needed a place in a week or so, we stopped by again and said hello to the pastor, Ray Bartel, who now happens to be one of my associate pastors, and had a friendly discussion.
He showed us the building, showed us the sanctuary, and it was nice, it didn’t surprise us in any way, but he did let us know that they also owned a warehouse, which was across the parking lot; it was a 4,500-square-foot space.
It was not occupied at that time; in fact, it had been recommended to be shut down by the fire marshals.
So we began our relationship with them as tenants. They were our landlords. To put it in much more Christian terms, we became neighbors, if you will -- colleagues partnering in ministry. And even though there weren’t a lot of things that we were doing together, I think it was a process of getting to know one another, which took place over the course of many years.
And during that time, the pastor, Ray, and I became good friends. We had meals together; we would share our burdens together. So that’s how it all began. Probably the most important thing is the authenticity of a relationship between two pastors, along with the church communities.
Q: The notion that you would go from being the church plant tenant to being the lead pastor, with Ray Bartel working as your associate, seems like such an unusual and generous transformation.
Yes, yes. Absolutely. I think that’s probably the most compelling aspect of this story. Ray Bartel was in his [late 50s] at that time. And he’s a second-career pastor -- worked at Boeing for some time. Has a couple of decades of ministry under his belt.
And to give you a little bit of the landscape of Interbay Covenant Church, they were about the average-size church in Seattle. They were about 70 people. They had no debt; they had this land and building, which isn’t huge, but it’s fairly valuable, because it’s located in the city of Seattle.
So they didn’t really have to do what they eventually chose to do. I think that’s the most important part, at least for me, of radical grace and generosity in this story.
But I think what was tugging at his heart, in addition to maybe some of their leaders, is that while they understood the importance of being missional, of engaging the culture, of doing ministry in today’s current context, they understood it theologically.
Pastor Ray has read the books; he understood. But I think he, along with the church especially, had a hard time translating that into application, into practicing it.
I think that’s what was a big struggle for him, as well as for the church.
A year later, through Interbay Covenant Church’s assistance, we were able to remodel the warehouse next door. And so we created our office spaces there, created a nonprofit cafe, community center, music venue, art space, and also used that space for our church gatherings on Sundays.
When we moved over to Interbay Church, we were initially about 30 people; 30 people became 60 people; 60 people became 120 people; one service became two services; two services became three services.
And they were not at all territorial. They weren’t at all insecure about it, but I think they began to ask what anybody would ask: “Why are they growing -- and why aren’t we growing?”
And I think that, again, speaks to Ray’s leadership. I think he had the courage to ask those questions, and I think some of those leaders also were asking those questions. And I think, as a result, we began to talk more about what that could look like. But it really stemmed from his maturity as a leader, his security in the gospel, and I think something about the larger vision of the kingdom.
When the conversation with Ray and I began to escalate after, I would say, a full year of a lot of prayer and discussion, he brought it up to his leadership team. They eventually had some discussions, and they voted on this merger.
“Merger” is what we called it, because we thought it was the most honorable, dignifying way of calling it. I’ve had some people look at it from their corporate lens and say it was a takeover, and it wasn’t a takeover, because it was all on their own initiation.
But when their leadership team voted on it initially, it was 9 to 1 against it. Ray was the only one that voted for it. So that’s a really important part of the story, because even though it makes sense and even though there were some who understood it in their minds, when it became closer to reality, it was really frightening.
So it’s important to share that when they first had their vote, it was 9 to 1 against it. And Ray made a promise to his leadership team that he would never bring this up again on his own accord, because he didn’t want to be that pastor that was somehow manipulating or shoving something down his team’s throat.
And I really respect him for that. I was discouraged that day when he told me the results of the vote, but that’s how it turned out.
And so for me, I started looking at other places, because we were at a point where we were now running three services and we needed a larger space. And so I had to be more active in looking for other spaces.
It was several months later that his leadership team came back to Ray and said, “OK, we’re now ready to talk about it.”
And I think the initial first wave of conversation was just so radical for them that they just had a hard time processing it. During that time, they said, “Well, if we merge and that would mean that Eugene would become our senior pastor, we’d like to get to know him better to see if that’s something that we would feel comfortable with.”
And as pastorally as I could, as gently as I could, I said to this person, “I know exactly what it will look like. It will look like Quest Church, as we are right now.”
And I think that was stunning for that person, because I think when you think of the word “merger,” the assumption is that this new thing would come about.
So I explained to this person that while it would look like Quest Church, I think about the legacy of their relationships, the legacy of their story, the legacy of all the gifts that they bring into our church. And about 30 of them actually joined our church after the merger officially took place. Our congregation at that point, including our children, was probably around 400 or so.
Their leadership team had another vote, and they voted 9 to 1 for the merger. And the one person, an amazing gentleman, who could not give his endorsement -- he was one of the church planters, one of the founding members of that church. He literally built the very foundation of that church, because he was in construction.
But they continued, and they joined our new church afterward, he and his wife.
Q: I get a sense that you brought something to that congregation, and obviously you were able to leverage the physical plant. What did that congregation bring to you that you didn’t have without them?
Our church was so young -- we have a bunch of 20-somethings, 30-somethings -- and one of the things that we were sorely lacking in was wisdom. You can’t fabricate time. So we have these folks that are older brothers and sisters in Christ who were in their 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s -- we had a couple of ladies hit their 100s before they passed away -- and came with so much. Not just faith and love for the gospel and their vision for the kingdom, but just so much wisdom, and their desire to love on these young people as well.
That was a huge answer to prayer, and it’s really hard to quantify the value of that to a church community like ours that was enthusiastic but lacking in experience, lacking in wisdom.
And I would just say that that would be the same with me as well. I was then probably around 35, 36 years old; I was 31 when I planted Quest Church. And while I have my share of experiences, it was always a great thing to have another pastor like Ray join our team, and with that comes his gifts and talents and also his wisdom and experience.
Q: Was Quest always an Evangelical Covenant church?
I was part of a mainline denomination some years ago. I did my theological studies at Princeton Theological Seminary, but at some point over the years, I had grown somewhat cynical about denominations and really about the larger organized religion conversation. So I kind of swore off denominations as a whole. When I planted Quest Church, it was nondenominational.
And as it started growing, a couple of things happened. One, people were asking, “Who are you with?” They didn’t care at first, but as we started growing, people started caring a little bit. And I didn’t have an answer, in terms of where our accountability came from.
The further we moved along the process, feeling like an island to ourselves became very apparent. And one of the themes of our church is that we’re never an island to ourselves. And I felt like we needed to live that out, even as a church plant.
Along the way, we began to speak with a denomination called the Evangelical Covenant Church. So when we were renting the space from Interbay, we became an official Covenant church.
So by the time that we had been in discussions of merging with Interbay, we were officially an Evangelical Covenant church, which made the process a little easier.
I distinctly remember one of their questions that -- it did sting a little bit, but it made sense to me -- the question they asked was, “Are you really a Covenant church?”
And I think the meaning behind that question is that, like all denominations, the world is changing. The Covenant denomination was started by Swedish immigrants in 1885 and was predominantly an outreach to Swedish immigrants -- families and communities.
They eventually learned that their vision for the kingdom and for ministry needed to expand, not just theologically, but also for its own survival. And so the Covenant is one of the more diverse denominations in the country right now.
And so they asked that question because we just did not look like a typical Covenant church. We were very diverse, with a young Asian leader, but by the time the merger took place, we were indeed a fully functioning Covenant church.
Q: So did their congregation actually dissolve?
They dissolved; that’s right.
We literally gave them blank sheets of paper and we said, “We want to honor you through this process. We want to make sure that your team is heard. We want to make sure that we can do all that we can to recognize the deep sacrifice and to honor your community.”
And so we asked them to write down everything that was important to them. That would be part of that commitment of seeing them and honoring them and recognizing them. And so they did.
Some of them included stuff like [the fact that] they wanted to merge their staff for at least one year, for us to assume relationship and support of all of their missionaries, to allow all of their members who wanted to continue to become members at Quest Church -- things of that nature.
They only had two staff; they had an administrator, and then they had Pastor Ray. And so we joyfully brought them onto our team, and Ray became one of several associate pastors at our church.
And we laugh about this -- I was just talking to him [about it] a couple of weeks ago over lunch -- we laugh about this, because his plan, which he had shared with me, was that he was intending to just stay on for one year and move on.
After that first year, he came to me, as well as my elder board, and he wanted to make sure (these are his words) that -- he didn’t want to feel like “dead weight.” You know, that we were not doing things for the sake of stroking his ego.
But he also decided that he no longer needed to receive a salary from the church, that he lives fairly simply, he and his wife, Joy. Joy still does our grounds; she takes care of the grass and the weeds and flowers. She doesn’t have to, but she remains committed to that.
And so he’s been a full-time associate pastor for the last seven years. The last six of those years, he’s not taken a salary, which has really enabled our church to make investments in other places, in other staff and other ministries.
So, again, it’s just an amazing -- the more I talk about it, I’m starting to get a little emotional. I respect that man, I love that man, and I really believe that when the time comes, he will truly sense God’s pleasure over his life.
Q: That is an amazing story. I mean, the lack of ego in that transition is pretty astounding.
