I note with some passing interest that the church I attended in college recently celebrated the full retirement of the man who served as its lead pastor while I was there.
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Pat Webber became the lead pastor of Easton Assembly of God in late 1991, I think during my senior year at college. The man wasn’t perfect, nor was he as good as the pastor he replaced — who is, really? — but he lasted in that position for about 30 years before retiring. That sort of longevity bespeaks a compatibility with the church that picked him.
I first attended Easton Assembly of God in 1989. Within a year I had become a member and started working in the children’s ministry. I’d grown up in a staid Presbyterian church where there would have been a scandal if anyone actually smiled or enjoyed themselves. It was a shock to my system, and a welcome one, to find and attend a church so festive. Worship didn’t sound like a funeral march, people actually seemed happy to be there, and where the whole thing felt alive and infused with passion.
About 200 people attended church any given Sunday morning. Even Wednesday evening services — we actually had those back in the day — saw 50 people show up, give or take.
Much of the draw came from Mike Poppa, a charismatic and gifted teacher in his late 30s. If memory serves, Mike either had founded the church shortly after finishing Bible college, or a much smaller congregation had taken a chance on him. Either way, under his leadership the church had grown into a remarkably active community of faith with something happening every day of the week. The church also sponsored some 30 missionaries around the globe, including a former associate pastor at the church and his wife.
While a lot of Pentecostal churches slip into error with prosperity teaching, play loose with church doctrine, act too razzly-dazzly with the gifts of the Spirit, or favor the You’e Going to Hell card in the weekly sermons, there was none of that under Mike’s watch. Mike rooted his sermons in the Bible, not personal revelation. He made sure everyone understood how spiritual gifts like glossalalia were supposed to work, and he kept the ship running smoothly. There were King James Bibles in the pews, but he wasn’t above citing a more accessible translation in his sermons, nor was he beyond poking a little fun at the King James purism when it was called for.
There was a Christian fellowship on campus that I joined, but there was never any question for me. Easton Assembly of God was my spiritual home.
Then one day an announcement came from the pulpit like lightning from Mount Sinai. Mike and his wife, Laurie, and their daughters were moving to Westchester. They had agreed to take a position at another church.
Mike had always been a good preacher, but starting that Sunday and through his last in Easton, he outdid himself. It didn’t matter if it was Communion Sunday, or if the text was John 15’s “I am the vine, you are the branches,” every sermon worked on multiple levels. There was the text that he was expositing on. There was a personal application that individual listeners could use. And beneath that, this message carried through each week: God is at work in this change. You will make it through with flying colors if you stick together.
Like most churches, Easton Assembly of God was governed by a board of elders elected from the congregation every year for staggered terms. They provided governance and accountability to the pastor, and in true biblical fashion they were likewise accountable to the congregation that elected and could recall them.
The elders anticipated it would take some time before the church would be ready to consider replacing Mike, but he had done a good job preparing the church for his departure. Plus, we still had Dan Shumate. Dan was Mike’s current and most recent associate pastor, a man in his 30s. Once Mike stepped down, Dan took the lead as interim pastor. It was a post he would execute faithfully until we hired a permanent replacement.
Weeks passed, and then months, and then, finally, the search began. The elders advertised the pastoral opening, screened and interviewed candidates, and then brought them in for the congregation to consider.
It worked like this. The candidate would arrive one designated Sunday and deliver a sermon. He’d stick around for a potluck lunch in the church basement with the congregation. Afterward, we’d all return to the sanctuary and for an hour or 90 minutes, people would ask him questions, and he would answer.
The elders already had screened candidates for adherence to Assembly of God teachings and Christian orthodoxy. Our questions focused on areas that mattered to us individually. We asked questions like “How would you expand the church’s ministry to our city?” A parent with grade school children wanted to know, “What’s your perspective on Christian schools?” (We had one.) One question had to do with how a candidate would provide pastoral counsel for victims of abuse. These weren’t fluff questions. The first candidate lost a lot of support when he said he didn’t take people seriously who claimed to have been abused, since in his experience they usually were just seeking attention.
This was 30 years ago, and there’s a lot I either don’t know or don’t remember about the church’s search process. At the time, I was in college and too busy with my studies and other church activities to worry about the mechanics of pastoral succession, but as I look back, I’m impressed with how much the elders got right.
For starters, they didn’t rush right into the search; instead, they took their time — I remember it as close to a year, though this is probably an exaggeration — so Mike’s ghost would have time to leave the building without disrupting the search. By the time the elders started bringing in candidates, we were ready to move on. We were no longer waiting for the Second Coming of Mike Poppa.
The elders also walked with a spirit of humility. They knew that they wouldn’t think of everything, so they gave us a chance as the congregation to interview the candidate too. And when that was done, the final decision was ours. They didn’t select a new pastor for us and then announce their decision as leaders; they worked with us, as fully vested partners. We held a congregational meeting and we cast our votes, yea or nay, by secret ballot.
As a result, there was always the chance the congregtion would pick the “wrong” candidate from the point of view of the board. But the board had faith that there was no need to control everything and make things go the way they wanted. They trusted that God’s will, God’s purposes and God’s kingdom would win out in the end.
As I said, Pastor Webber wasn’t perfect. He was a little too keen on the prosperity gospel for my tastes, though it never unseated him as it has others; and there were other parts of his style that didn’t suit me. That doesn’t matter.
What does matter in the end is that the elders of our church valued the congregational voice and its right to shape the future of the church. They made their recommendation and they explained why they were making it, but the final say was ours.
It’s had some ups and downs, but 30 years later, that church is still there.
That sounds like faith well-placed.
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