Annual Congregational Meeting
The Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville held the Annual Congregational Meeting yesterday.
I won’t bother to comment on the many reports that were given. In general, the church is healthy.
The only slight negative in any report was that the Stewardship Campaign for last year didn’t reach it’s goals. Those goals were tough – a 10% increase in pledges and a 10% increase in total pledge amount. The committee achieved a 5% increase in total pledge amount with a decrease in pledges.
The Youth and Young Adult Ministry was by far the longest and most comprehensive report – covering 2.5 pages with 9 pt. type. I was mentioned as a youth leader several times – including being credited with being a “devoted” leader of the Jr. High group even though I attended only once.
The “Green Team” wasn’t mentioned except in passing as the sponsor of one adult education event.
The Stated Clerk’s Report rolled up the membership numbers for the year. We started the year with 867. There were 29 new members (13 by Profession/Reaffirmation of Faith, 14 by letter of transfer, and 2 restored to the roll). We lost 65 members – 6 by Letter of Transfer, 11 by Death, and 48 by Session Removals (making them inactive). If you take out the Inactives, we had a net gain of 12. We ended the year with 831. There were also 10 infant baptisms and one adult baptism.
The Sunday School and Youth programs total 256 youngsters.
Aside from one remark made by the pastor regarding inactive members (and which I’ve contacted him about via e-mail) there was nothing to be concerned about. All seems to be well.
But I’m concerned.
I believe that I am guilty of the sin of envy.
The Nominating Committee nominated 5 people to serve as elders, 8 people to serve as deacons, and one person to serve the remaining two years of a term as deacon. I was pleasantly surprised to see a youth nominated to fill that unexpired deacon term – Claire will do a great job and if I have her year in school correct she’ll be able to finish her term before going to college (which I unfortunately was unable to do so many years ago).
Three of the officers were members of the same New Members class as me. I was very surprised to see them nominated – I figured that nobody that new would even be considered (indeed – one of the pastoral associates said something to that effect to me). The man nominated to be an elder is actually a returning member (he moved away and then back). All three of them are devoted members and completely appropriate for the office.
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But a voice inside me asks “Why them and not me? Haven’t I worked hard enough?”
Another voice answers “Why does it matter? What do you want from the church?”
Yet another voice says “If you’re upset about this, you clearly aren’t worthy anyway.”
I do make a solid contribution to the youth ministry and feel appreciated there. I know that I made a good contribution to the Green Team and I have felt appreciation from some about that. I try to pitch in wherever I can.
I know that I make valued contributions at camp, and they are recognized. Camp feels like home – what I do there to help (while sometimes tiring) never feels like work.
Clearly the pastor sees a future contribution from me – it shows in his choice to ask me to lead the new task force. This is partially offset by the fact that it’s been over 2 months since I talked to him about the task force and it still isn’t populated yet. When last we spoke we had three members (out of a target of 8) and we had named another 8 members to ask. Our plan for meeting before the summer went out the window – we’ll now be lucky if we can start our task in September.
So what am I looking for anyway?
Clearly, any consideration of the church as a future full-time vocation has to go on the back burner.
I feel like I’m back at square one with my discernment process. Did I really join the church for the reasons that I thought I did? Am I being fed?
As I said last week, there is turbulence. Now it’s revealed to be inside my head.
In the mean time, I persevere. I’ll keep working on things as planned. I’ll still be at camp in about 2 weeks to help with check-in. I’ll still work on the task force when/if it gets going. I’ll still be working with the youth.
Random Bullets from my head
My life has been … not so much turbulent as full of changes at my periphery and disquiet in my mind. Here are some random thoughts:
- Today is the last day at my company of the woman who sits across the aisle from me. She started with the company about 3 months before I did back in 1993. For the last almost-year we’ve sat across from each other and been very happy (we both like quiet, we enjoy each other’s company). I’m really gonna miss seeing a beautiful, intelligent, and friendly face every day.
- Also at work: the CIO has realized that morale within the IT group is not particularly good. We’ve had four voluntary departures in the last month (out of a group that was about 45 people). He’s holding lunch meetings with a smattering of people in each (everybody goes to one of them) to talk about issues. I took the initiative to meet with him this past Monday. I scheduled the meeting for an hour and his questions drew my list of issues out to an hour and 45 minutes. It was a good session and minor happenings since show that he listened to what I said. The problem is that many of my issues are outside of his direct control – they are company-wide.
- Between what is happening with my church work (on an upswing) and what is going on at work (on a downswing), I’m wondering if I’m in the right career. That’s right – not just right job but right career. Any assistance for someone undergoing a mid-life career discernment questioning period would be appreciated – leave a comment or use the e-mail link at left.
- This weekend I should be going flying for the first time since the end of March. My blood pressure broke free of control back then – my doctor changed my dosage and I’m now stable again. Actually I’ve been stable since early May, but I’ve been too busy to fly.
- Also this weekend I’m a bachelor. Carolyn is headed up north to go to a garden show with her parents. She’ll stay overnight Saturday and come home on Sunday. My bachelor amusements will include lawn-cutting, bill-paying, and laundry.
- Sunday at church we have the Annual Congregational Meeting. This includes the usual reports and election of officers. I’m not on the program (either giving a report or being elected), so I will probably attend. If it’s too hot (and it’s looking that way) I might just grab a copy of the annual report and check out if they have a quorum. You see, our church isn’t air conditioned ….
- I’m waiting for Verizon to finish installing FIOS in the neighborhood. They ran the underground conduits 2 weeks ago. So far the box in the ground had nothing in it but mud (or high water when it rains – I don’t know if they’ll actually be able to use the box). I’m looking forward to getting FIOS Internet service and dumping Cablevision completely. I might get FIOS TV as well (it’s available in my town) but I’ll have to see how it stacks up against DirecTV. I’d like to keep my HD Tivo, but DirecTV is switching technology for HD programming and a Tivo will not be an option soon. I can do a Tivo Series 3 with FIOS, but I lose video on demand and pay per view. Decisions, decisions.
- The cats are fine, but increasingly geriatric at age 11. Sometimes they still run around like maniacs but those episodes are few and far between.
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Have a good weekend!
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