It was not as easy as maybe it sounds. I think internally there were some things. All of us are committed to the team. We’ve got a team of 17 people on our staff, including a couple of pastors that are well-known on a national level.
What Ray would tell you is that it was a lot more difficult than he thought it was going to be. He knew it was going to be difficult. None of us are naive; we’ve been around the block a few times. [But] even though we’re team-oriented and kingdom-minded, we all have a sense of ego; we all have a sense of identity.
Q: I can imagine it probably was difficult for you, too; you could feel threatened by the former senior pastor.
I don’t know if I ever felt threatened. I think part of it, again, is just because of who he is. But I think both of us really understand what it means to be colleagues. I think both of us really understand the honor it is to be a minister of the word and sacrament. I don’t think either of us ever felt threatened.
I think the thing that I struggled with the most was that even though it looked like Quest Church, in terms of expression, in terms of its ministry, in terms of language, in terms of our worship, it was really trying to pastor well the whole church, including the 30 or so folk that chose to join Quest Church from Interbay.
There were times that I just really struggled: “Am I a good pastor? Am I doing this well?” We were navigating lots of changes, and growth possibilities as well.
We’re not a large church, but we’re currently about 800 people. There’s constant transitions and challenges that came our way, and I would just say it’s the insecurity of a pastor not knowing exactly how to navigate those waters; everything was a first-time experience, including planting a church.
Q: You were a very young, fresh, new way of doing church, and yet you took on a kind of history and tradition that you didn’t have before.
I had about 10 years of ministry experience prior to [Quest], in different contexts. You could read the books, you could read magazines and articles, you could do a lot of those things, and then the actual doing it is just an entirely different experience.
It reminds me of being a parent of three kids; you could read all the books and go to all the classes that hospitals offer, but it’s a different experience when you’re actually holding a kid at 2 o’clock in the morning.
And I’m so grateful, because the one distinction now, as opposed to the first year of the church plant, is not only were we significantly smaller -- we began with seven people -- [but] I was its only leader. And there were times it was very lonely. There’s a lot of self-doubting, self-deprecation as well.
[Now, I’m] in a position where I get to have a robust lay leadership on all levels of our church, to be able to journey with other women and men, people from different walks of life.
While we’re committed to the same trajectory, we also come with our unique gifts and skill sets and lenses by which we see things. This has been a profound impact, not just for the church, but a profound impact for my soul as a believer and as a leader in ministry.Monday, April 27, 2015
Facing Decline, Finding Hope is a powerful book for leaders who want to honestly assess the size of their church and plan for faithful, invigorating service regardless of whether membership numbers are up or down.
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The Mission-Focused Board
A Church Network Webinar with Dan Hotchkiss
May 5 at 2:30 p.m. EDT
True partnership begins with clear role boundaries, effective delegation and a constructive system of accountability. Alban author and consultant Dan Hotchkiss offers fresh perspective and practical steps to help a church to move beyond frustrating and ineffective management of boards, clergy and staff.
The webinar will help participants to:
Keep the church's mission at the center of its ministry.
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Make space for spiritual discernment and holy conversations.
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Ideas that Impact: Merging Congregations
And the Two Shall Become OneCongregational Mergers Present Opportunities for Growth–As Well as Unique Challenges
With a slew of bad economic news for businesses lately, it’s no surprise that faith communities are also feeling the effects of the poor economy.
Although there are few statistics on how congregations are being affected by the recession, many have felt the pinch for quite some time. And like failing businesses, many congregations are weighing their options—including merging with other houses of worship.
Alice Mann, senior consultant at the Alban Institute, says a congregational merger is “a strategy for dramatic change.” She strongly encourages congregations to look at all their options before considering a merge so they’ll be very clear as to whether a merger will be beneficial. As she points out, mergers are universally stressful situations, and they usually demand much more change than the people involved ever anticipated.
“Readiness” is a key component when considering a merger, and according to Mann, it involves four things:
Practical issues“Congregational merger” is a far-reaching term with many possible variables. In some cases a stable church or synagogue will absorb a struggling congregation, in which case one party simply closes its doors and there are no negotiations to speak of. However, sometimes the receiving church will go to great lengths to welcome the new congregation, incorporating some of their traditions and even taking on their staff.
Probably the biggest issues involved with a merger are matters of the heart. When two congregations are joined together, blessings are multiplied, but for the sake of unity, some things may also be sacrificed.
When the Fields Yield No Food: The Story of a Church Merger by Brett Opalinski
"[The prophet Habakkuk's] hope resonates with me as I reflect on the story of Rader Memorial United Methodist Church, a church that embarked on a journey from death to resurrection, but not in the way one may expect. It is not the story of a down-and-out church that changed its ways to find people flocking to its pews. That would have been a nice story to write, but it is not the story of this church. No, Rader's story is one of death and the unlikely hope that there was something beyond that death."In the prophetic literature of the Hebrew Bible, Habakkuk ends with the prophet uttering the following words:
Rader had a story that its people were very proud of. It was founded in the northeast quadrant of Miami in the early 1920s, and in the 1950s and ’60s it was one of the premier churches in the Florida Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church. The large sanctuary was full on Sunday mornings and Sunday school classes brimmed over with kids and adults. Old black-and-white photos showed a choir loft that was full of people in crisp white choir robes.
Then everything changed. In the late 1960s the neighborhood began to experience transformation; Little Haiti moved closer to the church and church members moved farther away. Between the late 1960s and the early ’80s, Rader lost nearly 1,000 members. It was a period of transition from which the church would never fully rebound. There was a loyal remnant that remained, but a significant number moved to other neighborhoods, other churches. Unfortunately, those remaining had a large facility and a shrinking congregation. Fortunately, there were funds from trusts and the sale of real estate that provided a healthy flow of income to the church. These would be enough for a time.
In early 2004, I was in Denver, Colorado, finishing up coursework in a Ph.D. program in New Testament and early Christian history. Since I knew I would soon enter the dissertation phase, my family and I decided it was time to return home to Florida and request an appointment to a local church. I contacted my district superintendent with my request, and a short time later he called and said, “I have just the place for you, Rader Memorial United Methodist Church, in Miami.”
I asked if I could think about it for a few days and immediately called a friend who had been raised at Rader to ask what he thought. His response was swift: “Don’t do it!” Rader, he said, was perceived as a church moving in the wrong direction and would not be a pleasant place to serve. I thanked him and assured him that I would pray about the decision, which I did. A few days later, I told my wife that I really felt called to accept the appointment and “if it means turning the church around, so be it, and if it means closing the doors, so be it.”
So my family and I found ourselves back in Florida, in the strange, beautiful, diverse world of Miami, and I began my new appointment at Rader. There were some ominous signs from the start. For one, the church secretary quit the Friday before I was to arrive. Some church members quickly scrambled to get volunteer teenagers to answer phones, but that lasted only for a short time. In something of a surreal moment, I even discovered the cremated remains of two individuals in the closet of my office. On my first Sunday I arrived very early to find bulletins that were several months old stacked on pews in the narthex of the sanctuary. In the balcony I found bulletins that were several years old. It was obvious that no one had been in the sanctuary balcony in some time. It also looked as if the carpet in the sanctuary had not been vacuumed in quite a while. As it got closer to worship time, I began to wonder if anyone was even going to show up. A little while later there were only a few people who had arrived to take their places in the rather large sanctuary.
Signs of Hope
Yet there was a moment on that first Sunday that has brought me comfort many days since. As I stood to do the benediction at the close of the service I looked out at the diversity of people in that small congregation: young and old, black and white, men and women, gay and straight, Haitian, Bahaman, and Jamaican. I remember having a strong sense that this representation of diversity is what the Kingdom of God looks like. This vision became proof for me that the living Jesus was at work in this church and with these people.
This was not the only flicker of hope, though. While many of the past church leaders had long since left, others remained, and some of the new members to the church had extraordinary leadership skills. There were also some exciting ministries happening. A food closet passed out nonperishable items on a daily basis, a Wednesday community meal provided food to many in need of food or just basic social interaction, and the small music program had noticeable talent.
I look back at my sermons from that time and they were full of hope, based on the potential I saw in these people and their ministries. In the early days, I honestly believed that if we worked and prayed hard enough, change would come. This prayer was answered, but not as I would have expected or wanted.
Signs of Trouble
The tide started to change, though, a little over a year after my arrival at the church. Some of the financial reports left me with questions and concerns, and as I looked into these matters further I discovered that the trust funds the church had been relying on were running out much faster than anyone had projected. When I arrived, the last remaining trust fund was at $125,000. A couple of years prior, the Finance Committee had decided to begin using some of the principal from the trust with the plan to put the funds back when funds were available; this, of course, is a slippery slope, and it is no surprise that no money was paid back on the principal. As the balance dwindled, it was brought to the attention of the Finance Committee that the balance was now at $55,000. The math was simple: there would not be money left in the account for long. The budget at that point was already skeletal, with funds used almost exclusively for keeping the doors open and the lights on. Money would have to be transferred from the trust fund just to meet that budget. There were pledges to supplement the trust fund transfers (in fact they had increased over the previous year), but there was just not enough money or time to stop the bleeding in the trust fund balance. When that money ran out, the coffers would be empty.
