"Nobody can be exactly like me. Sometimes even I have trouble doing it." - Tallulah Bankhead

In the last couple of days I’ve learned from TV the belt clips that hold a cell phone (aka holsters) are NOT cool. “Put it in your pocket!” I also was educated on blue jean shorts. “Throw them out, NOW.”

WHY AREN’T YOU PEOPLE TELLING ME THESE THINGS?? It’s not like my cool quotient is so high I can afford even the smallest foe paw. I’m hanging by a thread here, and depend on you to protect me from my own total cluelessness on all things fashion related. Please!

For the last three or four days we’ve had winds over 20 mph. With the extra rain we had this winter the air is filled with pollen and anyone who suffers from allergies is miserable. Thankfully, I’m not one of them.

I don’t understand officiating in the playoffs. NBA games alternate between rugby matches and ticky-tack toe.
I wouldn’t mind at all if the Celtics won their series against the Cavs. LeBron is very, very good but there’s nothing winsome about him at all.
Over at the PGA Lefty is getting all kinds of love from the fans. Did Tiger’s mess make Phil even more lovable? One of the announcers said he even gets cheered for coming out of the Porta-Potty.

Back when I was a student in the pastoral program we were advised against forming close friendships with individuals in our church. A degree of detachment was necessary to maintain the prophetic voice in the pulpit and avoid the accusation of favoritism. I must admit that over the years I’ve occasionally had problems with both. One of the major factors that played into our decision to leave the great people of Prunedale, CA was that I felt I had become a friend to the extent I could no longer effectively call them to discipleship. I was Craig, not Pastor Craig. Not that the title matters, per se, but because we hung out so much during the week, having a lot of fun together, it was difficult for them to see me as the pastor on Sundays when I stepped into the pulpit.

From Prunedale to Riverside. Whereas Prunedale was a rural area with most of us living within a couple miles of each other, Riverside was a metropolitan situation. We rarely ran into anyone from church while out and about. But we did form good friendships with a couple of families in the church, which resulted in others feeling like they were on the outside. “You like ______ better than me.” OK, that’s true. But you complain about everything in life and do nothing to help out at church. Hello; nobody likes you. (I didn’t really say that out loud.)

So, pastors should avoid close friendships, thus preserving their effectiveness in ministry and protecting themselves against accusations of favoritism. What they didn’t say is that the resulting downside is an isolation and loneliness that accounts in large part for the very high dropout rate among pastors. Yeah, they said we should form friendships outside of church but that’s unrealistic for a whole bunch of reasons.

So, what have I done?
I went from Riverside back to teach at the college where I spent the next 10 years in the classroom during the week and as a lay person on the weekends. I could hang out with anyone from church I (we) wanted, because I wasn’t the pastor. Then I left the college and became the pastor of that church. And a weird thing happened. Celebration was such a great group of people that we were all friends. Why didn’t I loose the prophetic voice as I had in Prunedale? Most of them called me Pastor Craig (some used "PC"), but I don’t think that’s the reason. It probably had as much to do with the culture in west Michigan which is steeped in traditional Dutch Reformed denominationalism. Up until a generation ago the pastor was referred to as Domini, the Dutch word for Father. They could have called me Doofus (some probably did) and still respected my prophetic role because it is such a part of that culture. The pastor is held in high regard when he delivers the Word of God.

At Pathway? Interesting question. Almost no one at Pathway calls me Pastor Craig. I’ve wondered if I should encourage that appellation as a way to avoid what happened at Prunedale. But I don’t think that’s necessary. See, I’m 20+ years older than almost all of them, I have gray hair and I live in Sun City. So I thoroughly enjoy their company and we have fun together, but I’m old enough to be their father, so the familiarity that caused a problem in Prunedale, where we were all within a few years of each other, isn’t a big risk here.

One more thought, though. Part of my job as a pastor is to prepare them for the future. So I’ve wondered if I should encourage the Pastor Craig bit so that my successor (when, not if) will come into a situation that gives him that layer of protection.

FOLLOW UP - I just saw an Advair commercial where people held the purple disk, thus giving a perspective re. its size. Now will we see someone use it?