Baptist to Anglican by Amy Wright

We were serving in a Baptist church in the panhandle of Texas with 2 little boys at home.  My husband, Jay, was the worship leader at the church and had discovered the Book of Common Prayer (BCP) and the liturgical church calendar.  Both things were new and foreign to our little Baptist/Bible Church upbringing.  Jay fell in love with the BCP and would take it to his office at church and read it in secret with his door shut.  If the other pastors knew what he was doing, they would not be very understanding.  He began to try and incorporate things like Advent into our Sunday services, but he was met with quite a bit of resistance.  The senior and associate pastors began to meet and try to figure out what to do with this guy who had obviously gone off his rocker.  To find encouragement and support, he would sneak over to the Methodist church in town and share in confidence what he was learning with the pastor of that church.  Sometimes he would even sit down and talk with the Episcopal priest in town!  

After some time, Jay came to me and asked if he could start taking some classes  at a school in Jacksonville, FL.  The school happened to meet in an Episcopal church, and the church was going through a huge change where a group was disassociating from the Episcopal church and joining the Anglican church.  The new church was looking for a worship leader and Jay was very interested.  He gave me a call (while he was in Florida for classes) and asked what I thought about him applying for the job.  I kind of scoffed and said, “Sure.  But why would they hire a Baptist?”  You see, Baptists don’t really hire people from other denominations, so I figured it was that way in every other denomination.  I was wrong.  We got a phone call soon after and the interview process began.  I went along with it, but on the inside I was praying desperately for a way out.  I thought that opportunity came when we received a phone call saying that something happened in the church, and they would have to hold off on the hiring process.  I was relieved!  I thought that God had heard my pitiful cries and saved me from leaving my familiar world.

A few months later, Jay told me that if that church called us back, he would really like to reconsider.  We had already told them that we were no longer interested, so I very safely told Jay that, of course, if they called again, I would support that decision.  Again, I was wrong.  I was reading our email one evening (we shared an account at the time) and saw an email from the head of the search team.  I started shaking and opened up the letter to find that they were asking Jay to reconsider.  I started crying so hard.  Jay was worried and started asking me what was wrong.  I’m pretty sure that he thought someone had died.  I told him what the email said and he started laughing and told me that we didn’t have to move.  Through my tears I cried, “Yes we do!  This is just the way that God does things with me!!!!”  Pitiful.

Before I knew it, we were moving to a suburb of Jacksonville, FL.  I had no idea what to expect of an Anglican church.  To be honest, I thought it was most likely dead, boring, and reeking of incense.  Much to my surprise, I encountered life, and lots of it!  People loved God so deeply.  I found so much freedom in that church.  People didn’t carry their Bibles to church, and that was okay!  Not everyone knew every answer to every spiritual question asked, and that was okay!  Most people didn’t know who I was.  Most people didn’t even know the senior pastor’s wife!  If I wanted to sign up for VBS, it was my choice!!!  If I didn’t help in the nursery, no one said “Boo!”  There were absolutely no expectations of me. 

But aside from all of the freedoms I found in the simple things, the greatest thing was experiencing God in a whole new way.  I think that I cried in every service for a few weeks.  When the priests would process in with the cross, I felt God’s power.  When I would kneel at the rail to receive communion, I began to find healing in Jesus.  And when everyone worshiped with one voice, the Holy Spirit became more and more alive to me.  

All of this didn’t happen because I went from being a Baptist to an Anglican.  I think it happened because God allowed me to get away from what I knew (and knew like the back of my hand).  He took me out of my comfort zone and placed me right where I needed to be.  

The day I finally told Jay that I was fine with being in an Anglican church, I told him to at least promise me that he wouldn’t become a priest.  He laughed and said that he had no desire, but that he couldn’t promise.  Good thing he was wise enough to never say never.  I’m now married to an Anglican priest and wouldn’t have it any other way! 

