THINKING ABOUT MOVING ON

 Dan in his office at Rockyview Alliance Church

Knowing when to leave a church and move on is always a soul searching time.  Should I leave, should I stay?  What are the reasons for leaving?  What are the reasons for staying?  Well, after nearly eight years as senior pastor at Rockyview Alliance Church, I started thinking that maybe it was time to move on.  I informed the district superintendent of my intentions and also notified the district superintendent of the Canadian Pacific District of the C&MA.

The superintendents obviously share with other superintendents when a pastor is thinking of moving on.  So once I had shared with my superintendent of the Western Canadian District of the C&MA and the Canadian Pacific District of the C&MA, a superintendent of another district in Canada, phoned me asking if I would consider being a pastoral candidate at a growing church in his district.  He told me that I would be the perfect fit for that church and that church did not have one problem.  Wow!  No problems?  That sounded too good to be true.  I declined his offer.  After all, I was not a perfect pastor.  I learned a couple of years later that this perfect church split.  One of the pastors and some of the members left and started an independent church in the same city.

Well, it wasn't long after I informed the Alberta and British Columbia district superintendents of my thoughts re leaving Calgary that Gordon Fowler, superintendent in British Columbia said that he had a church that I might be interested in looking at.  In June we were camped in the Okanagan Valley and I was invited to drive up to Kamloops one evening and have dinner with a couple of the elders of the Kamloops Alliance Church.  I spent a pleasant evening with these two men.  The long and short of it all was that in August Leona and I drove to Kamloops for a five day weekend.  We went a day or so early to celebrate our 26th wedding anniversary.  The rest of the days were spent meeting with the Board of Elders of the Kamloops Alliance Church, the children's club workers, youth leaders, the two associate pastors, other interested members and preaching twice on Sunday, August 18th, 1985.

A few days later I received an invitation to be the senior pastor there in Kamloops.  My next move was to resign from Rockyview Alliance Church. My farewell Sunday in Calgary was Sunday, September 29th.  Rockyview Alliance Church was very gracious and loving.  I had been treated well during my ministry there. That last Sunday, following the evening service, when we were having a fellowship time with refreshments, the elders gathered around Leona and me for prayer.  It was expressed that they were not just letting us leave Rockyview, they were commissioning us for ministry as senior pastor of the Kamloops Alliance Church.  I have never forgotten their attitude and this gesture as I bid them farewell.

 Rockyview elders commissioning us for ministry in Kamloops

We have been back to Rockyview twice in the last, almost 33 years.  I spoke one Sunday morning in the spring of 1992.  I was invited back to Rockyview in October 1998 to be speaker at their 25th Anniversary.  That was a most enjoyable weekend for the two of us and one that brought back many fond memories.  The weekend included a banquet on the Saturday night and the Sunday morning service.  I spoke at both of these events.  Though thirteen years had passed since we resigned, that anniversary weekend seemed like old times.  Many of the members had moved across the city and no longer attended Rockyview, but they came for that big anniversary celebration.  The musicians, that had sung together when I was pastor, reconnected and performed like they were still singing together.  It was a big reunion for them, too.  I sometimes wonder what heaven will be like when we're all together again, forever.  What a day that will be!

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