Proper Billing
Once I’ve found the right person, I still have to make sure that he gets proper billing. Otherwise, he’ll always be seen as my substitute, someone who’s giving them less than the best.
I’ve found one of the most effective ways to present someone as the other preacher rather than my stand-in is to be highly visible whenever he’s scheduled to preach. To do that, I’ll often make the weekly announcements. That lets everyone know that I’m in town and healthy. It also sends a clear message that he’s not just filling in because I’m unavailable.
That proved to be particularly valuable when I first started sharing the pulpit. In fact, when I went out of town, I often came back early just to show my face. Though it’s something I no longer need to do, it paid high dividends during those early days.
It’s also important not to give away all the Sundays nobody wants. To assign someone to preach during my vacations and holiday weekends is hardly sharing the pulpit. It’s dumping the dogs!
Finally, I’m careful about how I talk about our roles. I always introduce myself as “one of the pastors.” I never call Mike “my associate.” He’s the “other pastor” or “one of the other pastors.”
None of these techniques are as vital as mutual respect and good preaching skills. Still, they’ve gone a long way toward establishing the credibility of the other person in the pulpit.
Meeting Congregational Expectations
Every congregation has expectations (mostly unwritten), tampered with at great peril. To share the pulpit successfully, it’s important to know what these expectations are and to meet them or find a way to change them.
For instance, our people expect me to be in the pulpit on Christmas and Easter. I can give away any other Sunday without hearing a complaint. But let me fail to preach on either of those days, and I’ll have a small uprising on my hands.
How much of the pulpit can be shared will also be dictated by congregational expectations. As Lyle Schaller has noted, churches that place a greater emphasis on the sermon and the personality of the preacher, rather than on the Eucharist and the office of the minister, will have a harder time adjusting to an equal interchange of preachers.
In our case, we’re sermon-centered. So when I first started sharing the pulpit, I was pushing it when I was out of the pulpit 15 percent of the time.
Now, I’m out as much as 30 percent, but that’s probably as high as it will ever be able to go here. The pastor of one church never missed a Sunday during his long tenure. Even during his vacations, he shuttled back and forth on weekends to be in the pulpit. As you can imagine, that built in the congregation some incredible expectations. When a friend of mine became this pastor’s successor, the best he could do was to turn over some Sunday nights and his vacation weekends. Anything more would have been interpreted as shirking his duties. The key in any situation is to know what will and won’t work there and to adjust accordingly.
Preaching, I’ve discovered, is only one part of being a pastor. It may be the most important part, but it is still only a part. When I learned to share that part with a trusted and skillful colleague, it not only made me a better preacher but also a better pastor. And it made our church a better church.
