Be Yourself?!?

This weekend I had the opportunity to attend the Simply Youth Ministry Conference in Chicago - after a 12-hour drive through a snowstorm to get there, which is a whole other blog post on our call to perseverance :)  However, once I got there, I attended an 8-hour intensive "deep track" with Chap Clark titled "Thinking Theologically In Youth Ministry".  During the four sessions that comprised the course, Chap had a lot to say about some negative blogging press he's been receiving (and capped off a detailed description of his detractors and their problems with "but of course I don't care about any of this" - riiiight).  So I decided that I'd give him some positive attention on the Interwebs, specifically about the portion of the 3rd session dedicated to the call of Christian leadership.

(What follows is a very brief summation of what he had to say.  My notes may be inaccurate or incomplete - I apologize to Chap and Fuller Seminary if I have misrepresented his work.  On the other hand, since I was the intended and actual audience for the lecture, if I misrepresent his work, he may need to rethink some things.  Just sayin'.)

The first point Chap makes about call is that it needs to be "thick", or multilayered.  When we look at call in the Old Testament, we see that call was a defining force for those touched by it; call was nothing short of a radical change in personal and corporate identity.  The four layers of call Chap identified were:
1) Individual summons, a la John 15:1-8
2) Call to a new family of faith (John 15:9-17)
3) Call to holy living (Phil. 5:1-3)
4) Call to live in the Kingdom by being yourself! 
Chap goes on to mark the difference between job and vocation as God's presence and our acknowledgment of God as our audience.  Within those parameters, he says our call should also contain or be defined by an unquenchable thirst for growth - not necessarily in numbers, but in depth and strength (my notes here have the Olympic motto - "higher, stronger, faster").

This last point is a sticker for those of us in professional ministry.  I have watched nearly a dozen pastors of churches I've attended or worked at over the past decade struggle with how to relate to their congregations.  Some choose to put up walls, to keep their private lives behind closed doors and to maintain emotional distance from those they serve.  Others get right in there alongside their congregations, build relationships, share confidences - only to have a doubly difficult time extricating themselves when they are (inevitably, in the United Methodist system) reappointed.  Most try to walk a tightrope line in the middle - allowing their personality to flavor their ministry and interactions more than some, but not getting as emotionally invested as others do.

Two weeks ago I began a paid ministry position as a youth director for a midsize church about an hour away from where I live.  I haven't gotten to spend a whole lot of time with my youth and youth leaders (being in Chicago for four days somewhat hindered being present in Maryland), but already I'm wondering, as a staff member with no other history with or connection to the church, how close the congregation will let me get to them - and how willing I am to let them get close to me.  In my experience, with youth especially, you have to allow your church, your youth, your family, to get under your skin if you have any hope of being an effective minister.  It's not said nearly enough, but service in ministry is a dual transformation - a transformation of the people we serve, and a transformation of us as ministers as we learn, grow, succeed and fail.  As Jake says in "To Save A Life" - what is the point of all this if you don't let it change you?  If our ministry is not transformative, we're not doing what God has called us to do - and it can't be transformative unless we allow ourselves to be an organism, open to change.