The Beginning of the End

I wish I could pinpoint when things actually started to go bad. I think when anyone looks back on something bad in their life, they wish the same thing. We tell ourselves if we went back to that moment, we could change things for the better. We like to feel like we are in control when in actuality that’s not the case. Still…if only for my own understanding…I wish I knew when that turn actually happened. I do know when I first became aware something was not right.

It had been a couple months since the Build Relationships retreat to Florida. It was the summertime, and the church didn’t do any programming during the summer. That meant the children’s, middle school, and high school ministry didn’t have weekly gatherings as we did during the school year. The children’s ministry would have vacation bible school, the high school ministry had it’s big trip, the middle school ministry had a local mission trip…but that was pretty much it. This was the first church I had worked with that did that…it was different…but I didn’t feel like I was at a place yet where I could suggest something else. The high school and middle school groups would do some combined weekly “fun trips” in the 2nd half of the summer but that’s really all they were. I had a plan in place for the fall semester already. I was making some changes to our format that would encourage more outreach, provide regular opportunities for deep conversation, and get involved in local service to the community. We’d have monthly fun nights, monthly service outings, and monthly panel discussion nights. We’d pick a relevant topic our youth leadership had picked out and have a panel discussion about it with youth and adults in the church interacting about the subject. I was excited about all of this…but I was also pretty much done with planning it. I felt bored…which led to me feeling very anxious about not knowing what to do next.

One day during the summer, the senior pastor Donn called me into his office. I always felt nervous whenever he did this…especially given my history with conversations in pastor’s offices. As I walked to his office this day, I told myself to calm down. We had talked recently about the status of the youth ministry, he hadn’t brought up any concerns, our numbers had grown, and we had just had a very successful retreat. “There’s no reason to worry,” I told myself. We sat down and he started asking specific questions about a recent summer fun trip…about a miscommunication that had happened between the venue and us about the price…and how I handled it. I had done what I thought I was supposed to do given the church policies for these trips…which was that the students paid for their participation. He was upset I hadn’t just paid for everyone with the church’s money after the miscommunication. I told him I didn’t think that was an option, but I would remember that next time. Then came this avalanche…an outpouring of bent up frustrations and grievances he had with me…and the job I was doing

He didn’t like that when I came into the office, I would have headphones on. He didn’t like that my office desk was messy. He didn’t like that I wasn’t more outgoing on Sunday mornings at church. He said he didn’t feel like I was passionate about the job. He also started asking me questions that I had already answered or informed him of before. We somehow got into a discussion about the Florida retreat, and he said, “What WAS the point of that anyway?” After months of meetings talking about every detail of that trip…it was hard not to feel insulted by that question. “What are you even working on right now?” he asked. I stuttered and stumbled trying to find words and told him I was still working hard on the programming changes we were making in the fall…making sure we were ready to go. He started to tell me he didn’t think my ideas would work…or that he didn’t see how they would work. I asked him if he had any alternative ideas or suggestions. He did not. I asked if he wanted me to change anything and he told me to move forward with what I had planned. He also told me he didn’t think I had been working hard at all. That he had looked through my browsing history on my work computer…that he was unhappy with seeing lots of YouTube videos. I was embarrassed. I didn’t like working in silence and I told him as much…that most of those were either research for ministry ideas or for background noise while I was working on something else. He didn’t seem to care…so I just told him he wouldn’t see them again if he were to look again. He said he had been having conversations with church families…and he didn’t feel like they knew me very well…and that I was to blame. He said he expected my numbers to fall significantly when we started back up. He then said some things I will never forget.

He brought up a local service trip we had recently been on. A trip I had invited him to come to. A neighboring town had been damaged severely by recent flooding. A lot of people in our church community had strong relationships with people in that town…a former staff member was a pastor in that town. Our church had a volunteer event the weekend after the flooding that I went to along with Pastor Donn and other staff. While there I made sure to start conversations about having the youth come over to do service themselves that summer. Once that was arranged we put the word out and Pastor Donn was invited. This was the trip he was referencing in our conversation. He said he thought I had been lazy. That I did minimal work and didn’t want to be there. I tried to explain that I felt anxious in worksite situations…that I didn’t know what to do so I would try to delegate and follow the lead as best I could. I explained that this had been a youth-centric trip and I wanted to make sure the youth were given as much access to the work as possible. He didn’t want to hear it. He insinuated that I didn’t want to be there because I was missing my 6-month-old daughter. “I have to tell you, if you’re going to be missing your daughter you might as well go find yourself a 9-5 job somewhere else…cause you can’t work in ministry if you’re gonna be feeling that way.” I wish I had been brave in that moment. I wish I would have stood up for myself. I wish I would have told him I wasn’t going to further the conversation without another party present. I didn’t do any of those things. I just stood there and took it…in a stunned, disheveled…mess. He ended the conversation by saying since the church was paying for me to be in the learning cohort I was in…he felt no obligation to personally help me get better at my job or improve any relationships I had at the church. With that I was sent back to my office.

That fall when we kicked off…our numbers did not stay where they had been. They went up. They stayed up for a couple months before midterms and bad weather deterred youth from coming. I invited Pastor Donn and our other pastors to be on one of our panel nights…where we’d discuss doubt and questions of faith. We had 45 high school youth come that night. I thought that would make a difference with him. It didn’t.

That summer conversation was the beginning of the end for me with that pastor and that church. I think even back then…a small part of me knew it…but it felt like there was nothing I could do about it.