There was another event that, I see now, was significant to the church’s story—the death of a certain member. This gentleman was in his early eighties but had the energy and spirit of a twenty-year-old. He had been away from the church for about ten years caring for his wife, who had Alzheimer’s. When he returned—at about the same time I arrived—he was appalled at the condition of the church. He immediately went to work at organizing a United Methodist men’s ministry to get the men of the congregation more active and involved. He confronted church leadership about how they needed to “clean the bathrooms and vacuum the carpet.” People listened to him. He was determined that as long as Rader was open, the church was going to make a difference. His thick New York accent seemed to motivate people in ways that amazed me. Then, out of the blue, he died of a sudden heart attack in his front yard. The church was stunned and something of the life went out of the congregation. They would never fully recover from this death.
A few weeks later, Hurricane Wilma passed through our area, leaving behind fallen trees and tattered roofs. Some of the people in the area were without power for sixteen days. The church, having a gas stove, served morning coffee and powdered soup to those in nearby homes. A few days later, the United Methodist Committee on Relief delivered several semi-trucks full of supplies that we stored in our fellowship hall and distributed to the community. As we passed out canned goods and health kits, cleaned up tree branches, and put things back together, we didn’t realize that it was the aftershock of the hurricane that would impact us the most.
As the new year began, significant financial problems still faced Rader Memorial. Then the bill for property insurance arrived. As members of the Florida Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, Rader was part of a conference-wide property insurance plan. As a result of the hurricanes that passed through Florida, our premium rose from $30,000 to over $60,000. There was no foreseeable way to pay this bill.
I do not point to the insurance increase as the reason that Rader had to close its doors. It was simply the event that forced our hand sooner than expected. Even if the premium had stayed the same, there would have been serious financial difficulties to come to terms with, but now we had choices to make. The first big decision involved me. I did not see any way that the congregation could afford a full-time pastor. After much prayer and struggle, I contacted my district superintendent and told her that there was no way I could return the following year. This was especially hard since I had preached such hope at the beginning. But the fields were not yielding the fruit that I had hoped.
Very early in the process I went to my district superintendent to explain the situation. I brought financial data and reports and discussed what I thought were possible scenarios. She helped me work through questions about my leaving Rader and was often a voice of comfort. I cannot overstate the support that I received from her and the difference it made in this process. It became a well from which to draw strength, courage, and reassurance.
Considering Our Options
In light of the situation now before us, I wanted to be proactive. I did some research and reflection and made a list of several options the congregation could consider; including bringing in a part-time local pastor, selling the property and relocating to a smaller facility, merging with another congregation, and sharing facilities with another congregation. In addition, we put together a process for making that decision.
The first step would be to tell our Staff Parish Relations Committee that I would be leaving in June and that this was not negotiable. That same night I would hold a meeting of the entire congregation to explain the issues, walk them through their options one at a time, and answer any questions they may have. A second meeting was scheduled for two weeks later to give church members an opportunity, after they had had a chance to contemplate the options, to ask more questions. The district superintendent agreed to be present at that meeting. A third meeting was scheduled for two weeks after that, where a vote would be taken about what to do.
If this sounds like a hurried process, it was. Funds were running out quickly and decisions had to be made; we did not have the luxury of time. When the third meeting came, there was little discussion. The plan was that we would vote on all eight options, then a second and final vote would be taken on the top two. As the final vote was being tallied, the district superintendent led the congregation in song. I will never forget the sight of longtime church members, awaiting the result of the vote with tears streaming down their faces, singing the old hymns of the church. In the end, the vote was twenty-four to twenty-two in favor of merging with another congregation.
Finding Our New Home
Things moved quickly from there. A team was put together to find another congregation for us to merge with. Interestingly, some churches (most in a similar financial situation as Rader) approached us about joining them, but our view was that we didn’t want to join another congregation in a situation similar to our own. We couldn’t see putting the congregation through all of this again a few years later. We wanted to join a congregation that was United Methodist, active in ministry, financially stable and close enough that members would not have to adjust their commute too much. Further, because the church was proactive, the funds from the sale of the Rader property would be transferred to the merged congregation. This was significant, as the building sold about a year later for several million dollars and this became part of what Rader could offer in the merger of the congregations: we could come with new people and resources.
The team began by brainstorming a list of United Methodist Churches in the area that were candidates. Most of the members of the team were at least somewhat familiar with the churches first mentioned. They knew members of each of the congregations and had worked together on various projects, ministries, and district committees, so there was a level of familiarity with the congregations and the congregations with Rader. Some were easily ruled out for the reasons mentioned above. For those that were possibilities, it was decided that members of the committee would visit the different congregations to try to get an even better sense of them. This took several weeks, and then there were several meetings to reflect on the various experiences team members had had at the other churches.
To some degree, the work of approaching other churches about the possibility of merging was done for us. Among United Methodists in the northeast part of Miami, word about Rader’s situation spread fast. In addition, I had a good relationship with many of the other United Methodist clergy in the area and I had numerous conversations with them about the events at Rader and the congregation’s upcoming decisions. One of the advantages of this was that I could get a sense during these conversations as to whether or not another congregation was interested in merger; most were, because it would mean more people and additional resources for them.
In the end, the Rader team recommended merging with Fulford United Methodist Church, located a few miles north of Rader. They were financially stable, had active ministries, and the personnel and other resources we could bring to Fulford represented great potential for growing the ministries that Fulford was already engaged in. Further, the resources we could contribute would enable Fulford to do some needed work to their facilities to increase ministry effectiveness, such as improvements that were needed to their preschool and education building.
I conferred with the pastor of Fulford, who took the proposal to the church’s Charge Conference (the governing body in local United Methodist congregations). They voted to approve the merger.
Each church now put together a transition team to help work through the process. Interestingly, the biggest question was what to name the merged congregation. The people from Rader graciously stated the name should remain Fulford because of historical significance, and so it did. The other question was property, but it was quickly decided that the Rader congregation would come to Fulford and the Rader property would be sold. The merger also meant there were now two pastors involved in the process. My colleague from Fulford was an amazing pastoral presence to both the people of Fulford and Rader. When I would leave a month or so later, she was left with much of the healing that remained. As my strength was running out, she carried the work through.
There were aftershocks that I never anticipated. There were some at Rader opposed to merger who acted out their grief in difficult ways. I remember one person telling me she would rather see the church’s refrigerator sent to a mission somewhere than go to the new church. There were some who openly stated that they would have preferred to see Rader just run out of money and close its doors. At one point, when I took a few days vacation, some even brought their cars down to the church and began taking plates and cookware from the kitchen, claiming they had paid for it over the years and it belonged to them. Many directed their anger at me for forcing the decision. After my children came upon an angry church member yelling at me one Sunday, we made the difficult decision that my wife and children would go ahead and make the move to Fulford. Even during these last days, denial was present. “There has got to be money somewhere,” one elderly woman insisted. “You are just not looking in the right places.” Many of the members with these reactions refused to go to Fulford, instead finding other church homes. One word of caution that I offer is while additional resources and people sound enticing, merger comes with a cost. There is a great deal of pastoral work to be done and sometimes as a pastor I had to put on a thick skin to walk with people in their grief. There were many days I came home exhausted and depleted, even after the decision was made.
New Beginnings
When Rader Memorial United Methodist Church’s last Sunday arrived, we celebrated its ministry through the years. It was both a sad and a joyful day. At the end of the service, we de-consecrated the sanctuary and recessed out with the cross that had stood on the altar for so many years! The cross was then taken by Rader members the few miles drive to Fulford. As we knocked on the door of the Fulford sanctuary, the congregation was waiting for us with bright smiles and nervous anticipation. We proceeded in and placed our old cross on a new altar table. A new day had begun.
I left for a new church about a month after that day. My colleague in ministry had many more pastoral and administrative issues to deal with. About a year later I went back to Fulford to do a baptism for a close friend. I was nervous about what I would see and experience. I knew that some were still angry with me. What I saw, though, was a beautiful sight: people working, serving, and worshiping together. There in that newly merged congregation, the fields were slowly producing food again. Long-awaited resurrection had finally come.
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NOTE 1. Habakkuk 3:17–18 (NRSV)
Principles for leaders to keep in mind:
Senior Consultant, The Alban Institute
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Questions for Reflection
From the experience of Rader United Methodist Church and her own extensive work with congregations, Alice Mann identifies eight key principles for leaders to keep in mind when merging congregations.
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Alban
In this interview, Cho explains how this remarkable transformation took place, and why he largely credits the Rev. Ray Bartel, Interbay’s former pastor who now serves as one of Cho’s associate pastors. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: How did Quest Church(link is external) develop the relationship you have today with the former Interbay Covenant Church?
You know, every now and then someone contacts me and they’ll say, “Hey, Eugene, how did you get a church to give you their land and assets and building?”
And for me, it just seems like a really distorted question, because it was never the intent when we began a relationship with this church -- nor is this, obviously, what you’re asking.
But I know, from some people’s perspective, that’s the most important question. And for us, it’s not the most important question; it was just something that happened organically as a result of building the relationship.
Church, which included a church building and a
warehouse space.
Our relationship with Interbay Covenant Church began because we needed a place to worship as a new church plant. When someone suggested Interbay Covenant Church, it was laughable, because I had never even heard of a neighborhood called Interbay.When we drove to this church the first time, I actually did not stop -- it was such the antithesis of what I wanted for a location for our church. Even though we were desperate, we didn’t stop, just drove by, because it was in a more industrial zone. And we were meeting in an area called the University District.