*Amy Wright has been married to Jay for 12 years.  They've been in full time ministry since 2004.  Jay started off serving as a music/worship pastor in Dalhart, Tx.  They moved to Fleming Island, Fl to work at New Grace Church in 2008.  Jay is now serving as worship leader/assistant priest at All Saints Church Dallas.  They are looking forward to planting a church in east Dallas in the fall of 2015.  They have 4 kids, Isaac (11 years), Josiah (9 years), Olivia (7 years), and Hadassah (3 years).

You're a slave to God...not the church! by Becky Dietz

"But now since you have been set free from sin and have become the slaves of God, you have your present reward in holiness and its end is eternal life."  Romans 6:22

Are you a servant...or a slave?  Sometimes it's hard to tell the difference because you may be doing the very same activity as either.  It's all in how it came to be and the attitude of your heart.

There are churches out there who think they "own" you as a pastor's family just because they pay your salary.  They don't mind telling you what you should be doing and have expectations about what you should be involved in and think you should pay your own way in the activities they think you should do.  And if you resist, they may see it as a sign of being less spiritual than you should be.

It's such a fine line.  I want to be involved.  But I want to do it with joy and not compulsion (which takes all of the joy out of it!).  I want to pay my way...but there have been times I've had to choose between a church activity or paying for school lunches for my kids.  The school lunches win every time!  It's not more "spiritual" to go on a women's retreat and then not have lunch money for your kids.  It's just not!  And for a church to expect you to do that is wrong.

And it's not wrong to speak the truth in love.  The first woman from the church who asks me why I'm not going on the retreat should be told simply and kindly, "I don't have the money in my budget to do that.  I wouldn't be able to pay for my kids' lunches that week if I chose the retreat."  It's honest, it's kind, and it's on the table.  It really is a heart issue.  Don't tell the church just to manipulate the church...but don't be afraid to be honest!  It's OK for the church to see you making choices---just like they do.  Money is a huge issue which can enslave you to the church.  (And one I may deal with in detail later.)

If I don't feel like God is leading me to teach children's Sunday School this next year, I should tell the leaders, "I'm not going to be teaching this next year."  (I need to give them plenty of notice so they can find another teacher, though.)  I was told years ago that it was OK to say "No!" and that I didn't have to give an explanation.  That freed me up!  But it doesn't give me a license to be uninvolved.  Find where you fit.  Find a place you'll enjoy serving.  Use your gifts for the body!  Serve...but don't become a slave to other's expectations.  There is a difference.

Be God's slave.  He's an easy, caring taskmaster--He even carries most of the load.  I love The Message's interpretation of Matthew 11:30...

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

Dealing With the Offense of Being Fired by Sandi Smith

And...

