Barnabas File

After a summer of plans to return to some semblance of normalcy, we find ourselves continuing to face the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.  The reasons are many, but the reality is that our best laid plans will not be realized.  We each have our own stories to share.  The reality was brought home to me this morning when I heard a report that many Americans have come to the point that they believe we will “just have to learn to live with COVID.”   This is discouraging for all of us—businesspeople, health professionals, teachers, parents, students, clergy and lay leaders in congregations, and more.  The marathon goes on and nerves wear thin.  One option is to seek someone to blame, but this only leads to further frustration and anger.  Another option is to acknowledge that this is, for present, our lot in life and seek the strength to endure.   We can find that strength in the Psalms, where writers are very transparent about their anger, grief, and uncertainty as well as their trust

During a recent webinar, my colleague Mark Tidsworth observed, “Every congregation is in redevelopment or transition.”    I agree, but my question is, “Do they realize it yet?”   In his classic work The Frog in the Kettle published in 1990, George Barna shared the metaphor of the frog residing a kettle where the temperature was steadily rising.  Barna suggested that the frog would not be aware of the rising heat until it was be too late to escape the boiling water. His take-away was that churches were in a similar situation. Things were slowly changing, churches were ignoring those changes, and they needed to respond before it was too late.   Societal and cultural changes in recent days have turned the heat up drastically and the change would be hard to ignore.  Even so, some of us are doing our best to try to get back to a “normal” that no longer exists.  The pandemic has accelerated cultural and societal changes that were already present, and we were doing our best to ignore.   Many

We take a lesson where we can find it—even on National Public Radio.  On Weekend Edition Saturday , host Scott Simon interviewed the owner of three  restaurants in Albuquerque, New Mexico, about the challenges of coming back from COVID.  Her remarks caught my attention on two points—employees and customers—and made me think about our churches.     Now, I know that we should avoid thinking of our staff leaders as “employees” and that congregants are not really “customers” (although some think they are), but there are some insights here for those who serve and especially for recipients of that service.   First, she pointed out, “ There's a lot of pressure on the team that is in place. We don't have a lot of depth to allow people time off, to allow people a break. We're losing the people that have been here because they're exhausted, fatigued because we're so short-staffed.”     This is certainly true of ministers.  Clergy stress is at an unprecedented high.  Although