And when it got to a point where we were so desperate we needed a place in a week or so, we stopped by again and said hello to the pastor, Ray Bartel, who now happens to be one of my associate pastors, and had a friendly discussion.
He showed us the building, showed us the sanctuary, and it was nice, it didn’t surprise us in any way, but he did let us know that they also owned a warehouse, which was across the parking lot; it was a 4,500-square-foot space.
It was not occupied at that time; in fact, it had been recommended to be shut down by the fire marshals.
So we began our relationship with them as tenants. They were our landlords. To put it in much more Christian terms, we became neighbors, if you will -- colleagues partnering in ministry. And even though there weren’t a lot of things that we were doing together, I think it was a process of getting to know one another, which took place over the course of many years.
And during that time, the pastor, Ray, and I became good friends. We had meals together; we would share our burdens together. So that’s how it all began. Probably the most important thing is the authenticity of a relationship between two pastors, along with the church communities.
Q: The notion that you would go from being the church plant tenant to being the lead pastor, with Ray Bartel working as your associate, seems like such an unusual and generous transformation.
Yes, yes. Absolutely. I think that’s probably the most compelling aspect of this story. Ray Bartel was in his [late 50s] at that time. And he’s a second-career pastor -- worked at Boeing for some time. Has a couple of decades of ministry under his belt.
And to give you a little bit of the landscape of Interbay Covenant Church, they were about the average-size church in Seattle. They were about 70 people. They had no debt; they had this land and building, which isn’t huge, but it’s fairly valuable, because it’s located in the city of Seattle.
So they didn’t really have to do what they eventually chose to do. I think that’s the most important part, at least for me, of radical grace and generosity in this story.
But I think what was tugging at his heart, in addition to maybe some of their leaders, is that while they understood the importance of being missional, of engaging the culture, of doing ministry in today’s current context, they understood it theologically.
Pastor Ray has read the books; he understood. But I think he, along with the church especially, had a hard time translating that into application, into practicing it.
I think that’s what was a big struggle for him, as well as for the church.
A year later, through Interbay Covenant Church’s assistance, we were able to remodel the warehouse next door. And so we created our office spaces there, created a nonprofit cafe, community center, music venue, art space, and also used that space for our church gatherings on Sundays.
When we moved over to Interbay Church, we were initially about 30 people; 30 people became 60 people; 60 people became 120 people; one service became two services; two services became three services.
And they were not at all territorial. They weren’t at all insecure about it, but I think they began to ask what anybody would ask: “Why are they growing -- and why aren’t we growing?”
And I think that, again, speaks to Ray’s leadership. I think he had the courage to ask those questions, and I think some of those leaders also were asking those questions. And I think, as a result, we began to talk more about what that could look like. But it really stemmed from his maturity as a leader, his security in the gospel, and I think something about the larger vision of the kingdom.
When the conversation with Ray and I began to escalate after, I would say, a full year of a lot of prayer and discussion, he brought it up to his leadership team. They eventually had some discussions, and they voted on this merger.
“Merger” is what we called it, because we thought it was the most honorable, dignifying way of calling it. I’ve had some people look at it from their corporate lens and say it was a takeover, and it wasn’t a takeover, because it was all on their own initiation.
But when their leadership team voted on it initially, it was 9 to 1 against it. Ray was the only one that voted for it. So that’s a really important part of the story, because even though it makes sense and even though there were some who understood it in their minds, when it became closer to reality, it was really frightening.
So it’s important to share that when they first had their vote, it was 9 to 1 against it. And Ray made a promise to his leadership team that he would never bring this up again on his own accord, because he didn’t want to be that pastor that was somehow manipulating or shoving something down his team’s throat.
And I really respect him for that. I was discouraged that day when he told me the results of the vote, but that’s how it turned out.
And so for me, I started looking at other places, because we were at a point where we were now running three services and we needed a larger space. And so I had to be more active in looking for other spaces.
It was several months later that his leadership team came back to Ray and said, “OK, we’re now ready to talk about it.”
And I think the initial first wave of conversation was just so radical for them that they just had a hard time processing it. During that time, they said, “Well, if we merge and that would mean that Eugene would become our senior pastor, we’d like to get to know him better to see if that’s something that we would feel comfortable with.”
Cho prays during a service at Quest Church.
One of the defining moments, at least for me, was when one of their members came to me, during one of our formal meetings, and said, “You know, Pastor Eugene, as our two churches meet, I’m having a hard time visualizing what this new church will look like. As the senior pastor, can you tell me what you believe this new church will look like?”And as pastorally as I could, as gently as I could, I said to this person, “I know exactly what it will look like. It will look like Quest Church, as we are right now.”
And I think that was stunning for that person, because I think when you think of the word “merger,” the assumption is that this new thing would come about.
So I explained to this person that while it would look like Quest Church, I think about the legacy of their relationships, the legacy of their story, the legacy of all the gifts that they bring into our church. And about 30 of them actually joined our church after the merger officially took place. Our congregation at that point, including our children, was probably around 400 or so.
Their leadership team had another vote, and they voted 9 to 1 for the merger. And the one person, an amazing gentleman, who could not give his endorsement -- he was one of the church planters, one of the founding members of that church. He literally built the very foundation of that church, because he was in construction.
But they continued, and they joined our new church afterward, he and his wife.
Q: I get a sense that you brought something to that congregation, and obviously you were able to leverage the physical plant. What did that congregation bring to you that you didn’t have without them?
Our church was so young -- we have a bunch of 20-somethings, 30-somethings -- and one of the things that we were sorely lacking in was wisdom. You can’t fabricate time. So we have these folks that are older brothers and sisters in Christ who were in their 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s -- we had a couple of ladies hit their 100s before they passed away -- and came with so much. Not just faith and love for the gospel and their vision for the kingdom, but just so much wisdom, and their desire to love on these young people as well.
That was a huge answer to prayer, and it’s really hard to quantify the value of that to a church community like ours that was enthusiastic but lacking in experience, lacking in wisdom.
And I would just say that that would be the same with me as well. I was then probably around 35, 36 years old; I was 31 when I planted Quest Church. And while I have my share of experiences, it was always a great thing to have another pastor like Ray join our team, and with that comes his gifts and talents and also his wisdom and experience.
Q: Was Quest always an Evangelical Covenant church?
I was part of a mainline denomination some years ago. I did my theological studies at Princeton Theological Seminary, but at some point over the years, I had grown somewhat cynical about denominations and really about the larger organized religion conversation. So I kind of swore off denominations as a whole. When I planted Quest Church, it was nondenominational.
And as it started growing, a couple of things happened. One, people were asking, “Who are you with?” They didn’t care at first, but as we started growing, people started caring a little bit. And I didn’t have an answer, in terms of where our accountability came from.
The further we moved along the process, feeling like an island to ourselves became very apparent. And one of the themes of our church is that we’re never an island to ourselves. And I felt like we needed to live that out, even as a church plant.
Along the way, we began to speak with a denomination called the Evangelical Covenant Church. So when we were renting the space from Interbay, we became an official Covenant church.
So by the time that we had been in discussions of merging with Interbay, we were officially an Evangelical Covenant church, which made the process a little easier.
I distinctly remember one of their questions that -- it did sting a little bit, but it made sense to me -- the question they asked was, “Are you really a Covenant church?”
And I think the meaning behind that question is that, like all denominations, the world is changing. The Covenant denomination was started by Swedish immigrants in 1885 and was predominantly an outreach to Swedish immigrants -- families and communities.
They eventually learned that their vision for the kingdom and for ministry needed to expand, not just theologically, but also for its own survival. And so the Covenant is one of the more diverse denominations in the country right now.
And so they asked that question because we just did not look like a typical Covenant church. We were very diverse, with a young Asian leader, but by the time the merger took place, we were indeed a fully functioning Covenant church.
Q: So did their congregation actually dissolve?
They dissolved; that’s right.
We literally gave them blank sheets of paper and we said, “We want to honor you through this process. We want to make sure that your team is heard. We want to make sure that we can do all that we can to recognize the deep sacrifice and to honor your community.”
And so we asked them to write down everything that was important to them. That would be part of that commitment of seeing them and honoring them and recognizing them. And so they did.
Some of them included stuff like [the fact that] they wanted to merge their staff for at least one year, for us to assume relationship and support of all of their missionaries, to allow all of their members who wanted to continue to become members at Quest Church -- things of that nature.
They only had two staff; they had an administrator, and then they had Pastor Ray. And so we joyfully brought them onto our team, and Ray became one of several associate pastors at our church.
And we laugh about this -- I was just talking to him [about it] a couple of weeks ago over lunch -- we laugh about this, because his plan, which he had shared with me, was that he was intending to just stay on for one year and move on.
After that first year, he came to me, as well as my elder board, and he wanted to make sure (these are his words) that -- he didn’t want to feel like “dead weight.” You know, that we were not doing things for the sake of stroking his ego.
But he also decided that he no longer needed to receive a salary from the church, that he lives fairly simply, he and his wife, Joy. Joy still does our grounds; she takes care of the grass and the weeds and flowers. She doesn’t have to, but she remains committed to that.
And so he’s been a full-time associate pastor for the last seven years. The last six of those years, he’s not taken a salary, which has really enabled our church to make investments in other places, in other staff and other ministries.
