A Mid-Summer Update

It is hard to believe that it is already August. At the end of this month, I will be out of a job. The church I pastor has voted to close and it will hold its last service of public worship on Sunday, August 30, 2009. It is a sad time for me and especially the congregation. So I have been swamped with all the details involved with closing down a congregation decently and in order in the PCUSA. Actually a lot of the heavy lifting has been delegated to an Administrative Commission and they are doing an excellent job. God does provide for the right people to be in the right place at the right time to do difficult tasks.

I don't want to get hung up on writing about the details of closing down a congregation. Mostly I have been spending my time focusing on the pastoral care needs of the my congregation members in these last few weeks and finding meaningful employment for me since I have to have to some means of income to pay the family bills.

I have been on three legitimate job interview, one group interview, and one extremely deceptive interview in the past month. I am still waiting to hear about the last two job interviews. One is for a full time as an administrative assistant type with benefits job and one is for a part time term job as a fund raiser. I didn't get a second interview as a hospice chaplain (work I think I would be really good at doing as a pastor to older adults and a gerontologist) or a call back to an interview for a concierge at a retirement community (I had more eduction than the Executive Director of the facility).

I am tired of getting emails about going into financial services or insurance sales. I have a business idea but it isn't cooked yet and I need to spend some time developing my business plan, but really can't do that until I find work to keep the roof over my head and the lights on so I can run the computer.

Right now I feel torn in a multitude of directions - take care of the folks at the church - find a new job - don't panic.