Learning To Walk In Grace While Trusting God

The critical issue when dealing with offenses as a pastor’s wife is in reality a trust and faith issue.  When offended, it brings you to a crisis of belief.  Are you going to accept God’s grace or reject it?  Is He Lord of all situations or not?  As a pastor’s wife, one of the strongest offenses that can come is when you are rejected by a church and find your husband out of a job.  It was May when the church told us that they wanted us to leave by the fall.  How devastating that was, which made it a very hard summer.  We immediately put our house up for sale.  We felt we had to, to get it sold, but I know deep down it was kind of our way of getting back.  Kind of like, “we will show you by putting a sign out in front and letting the church people know that something was going on.”  I guess also, it was kind of my way of making it not hurt so bad by getting back at them.  Something we had to get forgiveness for.  The summer went on, it was a hard summer for my husband (Associate Pastor) especially, because he had to go in daily and act as though nothing was going on, and constantly feeling attacked by the Senior Pastor and the personnel committee and the constant rumors that went around.  No one really knew the truth.  It also made it very hard to go to church and worship during that summer.  People became cold toward us, and acted like we weren’t there.  People who use to strongly support my husband’s ministry, no longer would even talk to us.  Thankfully, we made it through the summer.  When the end of summer came, we still had no idea what to do or when we would be asked to leave, but we did know we had to be out of our house by Labor Day weekend.  The week that we had to be out of our house was another hard week.  We knew we had to be out by the weekend, but we couldn’t find any place to go.  All the doors seemed to close on the few places that were available to rent.  It was now Friday and we still had not found a place to go.  I cried many a tear.  I guess in a way I was mad at God.  I kept crying out to my Heavenly Father,   “why don’t you show us a place to live.  Don’t you understand God; we are down to the line.  We only have three days before we have to be completely out of our house.  We have no place to go, we need a place NOW.”  That afternoon, a good friend of mine told me about a house next to people we already knew, and that the sign went up just that morning.  We immediately went by the house to see if we could get a phone number off the sign to call.  We were told that we would probably not be able to get an answer back from the realtor till Saturday or Sunday, because the owner was in the midst of moving himself,  from Dallas to Houston and there was no way of getting hold of him.  Praise God, the realtor called us and said it was alright with the owner if we moved in without signing a lease, only if we agreed to show the house to sale it for him.  The owner wanted a year’s lease, but we couldn’t promise that.  In our minds we thought we’d only be there a couple of months.  Little did we know this was going to be a time of refining that was going to last 23 months.  This raised the ultimate question… were we truly called and if we were truly called, the only thing you could do is wait on God and trust Him.  We then moved in on Sunday and Monday.  Boy, how the Lord works, I then realized why He didn’t show us a place to live sooner, because it was the one that went on the rental market that day.  The Lord didn’t show us any sooner, because the house wasn’t empty yet.  I should have just rested in the Lord 100%, but I still felt I needed to worry.  Amazing, little did we know that the house we moved into that weekend never sold as long as we were there, and the owner said we were such good renters for the first year that he decided that he was going to lower our rent.  Praise God!  We were also able to stay in the school where the boys had already been attending and they would even be able to walk to school with their friends.  It was wonderful!  Things began to settle down until about October when they called my husband in and said they wanted him to leave NOW.  We were now no longer employed and had no church home.  The personnel committee and the senior pastor told us that if we’d just leave they’d pay us three months severance pay, but if we stayed, they would drag us through the mud, and we’d never get a cent.  We decided the Lord couldn’t be glorified if we stayed and were drug through the mud, so we left.  We felt that it was more important for the Lord to handle the situation, and that we would just trust the Lord to take care of us.  After that, we did finally find a church home where we could worship during this time in our lives while waiting on the Lord to open a new door for us to serve.  The first week my husband was home, was pretty hard.  A lot of rejection was felt.  No one from our former church ever called or came by or checked on us for months.  The pain of not being wanted and not having a position of service was very hard.  The next few weeks got a little easier.  We had our good days and our bad.  There were days I even wondered, why bother to get up and get dressed, there was really nothing to do but sit around the house.  After a couple of weeks of this, my husband decided that he would take advantage of all of the extra time he had on his hands.  He began to listen to tapes of John McArthur and other pastor’s who he had great respect for.  He really got into some deep study and his and my prayer life got much stronger and closer to the Lord.  He had more time for the boys and they loved having him being at home so much, and I also loved having him at home a lot more, too.  It was now getting into the holiday season.  Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went, and January was coming quickly and the severance pay was about to run out.  My husband knew he had to start looking for some kind of temporary work that would help pay the bills until the Lord opened a door for ministry again.  Several months came and went once again and no door opened for temporary work, but my husband’s faith stood strong in the Lord, he was never worried about money and bills.  We really grew stronger in our spiritual growth and in our marriage.  We had to resort to living off of the $5,000 we had made off of the sale of our house.  Up and down days still came and went.  We never doubted that God was in control, (well at least my husband didn’t, maybe me, not so much).  March came and my husband was still looking for temporary work.  The Lord continued to take care of us and meet our needs. Some days that really seemed the hardest, we would just ask the Lord to give us a special hug that day, and He always came through.  A note would come in the mail, or money, or a phone call.  Something to let us know he hadn’t forgotten us.  April came and my husband got a call from a friend and asked him if he would like to come and work with him in his lawn service.  So he went to work for $7 an hour working anywhere from 8-12 hour days, 5 days a week.  Fortunately the boys had baseball to keep them occupied.  It made for long hard days for my husband, but we knew the Lord had opened this door, and we were thankful for the provision he provided us.  Our church where we were worshipping during this time, also continued to send groceries, or provide money gifts.  The main thing I think that we learned through this ordeal was that God wanted us to continue to trust him and He would take care of us and to learn to wait on Him.  Just be still and know that He is God.  To finish off this part of the saga in our lives, the Lord did open a door for my husband to continue to minister in the local church, and I continued to learn how to trust God and know that as long as we are in His will, He will never leave us or forsake us. It would have been easy to become bitter during this time, but the ones who would have been hurt/damaged the most would have been our family (Hebrews 12:15).  When offended trust God, walk in grace, and let Him write the final chapter.

