Anybody's Church Gone Through a Search for a New Pastor?

[Enlightenment]

I'm wondering what procedures were followed and how the whole event played out....

[carmen]

We did. The new pastor has been here since Aug-Sep timeframe.

We had a team that took on the job of selecting a new pastor. They solicited applications, got about 200, and prayerfully selected a list to ask for tapes from. Each listed their top 10 separately. IIRC, 8 of the 10 selected appeared on ALL the members' lists. They received the tapes, listened to them, and interviewed the candidates via telephone. The pastor eventually selected was the top pick for all but one member, I believe.

It was a very LENGTHY process, and I think it should have been done in about half the time. But the results were good, and I believe the members on the committee were looking not for their own preference, but for the man God wanted in the pulpit.

[Enlightenment]

We had a team that took on the job of selecting a new pastor. They solicited applications, got about 200, and prayerfully selected a list to ask for tapes from. Each listed their top 10 separately. IIRC, 8 of the 10 selected appeared on ALL the members' lists. They received the tapes, listened to them, and interviewed the candidates via telephone. The pastor eventually selected was the top pick for all but one member, I believe.

It was a very LENGTHY process, and I think it should have been done in about half the time. But the results were good, and I believe the members on the committee were looking not for their own preference, but for the man God wanted in the pulpit.

That's about how I envision the process. My church is in the General Baptist Conference. They have hired consultants to help them with the search. First thing they recommended is to NOT promote the associate pastor to senior pastor as this almost always is a bad move. (No further explanation was given, but associate pastor agrees with the assessment).

Next thing up is a survey, presumably of the congregation, I suppose asking for qualities they think a senior pastor should possess. (although warning bells were going off for me). I certainly hope they have some sort of an interview regarding doctrine for any prospective pastor.

They've given a time frame of about a year for the entire process.

That's as far as they've explained the process to the congregation at large.

[IbeleiveinJesus]

Our Church assembles a Call Committee which consists of a half dozen or so Church Members appointed by the Church Council.

The Call committee then works with the Synod Bishop to get the names of qualified Pastors seeking a call. There is a long series of interviews.. Past Sermon's are listened to, Candidates often visit the Church to talk to members of the Congregation, etc..

At the end of that, the Call Committee notifies the Personel Committee they have found a candidate to recommend..(hopefully, sometimes they have to go back the drawing board)

The Personel committee then contacts the candidate to discuss compensation.

Once that is done the recommendation goes to the Church Council.

Once the Church Council signs off on it, the Congregation is introduced to the candidate, and they vote on whether to extend the call...

Should the Congregation vote in the affirmative, a call is issued.

The candidate then has the option to accept, or reject the call... Should they reject the call (it has happened), the whole thing starts over..

We've had the process take over two years...

-Ted

[fiat_lux]

We're going through the process right now for an associate pastor, and did so for the senior pastor's position several years ago.

The norm at my church is similar to the above, except with the additional proviso that we normally do not begin looking for a replacement pastor until six months after the departure of the last one. The logic behind this is that both the team selecting the pastor and, ultimately, the congregation should be deciding whether the new pastor is who God has called to us and for what purpose, rather than whether he can fit exactly the same shoes that the former pastor did. I was a little skeptical of this at first, but I can understand the reasoning.

The process usually takes one and a half or two years, including the six months.

[70thWeek]

We just went through one.

We had an interim pastor who led us through the process. My name was mentioned a few times, but I don't have to time to invest in being the pastor at this point in my life (full-time work and a Ph.D. program are more than enough to occupy my time).
Several people came to "audition" and see if they were interested. It came down to one person (whom only one of us really knew) and an elder from the church. After prayer, the men of the church had a meeting to discuss who the pastor would be. We all got to give input. I kept my mouth shut most of the time until they asked to hear from the guy who actually had a theological degree. I voiced my support in favor of the guy from our church. He is now our pastor.