Be Nice to your Pastor

Saying for the day: Sheep sometimes bite and aren't alweays cute.

A 2006 Church of England report warned that disagreeable congregants, together with the pressures of the church's "feudal system" bureaucracy, were turning priests harshly negative and creating an "irritable clergy syndrome." One of the report's authors told The Times of London in December that priests are bothered by "having to be nice all the time to everyone, even when confronted with extremes of nastiness," such as aggressive and neurotic parishioners. [The Times (London), 12-9-06]1)
The people of God are not always nice to their leaders.
Sometimes it is hard to be the Shepherd of unruly sheep that bite.
So this morning if you are a church member say a little prayer for your Pastor or your Priest.
Pray that God would fill his or her life with joy and peace of the Holy Spirit.
Pray that people would be kind .
Pray that people will be as willing to forgive the Pastor’s failings as he or she is willing to forgive theirs.
When the Pastor preaches ask “ What is God saying to me” instead of “ What is wrong with this sermon”
You might even tell your Pastor or Priest that you are thankful God sent them to your congregation. ( Don’t lie-if you can’t do this at least tell him or her your praying for them)
The God who wants us to feed his sheep also wants us to care for His Shepherds.

@@@@ News from Pigeon Falls-The little town in my garage where the trains still run , dragons fly, and life goes on as usual– Pastor Marvel told the congregation this morning that it was probable that in the next week or so he would have to decide if he was going to continue to be their Pastor or if God was calling him to a new parish. He asked them to pray for him.During the coffee hour people were overheard saying the following:
“ He just wants more money”
“ He is still upset because Marie called him a stupid old man.”
“What does he really want?”
“ He is looking for a chance to have more power.?”
“ I thought he would stay until he got to be Bishop.”
“ He’s only been here twenty years . What’s his hurry to leave.“
“ Florida ! That’s like always being on vacation”
“ Doesn’t he care about us?”
“ After all we’ve done for him”
“ Didn’t we give him that $ 100 raise last year? What does he want?”
“ I sure will miss him if he goes”
After the service Pastor Marvel got a call telling him that “ Laughing Lutheran “ voted to call him. There were only two negative votes and the chairman said those two always vote negative on everything.
Now Pastor Marvel has to decide where God wants him to be. In Pigeon Falls or Kickme. Over the years he has come to love these people. He has baptized and confirmed so many of them. He has shared their joys and their sorrows. They are family. Does God want him now to leave family and go to an unknown land? He is not Abraham after all. He knows that there are people in Florida praying that he will come and there are people in Pigeon Falls praying that he will stay. He is praying that God’s will be done. If only he knew what that will was.
******

Today's Link:Wort's Going On Here - For beer lovers everywhere a change of pace. If you can still type at the end leave a Dr. John in the comment.
It was a sort of nice day. The church service was great. My daughter was on call and had to go off to the hospital several times. I blogged. I played with Cindra's words. I had a lot of fun with those. You will see the results tommorow in the Pigeon Falls section. I used the eighteen words four times each but you will only get to see two and then only if you choose to go to Petrovich's Website. But it was fun. Now I need a breathing treatment.
GBYA