*Sandi Smith has been married to Terry Smith for 35 years. They have been in the ministry for over 34 years.  Terry has served in various roles as an Associate Pastor, but is currently serving as Senior Pastor at Jerusalem Baptist Church in Fairfax, VA.  They have two adult sons, Scott who is married to Mary Jo (Hubbard), and Jeremy, who is married to Christina (Miller).  Scott is pastor of a new church plant - Well Spring Church of Joplin, Missouri.  Jeremy and Christina are missionaries in Southeast Asia.  They have three grandchildren, Grayson (born 2007), Mollie Kate (born 2012), and Adelyn Grace (2013).

Can I Have Friends? by Becky Dietz

Many pastor's wives ask the question, "Can I have friends?"  I've heard people counsel that pastor's wives shouldn't have close friends because it will create jealousy among the women in the church.   Or that you shouldn't confide in the women of your church because they will become disillusioned because you have needs (really??)--or they might betray your trust.  Then there are those who divide friendships into categories...coffee friends, shopping friends, day trip friends, prayer friends, etc....which isn't wrong.  But some do it to include as many women into their circle as they can and yet not give themselves completely to everyone--or maybe, anyone.

For years, I'd say, "Jesus is our example" for most things but didn't realize he'd left us an example for friendships.  He had levels of friendships.  You'll see his relationships extended from being with and ministering to large crowds to a confidential context with a best friend.  He was with the multitudes teaching them, healing them, and touching them.  But he ministered with a small crowd of people who followed him (including women).  He narrowed that down to discipling, training, and equipping twelve men.  He poured himself into these twelve.  He was entrusting his kingdom into their hands and was with them most of the time.  Out of those twelve men, he was closest to three:  Peter, James & John.  They were together at some pretty incredible moments--like the moment of transfiguration and praying together in the garden.  But of those three, Jesus had a best friend...John.  I love that John says about himself, "the disciple whom Jesus loved."  When Jesus was dying on the cross, he entrusted his own mother to his best friend, John.

I'm a person who needs friends.  I need deep, intimate, loyal friendships.  I didn't consciously set out to follow the example Jesus gave us with his own friendships, but when I understood his relationships, I realized I had the same level of friendships in my own life.

There are those women I've spent time ministering with--whether it was VBS, women's ministry, mission trips or benevolence ministry.  I think it's when you do ministry together in a large group like this that you begin to find people who are like-minded.  You're drawn to them and they begin to stick out as someone you want to get to know better.  Or it may be that you've had similar life experiences which creates a bond.  But out of this large pool of like-minded people, a smaller group can develop.

For Andy & I, this happened with a small group of friends.  We were all hungry to know God more.  We were searching for truth together and wanted to learn how to pray.  So we met to praise and pray in a safe environment and we jokingly began calling our time P&P (praise & prayer--and later, potluck)--and it stuck.  We met once a week with these friends with whom we felt safe and did what I call a holy experiment.  We tested the boundaries of prayer.  We may have done some crazy stuff to learn what pleased God, but we felt safe doing it because we were in it together wanting to grow spiritually.  We brought our children along and let them play together but many times they joined us.  Many of them point back to that time in their own lives as part of their own spiritual growth.

