From the President

Yogi Berra, star baseball player and manager for the New York Yankees, provided me with two quotations for my last communication with you. He provides me with one other for today: "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." Decision-making is an area where the church and its leadership can spend some additional time, both in training individuals to make good decisions and preparing individuals for what I call their ISE or initial service experience in their first call as a minister.

The first call is critical as one plants all one learned in the educational arena into the deep foundations and traditions of congregational life. Each congregation has a particular culture and ministry context that is unique to it alone. During the first call the new minister, steeped by formal training in the dance of the gospel, must now learn the dance of congregational leadership. The first call is precisely the time to listen and learn even more what it means to work alongside congregations and their leadership to advance the presence and effectiveness of the church in meeting critical human need.

Do you remember the day you were ordained or commissioned to be a minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)?  On that day, after the ordination or commissioning service was over, you were still the same person, skill and knowledge-wise, as you were a few hours earlier. Understanding ministry and service to a congregation in an academic or skill-set sense is not the same as knowing your leadership role or congregational system experientially. For this you will need "time and exposure."

This is why I believe that the education and formation of both our clergy and lay leadership happens over a lifetime of ministry. It happens by honing good leadership and decision-making skills from the onset of your service. If you lay a good foundation you can build upon it throughout a lifetime of ministry.