I am a pastoral fellow. It's kind of like being a pastor, but not really. I get all the experience of being a pastor without actually having the responsibilities of a pastor. I get to learn to walk the fine line of pastoral ministry with a safety net. It is a great set-up.
However, with the perks of being a pastoral fellow comes one great downside. I am not the only fellow on my church staff. There are actually five of us all going through this two year program. And to those in the church we are simply "the fellows." All of us are grouped together in one lump sum. When they need something at the church done, it falls to the fellows as a collective unit. I, being the only woman on the fellows team, have a little bit of an advantage, but not much of one. I'm still just another one of the fellows.
And to be honest, it starts to bug you after awhile. Sometimes it's like I don't really have my own identity. I am only who I am because of the group affiliation I have. My American individualism balks against this. But as I've been thinking it over I have made the hard realization that I was never really supposed to have my own identity. I am supposed to be known as one "in Christ". My identity is not my own but is based on the group to which I belong. Or at least it should be. And while I would love to say that even when I lose my identity to my position as a fellow I am perfectly content to have my identity found purely in my relation to Christ, that would be incorrect. I, like most Americans and probably most westerners in general, do not enjoy having someone else be primary and me be secondary. I do not enjoy being lumped into a group. I want to be unique and special. I've realized I have more of a desire to have my own pastoral identity than to demonstrate my identity in Christ. I want people to look at me and see a great pastor. God wants them to look at me and see Jesus. So as much as I resist the idea that the fellowship will eat my identity, perhaps this fellowship will be better preparation for life than I even knew.
Friday, June 12, 2009
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1 comments:
I have had this fear at times, too--that my identity will be "eaten" for some broader purpose and "I" will be stifled underneath.
But the "I" that I lose when I acknowledge first my identity as part of God's family is simply "me as-I-am-known," not necessarily the unadorned "me" through which I see the world.
So sometimes I wonder if dying to self is in identifying with God's people--together with a willingness to be misunderstood, to be lost in a crowd, and perhaps to be completely unnoticed. We do not seek to muffle the voice that God gives us to express His gospel through our uniqueness; we do not seek to flaunt our individuality as something to be claimed, owned, and clenched.
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