30th Ordination Anniverary

[Tim Bonney]

A week ago (December 10th) I celebrated the 30th anniversary of my ordination. Following my ordination in 1989 I only stayed in the SBC three more years. From the summer 1992 - February 2010, I served in the ABC/USA. And now I've been serving in the UMC since July of 2010.

Time really does fly!

[Haruo]

Congratulations! It occurs to me (for the first time) that next month I'll be marking the 30th anniversary of my baptism. All 30 spent in ABCUSA at Fremont Baptist Church in Seattle, rising from newly washed janitor to VP of the corporation.

[Dave Roberts]

I've often thought about my ordination. It was a great moment in my home church in June of 1968. I was a first-year seminary student serving on a church staff. It was a moment of bestowed confidence that had legal ramifications in weddings. It meant that five ministers interviewed me and agreed to proceed. The church voted, and then there was a service. The sad reality was that I did not need to know much or understand much about ministry. With the changes of pastors and the death of many of the people who knew me, I am now largely a stranger to the church. I have not preached there since the 1990's, and I wonder what it means to them now. I think one of our Baptist fallacies in ordination is that once it is done, no one assumes any responsibility for the person or to the church. Sorry about my ramble. Congratulations, Tim!

[Sandy]

Congratulations!

[Tim Bonney]

[Tim Bonney]

[Dave Roberts]

[Tim Bonney]

[Sandy]

So if your original ordination was in a Southern Baptist church, obviously you had to go through another process to get credentials in ABCUSA and the UMC, or did you?

[Tim Bonney]

[Tim Bonney]

BTW, the UMC has a policy of not re-ordaining ordained clergy if they come from a mainstream denomination. This is part of the UMC's ecumenical commitment to the Church. No re-ordination, no re-baptisms.

[Rvaughn]

[Tim Bonney]

[Sandy]

I'd like to see more "ecumenical" cooperation in things like church membership, ordination and acceptance of baptism. Of course, for many Christians, there is personal security in their denominational branding, so they are not willing to admit that accepting ordination or baptism from some other church isn't always acceptance or endorsement of everything that church teaches.

Educational options are such that while I believe a church or ecclesiastical authority that has the ability to grant ordination should set some minimum qualifications, there are some other factors which may need to be taken into consideration. I've known several pastors who were excellent at their job but who had no formal training in ministry. One in particular that comes to mind educated himself by reading and by "sitting under" the ministry of pastors he respected. He had two years of community college, but was capable of clear communication and could have written a doctoral dissertation if he's had to. There are a lot of undergraduate programs that provide the full scope of training required for an MDiv or MTh.

Having recently fellowshipped with a group of Christians who were only loosely connected to a "denomination" more by tradition and a very short list of commonly held values and which did not have "clergy" nor a hierarchy of elders, I wonder if many churches could avoid problems created by conflicts between pastors and members over the direction the church is headed. I served under a couple of pastors whose vision was always "get the church to build something" in order to "establish" their pastorate. One wanted to relocate the whole church, the other wanted a $1.5 million family life center for a mostly elderly congregation.

[Haruo]

[Tim Bonney]

[Tim Bonney]

[William Thornton]

Timothy, did you contact your original church, the one that ordained you? Did they contact you? I'm just curious and am not trying to make any point. Congratulations on your anniversary. Quite a journey thus far. You are the main reason I sometimes think a more hierarchical system would be preferable than our autonomous one. I generally get over those thoughts.

I've been close (maybe five miles) to my ordaining church for the last 22 years. We've attended there often. Over the almost 39 years since the event, I've seldom been contacted by the church. It's not on their agenda to keep up with guys who have gone out of the church. Odd system to foster a climate where you get people into the ministry, spin them out there, and that's the end of it.

[Tim Bonney]

[Sandy]

[Haruo]

[Sandy]

[Haruo]

Yes, that sort of thing is rife in many denominations, I think.

[Dave Roberts]

I must confess that I have participated in ordinations for three in churches I have served. One is deceased, I am still in close touch with a second, and the third was in an independent reformed church the last time we had any contact. It's a strange system among Baptists. I have pastored often with other ordained ministers in congregations (27 in one church where I was interim). I'm just not certain that we Baptists treat it with a real depth of responsibility one to another.

[Sandy]

A lot of the way Baptists do things has to do with their history. It was difficult for churches on the "frontier" and in remote locations, i.e. parts of Appalachia to get pastors at all, so they really depended on those among them who had demonstrated a sense of spiritual leadership and responsibility for their local church. There are still some "carry overs" in a lot of places. Many of my paternal grandfather's family members are buried in a cemetery next to a Baptist church in a very remote, rural part of West Virginia that is considered a "half-time church." They gather every week for Sunday School but only have a "preaching service" on the second and fourth Sunday. They share a pastor with another church, a practice they started over a hundred years ago and which they keep up, even though they are large enough and prosperous enough to afford a full time pastor. Their current pastor, who's been there almost thirty years now, is the first one they had who didn't grow up in the community and in one of the two churches and who came with a college and seminary degree.

Those "circuit ridin' days" have had a long term effect.