A Painful Reminder

The last time I wore my robe was in November of 2021. It was Christ the King Sunday, my favorite feast, and the final service of All Souls Protestant Church. After the Decommissioning Ceremony, I recessed with my head held high. But deep down I was feeling low, and my sorrows emerged in a peculiar way.

Suddenly I found myself unable to wear my Geneva gown. A preaching robe in the Protestant tradition that I have loved since becoming a pastor. I also found it hard to put on my cherished preaching bands, which I dreamed of wearing since childhood and collected as a hobby.

The truth is, that the end of All Souls shook my sense of call. For the first time I did not feel like a pastor, and the vestments (save my alb) seemed alien. Of course, I had encountered hard times in ministry before, but none of them compared to this. The garb that I loved was now a painful reminder of a loss that felt like failure.

You Are Not A Bad Strawberry

Indeed, my sorrows emerged in an very peculiar way, and after seeing this my wife urged me to reach out to a therapist. Thankfully, my denomination has resources for counseling, and during my first session the therapist shared an interesting story.

His grandfather was once in charge of produce for a large grocery chain, and one year their strawberry sales were plummeting. Though the berries were plump and red, their flavor was not so sweet. So, his grandfather called a soil technician to check the supplier’s field.

It turned out that the problem was a lack of minerals in the soil, and after finishing the story the therapist smiled and said this:

Sometimes the issue is really with us pastors, but other times it is with the place where we have been planted. Though you are not perfect, you are not a bad strawberry. You were simply in the wrong ground or a place where you could not thrive.

Good Ground

The news of not being a bad strawberry brought a much needed relief. It also gave me the comfort of knowing that God did not see me this way. I will still a pastor and my call had not changed, but what needed to change as I went forward was the ground that I was on.

To be clear, I believe that my time at All Souls was the Lord’s will, but the context I was in was not one where I could thrive. So looking ahead I prayed for the Lord to lead me to good ground and, as St. Paul writes, I got exceedingly and abundantly more than I asked for.

In addition to invitations to preach and give the Sacraments in wonderful Churches, I was also invited into spaces where clergy are not usually welcome. There were concerts where I was asked to give encouragement through poetic homilies. And there were public forums where I was asked to address pressing social issues. Each time there was the hope that I would come wearing something clerical. People of various backgrounds in life and faith wanted to see and hear me as a pastor.

Welcome Back Robe!

The good ground that I was led to was a variety of places, and in each of them I found the Spirit at work calling me to proclaim Good News. With all of their differences these spaces, sacred and secular, had one thing in common. They each had a spirit of celebration and not just toleration.

One space of celebration was the American Church in Berlin [ACB], which invited me as a guest pastor for this year’s Holy Week. While worshiping with them on Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday, I found my gifts, and who I am as a person, accepted and affirmed with a warm and respectful appreciation.

At ACB my sense of call was strengthened and further restored, and the vestments that I dearly love were no longer alien. After almost two years, I was able to welcome back my robe and the cherished bands that have graced my collar through many sermons and Sacraments.

Compasses

There might be times ahead where I will lose my sense of call again. Nevertheless, I have gained a word for such times from the season where I hung up my robe. This word is three encouragements that all pastors should constantly remember. They can also be used by Christians in general, for everyone who follows Jesus is in some way a minister.

When you feel like hanging up your robe, remember that:

1. God loves you. (Romans 8:39)

2. God is for you. (Romans 8:31)

3. God is not done with you. (Philippians 1:6)

These encouragements are like compasses that will guide and bring you back home. Back to the call God has given to you, and beckons you to reclaim.