So, again, it’s just an amazing -- the more I talk about it, I’m starting to get a little emotional. I respect that man, I love that man, and I really believe that when the time comes, he will truly sense God’s pleasure over his life.
Q: That is an amazing story. I mean, the lack of ego in that transition is pretty astounding.
It was not as easy as maybe it sounds. I think internally there were some things. All of us are committed to the team. We’ve got a team of 17 people on our staff, including a couple of pastors that are well-known on a national level.
What Ray would tell you is that it was a lot more difficult than he thought it was going to be. He knew it was going to be difficult. None of us are naive; we’ve been around the block a few times. [But] even though we’re team-oriented and kingdom-minded, we all have a sense of ego; we all have a sense of identity.
Q: I can imagine it probably was difficult for you, too; you could feel threatened by the former senior pastor.
I don’t know if I ever felt threatened. I think part of it, again, is just because of who he is. But I think both of us really understand what it means to be colleagues. I think both of us really understand the honor it is to be a minister of the word and sacrament. I don’t think either of us ever felt threatened.
I think the thing that I struggled with the most was that even though it looked like Quest Church, in terms of expression, in terms of its ministry, in terms of language, in terms of our worship, it was really trying to pastor well the whole church, including the 30 or so folk that chose to join Quest Church from Interbay.
There were times that I just really struggled: “Am I a good pastor? Am I doing this well?” We were navigating lots of changes, and growth possibilities as well.
We’re not a large church, but we’re currently about 800 people. There’s constant transitions and challenges that came our way, and I would just say it’s the insecurity of a pastor not knowing exactly how to navigate those waters; everything was a first-time experience, including planting a church.
Q: You were a very young, fresh, new way of doing church, and yet you took on a kind of history and tradition that you didn’t have before.
I had about 10 years of ministry experience prior to [Quest], in different contexts. You could read the books, you could read magazines and articles, you could do a lot of those things, and then the actual doing it is just an entirely different experience.
It reminds me of being a parent of three kids; you could read all the books and go to all the classes that hospitals offer, but it’s a different experience when you’re actually holding a kid at 2 o’clock in the morning.
And I’m so grateful, because the one distinction now, as opposed to the first year of the church plant, is not only were we significantly smaller -- we began with seven people -- [but] I was its only leader. And there were times it was very lonely. There’s a lot of self-doubting, self-deprecation as well.
[Now, I’m] in a position where I get to have a robust lay leadership on all levels of our church, to be able to journey with other women and men, people from different walks of life.
While we’re committed to the same trajectory, we also come with our unique gifts and skill sets and lenses by which we see things. This has been a profound impact, not just for the church, but a profound impact for my soul as a believer and as a leader in ministry.Monday, April 27, 2015
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A Church Network Webinar with Dan Hotchkiss
May 5 at 2:30 p.m. EDT
True partnership begins with clear role boundaries, effective delegation and a constructive system of accountability. Alban author and consultant Dan Hotchkiss offers fresh perspective and practical steps to help a church to move beyond frustrating and ineffective management of boards, clergy and staff.
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Ideas that Impact: Merging Congregations
And the Two Shall Become OneCongregational Mergers Present Opportunities for Growth–As Well as Unique Challenges
With a slew of bad economic news for businesses lately, it’s no surprise that faith communities are also feeling the effects of the poor economy.
Although there are few statistics on how congregations are being affected by the recession, many have felt the pinch for quite some time. And like failing businesses, many congregations are weighing their options—including merging with other houses of worship.
Alice Mann, senior consultant at the Alban Institute, says a congregational merger is “a strategy for dramatic change.” She strongly encourages congregations to look at all their options before considering a merge so they’ll be very clear as to whether a merger will be beneficial. As she points out, mergers are universally stressful situations, and they usually demand much more change than the people involved ever anticipated.
“Readiness” is a key component when considering a merger, and according to Mann, it involves four things:
- Do the people involved really believe there’s an urgency to do something differently? There must be more than three or four “eager beavers” who want change. The congregation must be prepared. Communication must be open and transparent, and a majority of the congregation must be supportive of the merger and all it could entail—including possible new leadership, a new location, and a new style of worship.
- It is critical for congregations to do a self-assessment. They must be aware of the internal dynamics, strengths, foibles, styles of communication, and interpersonal relationships that are affecting the congregation. This knowledge will be extremely important when deciding whether a merger is the best option. It will also help them to know what type of congregation would be best for them to merge with.
- Armed with the knowledge from their self-assessment, Mann says the leadership then ought to weigh all possible options—other than a merger. If congregational growth has reached a plateau or finances are challenged, would it help to change locations, leadership, or worship styles? Is it time to consider a “holy death” for the congregation and allow members to find a new church or synagogue?
- Finally, before considering a merger, it must be determined whether the congregation and leadership are fundamentally focused on God’s mission in their community. Mann says that most positive merger experiences involve people who are more committed to the continuity of their faith than the building. Many find it difficult to separate their ministry from the building, and that can cause problems later in the process.
Practical issues“Congregational merger” is a far-reaching term with many possible variables. In some cases a stable church or synagogue will absorb a struggling congregation, in which case one party simply closes its doors and there are no negotiations to speak of. However, sometimes the receiving church will go to great lengths to welcome the new congregation, incorporating some of their traditions and even taking on their staff.
- Another common scenario is when denominational officials decide to take two or three struggling congregations that are geographically close and combine them. While this may seem like a quick solution to financial woes, Mann warns that this situation can have a negative outcome. In her experience, the factors that contributed to the state of these churches, unless resolved, can multiply when other struggling congregations are joined.
- Mann says that in this type of case it’s often better to move the strained congregations to an entirely new location, call someone new to lead, and give the merged churches a new name. This increases the likelihood of survival.
- Cluster churches and cooperative ministries are also becoming more common. In these situations, congregations maintain their separate identities—and even locations—but share ministry resources as well as their rabbis or ministers. They combine groups such as youth and elder care, and they may pool administrative staff.
- However, if the cost of maintaining a large or aging building is putting a burden on congregational finances, cooperative ministries may not be the best solution. Also, some congregants may feel they are not getting the attention they once received, and clergy may feel overwhelmed with the additional responsibilities this approach requires of them.
- If a church is part of a denomination, it must seek denominational approval and determine whether the church property is owned by the denomination before proceeding.
- Bequests to the congregation will also have to be dealt with. In some cases, inheritances may revert to another heir if any changes are made. The leadership should find out what valuables, if any, were inherited.
- In addition to bequests, all gifted items should be made transparent. It is critical to communicate with congregants so that gifts to the church find a new home that is suitable to the giver, and nothing is lost in the transition.
- Finally, decisions must be made concerning the new entity. Will it be a continuation or will incorporation papers be necessary? If it is renamed, what will the legal consequences be? These answers will be specific to actual congregations, so legal representation is a must.
Probably the biggest issues involved with a merger are matters of the heart. When two congregations are joined together, blessings are multiplied, but for the sake of unity, some things may also be sacrificed.
- Communication through town hall meetings, e-mails, and verbal updates during the weekly worship service are vital. Congregants must understand why change is necessary in order for them to support it.
- A congregational merger can bring about changes in worship style, music, leadership, and traditions unique to a local church or synagogue. These issues can be deal breakers—or deal makers—when people of faith choose a house of worship. If the congregations involved take ownership of the idea to merge, a successful transition is likely, and everyone will benefit.
When the Fields Yield No Food: The Story of a Church Merger by Brett Opalinski
"[The prophet Habakkuk's] hope resonates with me as I reflect on the story of Rader Memorial United Methodist Church, a church that embarked on a journey from death to resurrection, but not in the way one may expect. It is not the story of a down-and-out church that changed its ways to find people flocking to its pews. That would have been a nice story to write, but it is not the story of this church. No, Rader's story is one of death and the unlikely hope that there was something beyond that death."In the prophetic literature of the Hebrew Bible, Habakkuk ends with the prophet uttering the following words:
Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the God of my salvation.1
These, to me, are courageous words of trust in a future that the present shows no signs of providing. Yet the prophet seems to know that there is something more than what is evident. This hope resonates with me as I reflect on the story of Rader Memorial United Methodist Church, a church that embarked on a journey from death to resurrection, but not in the way one may expect. It is not the story of a down-and-out church that changed its ways to find people flocking to its pews. That would have been a nice story to write, but it is not the story of this church. No, Rader’s story is one of death and the unlikely hope that there was something beyond that death.Rader had a story that its people were very proud of. It was founded in the northeast quadrant of Miami in the early 1920s, and in the 1950s and ’60s it was one of the premier churches in the Florida Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church. The large sanctuary was full on Sunday mornings and Sunday school classes brimmed over with kids and adults. Old black-and-white photos showed a choir loft that was full of people in crisp white choir robes.
Then everything changed. In the late 1960s the neighborhood began to experience transformation; Little Haiti moved closer to the church and church members moved farther away. Between the late 1960s and the early ’80s, Rader lost nearly 1,000 members. It was a period of transition from which the church would never fully rebound. There was a loyal remnant that remained, but a significant number moved to other neighborhoods, other churches. Unfortunately, those remaining had a large facility and a shrinking congregation. Fortunately, there were funds from trusts and the sale of real estate that provided a healthy flow of income to the church. These would be enough for a time.
