They didn't tell me I would get drafted
by Scott Dalen
I just got home to an empty house. The family has road tripped about 3 hours to my sister in law’s house for a birthday party and won’t be home till tomorrow. I on the other hand, had to bow out of the family gathering as my synod’s candidacy retreat was last night into today. The really nice part, the retreat was at a camp that is less than 10 miles from my house. I think I won the award for shortest travel distance on that one. The retreat itself was pretty low key, which suits me just fine, but was beneficial at the same time.
Our guest speaker was from the church wide office in Chicago, and one of her duties is to work with the process of announcement. If I understood correctly, this works pretty much hand in hand with every pastor’s “first call.” As she was talking with us about the process, I began to get an image in my head of the NFL draft which manages to dominate the airwaves once a year. Namely, there was an image of some guy in a suit coming out to a podium, looking into the camera and saying “With the first pick of the 2009 draft, the Denver Bronco’s pick Scott Dalen” and the crowd goes wild.
Granted, I’m sure it’s not quite to that point at the church wide office on announcement day, but then, I’ve never seen that one presented on ESPN either. Maybe it is pretty wild and crazy.
But all jokes aside, this presentation was really geared more at the candidates that are nearing the end of their seminary journey. As I listened to the conversation, I reflected back about a year ago to the ordination of my church’s former intern. I was on the brink of starting seminary at that time and remember being overwhelmed at the magnitude of the office that the Bishop was describing to the about-to-be pastor. Now here a year later (and a few classes under my belt) I don’t feel much more prepared. Fortunately, there’s a lot of water that still needs to go under the Scotty bridge before the NPL (national pastor league…haha) draft announces me to the multitudes. That’s a reassuring thing at this point.
Our guest speaker was from the church wide office in Chicago, and one of her duties is to work with the process of announcement. If I understood correctly, this works pretty much hand in hand with every pastor’s “first call.” As she was talking with us about the process, I began to get an image in my head of the NFL draft which manages to dominate the airwaves once a year. Namely, there was an image of some guy in a suit coming out to a podium, looking into the camera and saying “With the first pick of the 2009 draft, the Denver Bronco’s pick Scott Dalen” and the crowd goes wild.
Granted, I’m sure it’s not quite to that point at the church wide office on announcement day, but then, I’ve never seen that one presented on ESPN either. Maybe it is pretty wild and crazy.
But all jokes aside, this presentation was really geared more at the candidates that are nearing the end of their seminary journey. As I listened to the conversation, I reflected back about a year ago to the ordination of my church’s former intern. I was on the brink of starting seminary at that time and remember being overwhelmed at the magnitude of the office that the Bishop was describing to the about-to-be pastor. Now here a year later (and a few classes under my belt) I don’t feel much more prepared. Fortunately, there’s a lot of water that still needs to go under the Scotty bridge before the NPL (national pastor league…haha) draft announces me to the multitudes. That’s a reassuring thing at this point.
posted by Scott Dalen at 1:24 PM
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