June 11, 2023: Leadership Transition Update
This past Sunday the LT indicated that they are looking to engage a transitional pastor as we move forward. Below is the update from LT:
We as an elder board have decided on an approach called the transitional approach. Here is why we believe this path to be more beneficial for Sunridge. It’s difficult to make a pastoral hire without being crystal clear on what we’re even looking for. We would just be looking at a list of names.When we say yes to this approach, the BCMB sends our church a transitional pastor. This person takes over all of the lead pastor responsibilities right away. The bonus is that we are also getting an outside consultant to look at the way our church operates. Perhaps they see opportunities that we don’t see or more effective ways to do things...they’ll also be talking to many of us who are a part of this congregation to clarify the DNA of Sunridge to ensure we are going to have a good fit. It's an opportunity for us to have a loving audit. There's benefit number one.
Number two is that we can have a better understanding of Mike's departure as soon as we have a transitional pastor in place. Mike would like to step down in the next 3-6 months. This honors his timeline to leave and also gives more distance between him and the eventual pastor that will be permanently taking his place. We will all inevitably need time to make the transition ourselves from Mike and Teresa, who have faithfully led this church for over 26 years, to the next lead pastor.
Number three has to do with the type of church that Sunridge is. We are a church that relies heavily on volunteers. This means that almost all areas of our church are volunteer led. By doing the transitional approach we can more efficiently have someone in place to continually provide support to all of the wonderful volunteers, Therefore allowing us to better enter into the search for our next lead. Our search committee wouldn't start searching for our next permanent pastor until our transitional pastor is in place. That is because this approach advises doing other work first with the transitional pastor before a search would commence. Things like assessments, evaluations and goal setting for Sunridge, to make sure that we are looking for a pastor to fit these needs.
We as an elder board have already spoken with two transitional candidates but aligning our timelines has been difficult. If I could ask you to join us in prayer for the availability of a transitional pastor, that would be so appreciated. We as elders have felt God guide us towards this approach and we feel it is the best for Sunridge. I can not overstate the importance of our continued and combined efforts of prayer in this time. Please be in prayer for a transitional pastor. Pray for our future lead pastor. God already knows who they are. Pray that their circumstances would be just right to come to Sunridge. Pray for us as a church. We need a spirit of unity now more than ever as we work through this process.
If you have any questions about the process, please come to Kyle, Sara Corothers, Jo-Ann Kuchma, Bernie Schmidke or Hans Neuman. We would kindly ask that your questions not go to Mike or Teresa. The elders are tasked with this responsibility, not the lead pastor. If you have a question that we can’t answer, make sure you leave us some contact info and we’ll track down an answer for you as quickly as we can.