Getting Assessed
What Assessment was
Monday morning Jo, Gus and I flew to Atlanta, for our denominations Church Planter Assessment. The main goal of the Assessment was to interact with Jo and I to see how well we might do at starting a new church (often called church planting). Our denomination, the Presbyterian Church in America does this kind of thing several times a year. We were with 8 other couples and one guy.
The actual assessment was an intense process. It was broken up into projects, teaching, interviews, and personality testing. The men and women evaluating us had all participated in church planting or were in leadership in similar areas. All our assessors were great–they really cared about getting to know us, and while I assumed the whole thing would be just one big job interview, I’m glad I was wrong. I made some great connections with the other potential-planters as well as the assessors.
What Assessment wasn’t
- A cake walk — It wasn’t an easy process. We probably spent 15 hours just with the application alone, and that was before the intense 3 days spent in Atlanta.
- A vacation — I’ve never been on a vacation with that kind of breakneck pace.
- Final approval — The assessment offered us a recommendation. The final approval comes from our local network of churches(presbytery).
- That scene from Armageddon — The counseling wasn’t crazy and no one went near my cooli.
Why was it important?
- It was one of the best things that Jo and I have done for our marriage.
- The process also helped shape my thoughts on my limitations as a potential church planter.
- We went away from the week with a fresh perspective on our hopes for Lawrenceville, some of which changed over the week and other which were affirmed.
- It let me see that I hadn’t been relating to Christ the way I need to. I had been offering people the church, it was Jesus’s church, but I hadn’t been offering people Jesus. This blew me away, and I so glad that it did.
Does this change anything?
- Yup, it sure does, but I’m not exactly sure of everything yet, so I’m gonna keep my mouth shut.