In early 2004, I was in Denver, Colorado, finishing up coursework in a Ph.D. program in New Testament and early Christian history. Since I knew I would soon enter the dissertation phase, my family and I decided it was time to return home to Florida and request an appointment to a local church. I contacted my district superintendent with my request, and a short time later he called and said, “I have just the place for you, Rader Memorial United Methodist Church, in Miami.”
I asked if I could think about it for a few days and immediately called a friend who had been raised at Rader to ask what he thought. His response was swift: “Don’t do it!” Rader, he said, was perceived as a church moving in the wrong direction and would not be a pleasant place to serve. I thanked him and assured him that I would pray about the decision, which I did. A few days later, I told my wife that I really felt called to accept the appointment and “if it means turning the church around, so be it, and if it means closing the doors, so be it.”
So my family and I found ourselves back in Florida, in the strange, beautiful, diverse world of Miami, and I began my new appointment at Rader. There were some ominous signs from the start. For one, the church secretary quit the Friday before I was to arrive. Some church members quickly scrambled to get volunteer teenagers to answer phones, but that lasted only for a short time. In something of a surreal moment, I even discovered the cremated remains of two individuals in the closet of my office. On my first Sunday I arrived very early to find bulletins that were several months old stacked on pews in the narthex of the sanctuary. In the balcony I found bulletins that were several years old. It was obvious that no one had been in the sanctuary balcony in some time. It also looked as if the carpet in the sanctuary had not been vacuumed in quite a while. As it got closer to worship time, I began to wonder if anyone was even going to show up. A little while later there were only a few people who had arrived to take their places in the rather large sanctuary.
Signs of Hope
Yet there was a moment on that first Sunday that has brought me comfort many days since. As I stood to do the benediction at the close of the service I looked out at the diversity of people in that small congregation: young and old, black and white, men and women, gay and straight, Haitian, Bahaman, and Jamaican. I remember having a strong sense that this representation of diversity is what the Kingdom of God looks like. This vision became proof for me that the living Jesus was at work in this church and with these people.
This was not the only flicker of hope, though. While many of the past church leaders had long since left, others remained, and some of the new members to the church had extraordinary leadership skills. There were also some exciting ministries happening. A food closet passed out nonperishable items on a daily basis, a Wednesday community meal provided food to many in need of food or just basic social interaction, and the small music program had noticeable talent.
I look back at my sermons from that time and they were full of hope, based on the potential I saw in these people and their ministries. In the early days, I honestly believed that if we worked and prayed hard enough, change would come. This prayer was answered, but not as I would have expected or wanted.
Signs of Trouble
The tide started to change, though, a little over a year after my arrival at the church. Some of the financial reports left me with questions and concerns, and as I looked into these matters further I discovered that the trust funds the church had been relying on were running out much faster than anyone had projected. When I arrived, the last remaining trust fund was at $125,000. A couple of years prior, the Finance Committee had decided to begin using some of the principal from the trust with the plan to put the funds back when funds were available; this, of course, is a slippery slope, and it is no surprise that no money was paid back on the principal. As the balance dwindled, it was brought to the attention of the Finance Committee that the balance was now at $55,000. The math was simple: there would not be money left in the account for long. The budget at that point was already skeletal, with funds used almost exclusively for keeping the doors open and the lights on. Money would have to be transferred from the trust fund just to meet that budget. There were pledges to supplement the trust fund transfers (in fact they had increased over the previous year), but there was just not enough money or time to stop the bleeding in the trust fund balance. When that money ran out, the coffers would be empty.
There was another event that, I see now, was significant to the church’s story—the death of a certain member. This gentleman was in his early eighties but had the energy and spirit of a twenty-year-old. He had been away from the church for about ten years caring for his wife, who had Alzheimer’s. When he returned—at about the same time I arrived—he was appalled at the condition of the church. He immediately went to work at organizing a United Methodist men’s ministry to get the men of the congregation more active and involved. He confronted church leadership about how they needed to “clean the bathrooms and vacuum the carpet.” People listened to him. He was determined that as long as Rader was open, the church was going to make a difference. His thick New York accent seemed to motivate people in ways that amazed me. Then, out of the blue, he died of a sudden heart attack in his front yard. The church was stunned and something of the life went out of the congregation. They would never fully recover from this death.
A few weeks later, Hurricane Wilma passed through our area, leaving behind fallen trees and tattered roofs. Some of the people in the area were without power for sixteen days. The church, having a gas stove, served morning coffee and powdered soup to those in nearby homes. A few days later, the United Methodist Committee on Relief delivered several semi-trucks full of supplies that we stored in our fellowship hall and distributed to the community. As we passed out canned goods and health kits, cleaned up tree branches, and put things back together, we didn’t realize that it was the aftershock of the hurricane that would impact us the most.
As the new year began, significant financial problems still faced Rader Memorial. Then the bill for property insurance arrived. As members of the Florida Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, Rader was part of a conference-wide property insurance plan. As a result of the hurricanes that passed through Florida, our premium rose from $30,000 to over $60,000. There was no foreseeable way to pay this bill.
I do not point to the insurance increase as the reason that Rader had to close its doors. It was simply the event that forced our hand sooner than expected. Even if the premium had stayed the same, there would have been serious financial difficulties to come to terms with, but now we had choices to make. The first big decision involved me. I did not see any way that the congregation could afford a full-time pastor. After much prayer and struggle, I contacted my district superintendent and told her that there was no way I could return the following year. This was especially hard since I had preached such hope at the beginning. But the fields were not yielding the fruit that I had hoped.
Very early in the process I went to my district superintendent to explain the situation. I brought financial data and reports and discussed what I thought were possible scenarios. She helped me work through questions about my leaving Rader and was often a voice of comfort. I cannot overstate the support that I received from her and the difference it made in this process. It became a well from which to draw strength, courage, and reassurance.
Considering Our Options
In light of the situation now before us, I wanted to be proactive. I did some research and reflection and made a list of several options the congregation could consider; including bringing in a part-time local pastor, selling the property and relocating to a smaller facility, merging with another congregation, and sharing facilities with another congregation. In addition, we put together a process for making that decision.
The first step would be to tell our Staff Parish Relations Committee that I would be leaving in June and that this was not negotiable. That same night I would hold a meeting of the entire congregation to explain the issues, walk them through their options one at a time, and answer any questions they may have. A second meeting was scheduled for two weeks later to give church members an opportunity, after they had had a chance to contemplate the options, to ask more questions. The district superintendent agreed to be present at that meeting. A third meeting was scheduled for two weeks after that, where a vote would be taken about what to do.
If this sounds like a hurried process, it was. Funds were running out quickly and decisions had to be made; we did not have the luxury of time. When the third meeting came, there was little discussion. The plan was that we would vote on all eight options, then a second and final vote would be taken on the top two. As the final vote was being tallied, the district superintendent led the congregation in song. I will never forget the sight of longtime church members, awaiting the result of the vote with tears streaming down their faces, singing the old hymns of the church. In the end, the vote was twenty-four to twenty-two in favor of merging with another congregation.
Finding Our New Home
Things moved quickly from there. A team was put together to find another congregation for us to merge with. Interestingly, some churches (most in a similar financial situation as Rader) approached us about joining them, but our view was that we didn’t want to join another congregation in a situation similar to our own. We couldn’t see putting the congregation through all of this again a few years later. We wanted to join a congregation that was United Methodist, active in ministry, financially stable and close enough that members would not have to adjust their commute too much. Further, because the church was proactive, the funds from the sale of the Rader property would be transferred to the merged congregation. This was significant, as the building sold about a year later for several million dollars and this became part of what Rader could offer in the merger of the congregations: we could come with new people and resources.
The team began by brainstorming a list of United Methodist Churches in the area that were candidates. Most of the members of the team were at least somewhat familiar with the churches first mentioned. They knew members of each of the congregations and had worked together on various projects, ministries, and district committees, so there was a level of familiarity with the congregations and the congregations with Rader. Some were easily ruled out for the reasons mentioned above. For those that were possibilities, it was decided that members of the committee would visit the different congregations to try to get an even better sense of them. This took several weeks, and then there were several meetings to reflect on the various experiences team members had had at the other churches.
To some degree, the work of approaching other churches about the possibility of merging was done for us. Among United Methodists in the northeast part of Miami, word about Rader’s situation spread fast. In addition, I had a good relationship with many of the other United Methodist clergy in the area and I had numerous conversations with them about the events at Rader and the congregation’s upcoming decisions. One of the advantages of this was that I could get a sense during these conversations as to whether or not another congregation was interested in merger; most were, because it would mean more people and additional resources for them.
In the end, the Rader team recommended merging with Fulford United Methodist Church, located a few miles north of Rader. They were financially stable, had active ministries, and the personnel and other resources we could bring to Fulford represented great potential for growing the ministries that Fulford was already engaged in. Further, the resources we could contribute would enable Fulford to do some needed work to their facilities to increase ministry effectiveness, such as improvements that were needed to their preschool and education building.
I conferred with the pastor of Fulford, who took the proposal to the church’s Charge Conference (the governing body in local United Methodist congregations). They voted to approve the merger.
