An Open Letter to Historic Congregations and Their New Pastors

Recently, two young pastors resigned from their respective churches in the same city within weeks of each other. Both were serving full-time in historic congregations. Each arrived with their young families three to five years earlier amid tremendous welcome and enthusiasm from their congregations and the larger community.

I am well-acquainted with each church, having preached in both as a guest beginning in the 1990s when each had long-tenured pastors. In the early 1990s both churches still enjoyed robust worship attendance, active music ministries, and multiple staff tending to their needs. Though their worship and programs were traditional, they appeared vibrant with sufficient attendance and revenue to operate. Nonetheless, each was experiencing decline, and within each church the members were whispering that new pastoral leadership with new vision and ideas would be needed soon to attract families with children and other newcomers.

Most congregations have a more developed story about their past than about their future. But it is a fact that the times have changed … This calls for greater openness and receptivity to new leaders when they arrive with new perspectives. 

By 2020, especially after the pandemic hit, both churches exhibited severe decline in worship attendance, educational and mission programs, giving, and overall morale. Each church called new pastors in their early 30s with impressive seminary credentials, boundless energy, winsome personalities, and enthusiastic references from prominent clergy about the strong likelihood that these young ministers would lead change and draw new worshipers. 

However, as time passed, and the new pastors began leading toward congregational growth and greater local impact, a series of misunderstandings and mixed messages colluded with congregational distrust, fear of change, and conflicting visions that ended in disillusionment, disappointment, and devastating departures. 

What this unfortunate anecdote underscores is the urgent need today for healthier advanced dialogue between established congregations and emerging pastoral leaders before renewal, growth, and mission impact can happen. A more strategic and sophisticated quality of conversation—before, during, and after the call process—can clarify the important work to be done if new clergy and established congregations are to grow and evolve together. Though vibrant changes can result from a church’s traditional strategies and methods, I believe congregations and their new pastors should consider the following courses of action as they begin their new story together:

• Start early to cultivate mutual trust and an appreciation for each other’s ministerial passions, strengths, and gifts. It is not enough for a well-meaning congregation to bravely extend a call to an eager young pastor. During the call process and afterwards, each side must together seek an operational framework for the intensive work of moving forward. Depending on the composition of the membership and the disposition of the pastor, consider calling in a relationship specialist to help during this important stage.

• Use well-planned get-to-know-you sessions to move toward a deeper understanding of each other’s stories and skills before acting on new ideas. A strategic working alliance between congregation and pastor is not automatically created by a letter of call and an installation service. Coalesce around shared expectations and goals that can withstand systemic changes. Explore the major events and insights that shaped each one’s self-understanding and visions for the church’s mission in its neighborhood or city. Be aware of how past events in one’s life often lay concealed and unresolved beneath the surface in a new relationship. All these factors will inform how the pastor leads and how the congregation responds to the new leadership. 

• Reach deeply for Christ-like love, empathy, and a permission-giving mindset in order to pursue new ministries and challenges harmoniously. Every generation harbors unique religious, social, and political perspectives. Avoid making uninformed assumptions about each other’s identities, preferences, and non-negotiables without first agreeing to self-disclosure and mutual respect for the other’s thoughts and ideas.

• Acknowledge that everyone has a substantial stake in mutual cooperation in this new relationship. Long-term leaders of the congregation have years of investment, service, and sense of ownership of the church’s mission and legacy. Incoming clergy also have much at stake, having pledged their lives to a ministry call, invested personally and financially to prepare for ministry and ecclesiastical credentialing, having relocated to the new community, and staking their futures on reaching current and future generations. 

• Even though the ministry experiences of the new clergy might not run as long as those of the existing members, their sense of call to the ministry will nevertheless run deep. Their sacred convictions about what the church needs to do in this moment should not be underestimated. Often their compassion for potential new church members will appear to be more palpable than their excitement for the existing membership that is seeking acceptance, security, and reassurance from the new pastor. New pastors often assume allegiance on the part of current members while appearing to be preoccupied with who is not yet present at church. Accordingly, they will often yearn for the church to grow and evolve cross-culturally and cross-generationally. 

• Remember that all parties love the church and want it to succeed. In some instances, new pastors may lack the diplomatic skills or patience to communicate their insights and rationales persuasively regarding the changes they think are needed. Excellent ideas can be undermined by ineffective articulation. Differing visions, approaches, and operational styles ought not drive people apart or undermine their shared love for the church.

• Cooperate in the visioning and authorship of the church’s future story. Most congregations have a more developed story about their past than about their future. But it is a fact that the times have changed, and the society surrounding the churches have changed. This calls for greater openness and receptivity to new leaders when they arrive with new perspectives. 

• Exegete the times together. New leaders may be expected to bring useful social, spiritual, and emotional skills for exploring with their congregations the socio-cultural realities of the day—and respond to them with new organizational strategies, mission ideas, and funding approaches. New pastors can make a positive impression on the contemporary landscape when allowed to experiment with the spoken word, worship ideas, music, and other initiatives that the church has not engaged in before. 

• Together commit to bridging generational divides in the name of a collective vision of Beloved Community. Both the congregation and the pastor benefit when they collaborate around the many and changing forms that collective action may take in their circumstances. Cooperating in mission must be a conscious decision before it can be a practical vision. I like saying that whenever there is a way toward shared action, congregations and their pastors must find the will to pursue it. 

The Rev. Jeffrey Haggray ’88 M.Div. is executive director of the American Baptist Home Mission Societies, based in King of Prussia, Penn. Born in Savannah, Ga., he earned a B.A. from the University of Virginia and a Doctor of Ministry degree from Wesley Theological Seminary. Ordained as an American Baptist minister, he has been the pastor of congregations in Georgia, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C. In 2023, he was honored at YDS as the recipient of the Distinction in Congregational Ministry alumni award.