Each church now put together a transition team to help work through the process. Interestingly, the biggest question was what to name the merged congregation. The people from Rader graciously stated the name should remain Fulford because of historical significance, and so it did. The other question was property, but it was quickly decided that the Rader congregation would come to Fulford and the Rader property would be sold. The merger also meant there were now two pastors involved in the process. My colleague from Fulford was an amazing pastoral presence to both the people of Fulford and Rader. When I would leave a month or so later, she was left with much of the healing that remained. As my strength was running out, she carried the work through.
There were aftershocks that I never anticipated. There were some at Rader opposed to merger who acted out their grief in difficult ways. I remember one person telling me she would rather see the church’s refrigerator sent to a mission somewhere than go to the new church. There were some who openly stated that they would have preferred to see Rader just run out of money and close its doors. At one point, when I took a few days vacation, some even brought their cars down to the church and began taking plates and cookware from the kitchen, claiming they had paid for it over the years and it belonged to them. Many directed their anger at me for forcing the decision. After my children came upon an angry church member yelling at me one Sunday, we made the difficult decision that my wife and children would go ahead and make the move to Fulford. Even during these last days, denial was present. “There has got to be money somewhere,” one elderly woman insisted. “You are just not looking in the right places.” Many of the members with these reactions refused to go to Fulford, instead finding other church homes. One word of caution that I offer is while additional resources and people sound enticing, merger comes with a cost. There is a great deal of pastoral work to be done and sometimes as a pastor I had to put on a thick skin to walk with people in their grief. There were many days I came home exhausted and depleted, even after the decision was made.
New Beginnings
When Rader Memorial United Methodist Church’s last Sunday arrived, we celebrated its ministry through the years. It was both a sad and a joyful day. At the end of the service, we de-consecrated the sanctuary and recessed out with the cross that had stood on the altar for so many years! The cross was then taken by Rader members the few miles drive to Fulford. As we knocked on the door of the Fulford sanctuary, the congregation was waiting for us with bright smiles and nervous anticipation. We proceeded in and placed our old cross on a new altar table. A new day had begun.
I left for a new church about a month after that day. My colleague in ministry had many more pastoral and administrative issues to deal with. About a year later I went back to Fulford to do a baptism for a close friend. I was nervous about what I would see and experience. I knew that some were still angry with me. What I saw, though, was a beautiful sight: people working, serving, and worshiping together. There in that newly merged congregation, the fields were slowly producing food again. Long-awaited resurrection had finally come.
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NOTE 1. Habakkuk 3:17–18 (NRSV)
Principles for leaders to keep in mind:
- Prepare yourself spiritually. The pastor in this story began with prayer for personal guidance and an attitude of openness to many possible outcomes. This preparation enabled him to explore the possibilities for revitalization, then offer firm and loving leadership for discernment about how and whether to continue.
- Gather and face the facts. While may it may be painful to see and state the realities, it can also be empowering. By acting promptly, this congregation was able to make a life-affirming choice and bring a generous legacy to the combined ministry.
- Consider multiple options. Congregations make better decisions when they weigh all the plausible paths—even those that seem less likely or attractive.
- Follow a clear and open process. The three-step process used by this congregation provided a supportive structure within which members could come to terms with painful choices. Without this thoughtful procedure, unfettered anger and grief might well have ruined the possibility for a constructive merger.
- Act on the decision. Once the process is complete and a path selected, implementation should begin. In this case, leaders did not allow the narrow margin to create an excuse for delay; as a result, members could experience the change as real and channel their energies into the productive task of evaluating merger partners. This congregation was wise enough to choose a strong partner; though it may have been more painful in the short-run to relinquish their name and location, members gained a precious sense of stability and hope for years to come.
- Mark endings. The dignified and moving service linked a real ending (deconsecration of the church) with a real beginning (procession of the cross, and much of the congregation, to a new home). Such rituals are important components of a healthy transition.
- Expect symptoms of bereavement. This pastor’s account helpfully describes a wide range of behavioral responses, including some hostile and selfish gestures. While they do not always occur, such responses are common enough that leaders should prepare themselves to “take some heat.”
- Don’t take it personally. Even in situations where there are no personal accusations, conscientious leaders often wonder whether they are doing the right thing. Ask for God’s guidance, do your best, then move on to life-giving activities.
Senior Consultant, The Alban Institute
_________________________
Questions for Reflection
- Congregations, like people, go through different phases in the life cycle. What is the role of the pastor in helping congregations discern where they are in that cycle?
- What does it mean to preach hope when “the fields yield no food”?
- How do we as pastors/church leaders proclaim resurrection, without seeing it through a predetermined lens?
- How can we balance honest assessment and pastoral sensitivity in working with struggling congregations?
- What is the prophetic role of the pastor in struggling congregations?
From the experience of Rader United Methodist Church and her own extensive work with congregations, Alice Mann identifies eight key principles for leaders to keep in mind when merging congregations.
Principles for leaders to keep in mind from Brett Opalinski’s story of Rader United Methodist Church:
- Prepare yourself spiritually. The pastor in this story began with prayer for personal guidance and an attitude of openness to many possible outcomes. This preparation enabled him to explore the possibilities for revitalization, then offer firm and loving leadership for discernment about how and whether to continue.
- Gather and face the facts. While may it may be painful to see and state the realities, it can also be empowering. By acting promptly, this congregation was able to make a life-affirming choice and bring a generous legacy to the combined ministry.
- Consider multiple options. Congregations make better decisions when they weigh all the plausible paths—even those that seem less likely or attractive.
- Follow a clear and open process. The three-step process used by this congregation provided a supportive structure within which members could come to terms with painful choices. Without this thoughtful procedure, unfettered anger and grief might well have ruined the possibility for a constructive merger.
- Act on the decision. Once the process is complete and a path selected, implementation should begin. In this case, leaders did not allow the narrow margin to create an excuse for delay; as a result, members could experience the change as real and channel their energies into the productive task of evaluating merger partners. This congregation was wise enough to choose a strong partner; though it may have been more painful in the short-run to relinquish their name and location, members gained a precious sense of stability and hope for years to come.
- Mark endings. The dignified and moving service linked a real ending (deconsecration of the church) with a real beginning (procession of the cross, and much of the congregation, to a new home). Such rituals are important components of a healthy transition.
- Expect symptoms of bereavement. This pastor’s account helpfully describes a wide range of behavioral responses, including some hostile and selfish gestures. While they do not always occur, such responses are common enough that leaders should prepare themselves to “take some heat.”
- Don’t take it personally. Even in situations where there are no personal accusations, conscientious leaders often wonder whether they are doing the right thing. Ask for God’s guidance, do your best, then move on to life-giving activities.
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____________________________________
“Creativity and Mental Illness.” By Dr. Mark Vonnegut
Being related to a famous person is somewhere between a cruel joke and a minor distraction. My father was immensely talented and worked very hard at his writing, but the degree of his success was a fantastically unlikely bit of luck. There are lots of talented, hard-working artists who don’t make it.
The important thing in overcoming mental illness, whether or not you have a famous last name, is to want things to be better—and being willing to get help to make that happen.
Both of my parents’ families advised them to stay away from one another, as mental illness was rumored to be in each other’s family. The rumors were true, but it wasn’t like anyone then or now comes with any guarantees. It makes us feel more alive to be able to see, listen to and read great art, partly because great art is often the result of great struggle. The idea that artists and “the mentally ill” have inner demons while the rest of us do not is part of what has made it—and continues to make it—so hard to come to terms with mental illness.
The reason the arts and craziness run in families is because crazy people who can sing and dance and paint pictures and write well do a much better job of convincing others to have babies with them than if they’re just plain crazy. Thus has it ever been.
In my career as a mental patient, I started with schizophrenia, worked my way up through manic depression, and have now settled at bipolar disorder. I can joke about it because I recovered sufficiently to get into and through medical school, internship and residency, and have had the enormous honor and privilege of being trusted by parents to help them and their children. I make no bones about it; I make mistakes just like everyone else, but am very proud of how well I do my job. I’m also very aware of how easily I could have ended up otherwise—a suicide statistic or just another broken young man who never got well enough to have a life.
The diagnosis doesn’t matter much. What they think you have can give doctors a clue about what to do or not do, but for the person who is suffering, and for those who love him or her, wanting the pain and trouble to stop is enough. Knowing that others have recovered is very helpful; most patients, including myself, have diagnosed themselves as hopeless more than once.
I think my father had PTSD, and Faulkner was a depressed narcissist who drank too much. Who cares? The important point is that in spite of whatever “it” was that they had, they both managed to write magnificent transcendent literature that makes us all a little smarter and less lonely.
What matters is that their art stabilized them and gave them purpose, along with a substantial amount of fame and fortune. We have the relationship between creativity and mental illness exactly wrong; “crazy” people don’t create great art unless they are getting better. The illusion that someone in early recovery can simply chuck their meds and produce great art has sent many gifted young people over the cliff.
Whether or not someone needs psychiatric medication is beside the point. The point is to lead a good life and sustain loving relationships. I’m an optimistic person; on a regular basis I find myself looking in the mirror, hoping to see someone who doesn’t need medication staring back at me. However, seeing as I’m 67, that probably isn’t going to happen. And so, I try to make a little joke to myself as I take yet another dose of antipsychotic or mood stabilizing medication: “Boy, I sure hope this stuff works!”
Medications have side effects. No one who doesn’t need them should take them—I know I certainly wouldn’t. It’s a painful truth that medications and psychiatric hospitals, the faults of which could fill volumes, have both saved me, and made a good life for myself possible. For that, I am grateful.
Symptoms do not a diagnosis make. You can be impulsive, grandiose with flighty ideas and think everything you see on TV is about you without being “crazy.” The thing about being mentally ill is not being able to attend to day-to-day life, or be part of healthy relationships.
The reverse is also true; just because you don’t hear voices, doesn’t make you a model of mental health. One of the problems with mental health diagnosis is how reassuring the process is to “so-called normal” people. The sub-text to me having a thinking disorder is that your thinking is fine. I freely admit that I have an affective disorder, and find the idea that my feelings are more than a little off-base a huge relief—but to jump from my affective disorder to the conclusion that your feelings make perfect sense is just illogical.
There are all kinds of statistics, but the bottom line is that no one among us is 100% crazy, and no one is 100% sane. The chance that you or someone you love won’t need help at some point with what we broadly call “mental illness” is 0.
You don’t need a psychiatrist or a doctor to start the process of recovery. While a full-blown psychotic break involving emergency rooms and psychiatric hospitals is one way to go, I don’t recommend it. You’d think that the humiliation involved in that route would make it easier to accept help, but you’d be wrong. All you need is the desire to have things be different. It’s amazing how readily people accept depression, or alcoholism, or anxiety as the way things have to be. It doesn’t matter if it’s a friend, family member, or professional who tells you that your life can get better; all you have to do is accept the truth as best you can, and be willing to take the next step. Whether that step leads to a therapist, or AA, or NAMI doesn’t really matter.
The good thing about recovery is that it’s progressive. Just like depression, anxiety, addiction, PTSD and all the other diseases tend to worsen over time, a good friend or therapist can progress to a good treatment program, a good job, or appropriate medication. People who get better help other people get better. Someone who manages to find recovery can, and often does, help countless others in ways no one could possibly predict.
I’m a shameless eclectic pragmatist in my work as a pediatrician. Having raised three of them myself, I’m well aware that most adolescent and pre-adolescent boys would rather drink poison than talk with a therapist, but they also don’t want things to go on the way they have been. So I mention therapy as something I can probably get them out of if they’re willing to clean up their room, do their homework, maybe eat a little better and stop swearing at their mother. Most of them think they can do this. I point out that whether things go well or not, they can always go back to swearing at their parents and slamming doors, but regardless, I want to see them again in a week or two to see how the experiment is going. Acupuncture, yoga, IEPs, social skills groups—it truly doesn’t matter.
What Thorazine did for me 45 years ago was make it possible to talk to other people in the dayroom. Had my scraggly, 127-pound, Old-Testament-prophet self told them that I was going to get out of there, make it home with a lot of help from friends and family, work my way up from landscaping to medical school, publish a couple of books and raise three sons, they would have upped my meds, put me back in seclusion, or both.
There ain’t no difference between them and us. We’re all here to help each other through this, whatever it is.
There’s almost always something positive to do; the problem is believing, and letting others help you figure out what that thing is.
Originally posted on February 19th, 2015, at http://www.mghclaycenter.org/parenting-concerns/creativity-mental-illness/ as a part of a series entitled Real Lives, Real Stories: Personal Experiences With Mental Illness.
____________________________________
“Creativity and Mental Illness.” By Dr. Mark Vonnegut
Being related to a famous person is somewhere between a cruel joke and a minor distraction. My father was immensely talented and worked very hard at his writing, but the degree of his success was a fantastically unlikely bit of luck. There are lots of talented, hard-working artists who don’t make it.
The important thing in overcoming mental illness, whether or not you have a famous last name, is to want things to be better—and being willing to get help to make that happen.
Both of my parents’ families advised them to stay away from one another, as mental illness was rumored to be in each other’s family. The rumors were true, but it wasn’t like anyone then or now comes with any guarantees. It makes us feel more alive to be able to see, listen to and read great art, partly because great art is often the result of great struggle. The idea that artists and “the mentally ill” have inner demons while the rest of us do not is part of what has made it—and continues to make it—so hard to come to terms with mental illness.
The reason the arts and craziness run in families is because crazy people who can sing and dance and paint pictures and write well do a much better job of convincing others to have babies with them than if they’re just plain crazy. Thus has it ever been.
In my career as a mental patient, I started with schizophrenia, worked my way up through manic depression, and have now settled at bipolar disorder. I can joke about it because I recovered sufficiently to get into and through medical school, internship and residency, and have had the enormous honor and privilege of being trusted by parents to help them and their children. I make no bones about it; I make mistakes just like everyone else, but am very proud of how well I do my job. I’m also very aware of how easily I could have ended up otherwise—a suicide statistic or just another broken young man who never got well enough to have a life.
The diagnosis doesn’t matter much. What they think you have can give doctors a clue about what to do or not do, but for the person who is suffering, and for those who love him or her, wanting the pain and trouble to stop is enough. Knowing that others have recovered is very helpful; most patients, including myself, have diagnosed themselves as hopeless more than once.
I think my father had PTSD, and Faulkner was a depressed narcissist who drank too much. Who cares? The important point is that in spite of whatever “it” was that they had, they both managed to write magnificent transcendent literature that makes us all a little smarter and less lonely.
What matters is that their art stabilized them and gave them purpose, along with a substantial amount of fame and fortune. We have the relationship between creativity and mental illness exactly wrong; “crazy” people don’t create great art unless they are getting better. The illusion that someone in early recovery can simply chuck their meds and produce great art has sent many gifted young people over the cliff.
Whether or not someone needs psychiatric medication is beside the point. The point is to lead a good life and sustain loving relationships. I’m an optimistic person; on a regular basis I find myself looking in the mirror, hoping to see someone who doesn’t need medication staring back at me. However, seeing as I’m 67, that probably isn’t going to happen. And so, I try to make a little joke to myself as I take yet another dose of antipsychotic or mood stabilizing medication: “Boy, I sure hope this stuff works!”
Medications have side effects. No one who doesn’t need them should take them—I know I certainly wouldn’t. It’s a painful truth that medications and psychiatric hospitals, the faults of which could fill volumes, have both saved me, and made a good life for myself possible. For that, I am grateful.
Symptoms do not a diagnosis make. You can be impulsive, grandiose with flighty ideas and think everything you see on TV is about you without being “crazy.” The thing about being mentally ill is not being able to attend to day-to-day life, or be part of healthy relationships.
The reverse is also true; just because you don’t hear voices, doesn’t make you a model of mental health. One of the problems with mental health diagnosis is how reassuring the process is to “so-called normal” people. The sub-text to me having a thinking disorder is that your thinking is fine. I freely admit that I have an affective disorder, and find the idea that my feelings are more than a little off-base a huge relief—but to jump from my affective disorder to the conclusion that your feelings make perfect sense is just illogical.
There are all kinds of statistics, but the bottom line is that no one among us is 100% crazy, and no one is 100% sane. The chance that you or someone you love won’t need help at some point with what we broadly call “mental illness” is 0.
You don’t need a psychiatrist or a doctor to start the process of recovery. While a full-blown psychotic break involving emergency rooms and psychiatric hospitals is one way to go, I don’t recommend it. You’d think that the humiliation involved in that route would make it easier to accept help, but you’d be wrong. All you need is the desire to have things be different. It’s amazing how readily people accept depression, or alcoholism, or anxiety as the way things have to be. It doesn’t matter if it’s a friend, family member, or professional who tells you that your life can get better; all you have to do is accept the truth as best you can, and be willing to take the next step. Whether that step leads to a therapist, or AA, or NAMI doesn’t really matter.
The good thing about recovery is that it’s progressive. Just like depression, anxiety, addiction, PTSD and all the other diseases tend to worsen over time, a good friend or therapist can progress to a good treatment program, a good job, or appropriate medication. People who get better help other people get better. Someone who manages to find recovery can, and often does, help countless others in ways no one could possibly predict.
I’m a shameless eclectic pragmatist in my work as a pediatrician. Having raised three of them myself, I’m well aware that most adolescent and pre-adolescent boys would rather drink poison than talk with a therapist, but they also don’t want things to go on the way they have been. So I mention therapy as something I can probably get them out of if they’re willing to clean up their room, do their homework, maybe eat a little better and stop swearing at their mother. Most of them think they can do this. I point out that whether things go well or not, they can always go back to swearing at their parents and slamming doors, but regardless, I want to see them again in a week or two to see how the experiment is going. Acupuncture, yoga, IEPs, social skills groups—it truly doesn’t matter.
What Thorazine did for me 45 years ago was make it possible to talk to other people in the dayroom. Had my scraggly, 127-pound, Old-Testament-prophet self told them that I was going to get out of there, make it home with a lot of help from friends and family, work my way up from landscaping to medical school, publish a couple of books and raise three sons, they would have upped my meds, put me back in seclusion, or both.
There ain’t no difference between them and us. We’re all here to help each other through this, whatever it is.
There’s almost always something positive to do; the problem is believing, and letting others help you figure out what that thing is.
Originally posted on February 19th, 2015, at http://www.mghclaycenter.org/parenting-concerns/creativity-mental-illness/ as a part of a series entitled Real Lives, Real Stories: Personal Experiences With Mental Illness.
____________________________________
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