There are really very few women I've actually met with one-on-one to "pour into" or mentor as much as I've just walked with them and we've learned together.  My style of discipleship is through friendship.  As a friendship develops, I invest time in that friendship and when we're together, we just talk about God-things.  It's a give-and-take of conversation where we learn from one another and pray together.  At the same time we were doing P&P, I began meeting with a group of women to pray.  We met on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5:30 a.m. and shared and prayed until 7:00 a.m.  That gave us time to meet and pray before having to get our kids ready for school.   It was a commitment.  But we were all very needy...and I think because each of us had such big needs in our lives and we were all honestly and openly sharing those needs and praying together about them, it created loyalty among us.  I think being vulnerable is essential to a deep friendship.  We protected one another and never shared what happened in those prayer times.  It was between us and God.  It was an exciting time as we watched God work in our lives!

Can you have friends as a pastor's wife?  Oh, I hope you will!!  Might you be betrayed?  Yes.  There's always that chance.  Jesus was.  I once told a friend a very intimate detail about my life and she shared it publicly.  It damaged our friendship even though we tried to talk it out.  Can you have more than one intimate friend?  Yes.  You may have many.  Will it create jealousy among the women of your church?  It could.  But you have to remember that there are baby or immature Christians in your church.  But you can lead by example of being a good friend just like Jesus did.  And you have to have a friend to model friendship.  I've had friendships through the years that ended because of disagreements. I've had relationships which were very lopsided with me investing much more than the other person.  Or I've had relationships where the other person was desperately clingy.  I had to back out of those friendships as gracefully as possible because they just weren't healthy.

Good friendships don't come easily.  There's a cost.  I bet if you examine your close friendships you'll find that it's the hard stuff which creates a bond.  It's walking together through a crisis, pressure, or trying circumstances which will cause you to link arms and make it through together.  You may become best friends with other staff wives because of hard experiences in your church.  Or you may becomes best friends with an extended family member or other wives with whom you have shared experiences.

I'm just hoping you'll give friendship a chance.  Ask the Holy Spirit (who is your teacher, counselor, guide...) to lead you to a good, loyal friend.  Ask Him to help you be the friend you need to be.  Solomon said it pretty well....

"There are “friends” who pretend to be friends, 
but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother."
Proverbs 18:24 (TLB-emphasis mine)

Ask the Holy Spirit for that kind of friend--the one who sticks closer than a brother.  I'm praying He blesses you with a good, loyal, trustworthy friend--a friend for life.  A friendship filled with grace.

A Prayer for You by Becky Dietz

Father,
I'm asking you to bless us, Your pastors' wives.  You know each of our needs.  Some of us are just starting out as pastor's wives, some are pouring into those around them, some are wounded warriors, some are blossoming and growing, some are in full retreat.  You know each of us by name and our deepest needs.  BREATHE LIFE into us.  Fill us with Your mercy, Your grace, Your love, Your hope.  Massage each heart and cause it to beat in time with Yours.  Help us to come in agreement with You--for everything.  Bless our marriages and our children.  Keep our eyes fixed on You, the Author & Finisher of our faith.  Let us be gracious to those in our churches.  Let us see each church member the way You see them.  Let us be expressions of Your love, Your grace, Your mercy, Your hope.  Draw us near to You; keep us hidden under Your wing of protection.  Give us times of refreshment with You, with our husbands, with our families, and alone.  Father, bless us with good, trustworthy, loyal friends.  Help us to BE a good friend.  We need You, God.  We are desperate to see You move in our lives.  Would You surprise us by the power of Your Spirit?  Would You bless us with a sweet surprise from You today?  Oh God...most of all, would You put praise on our lips?  We want to offer You thanksgiving and praise...even if it's a sacrifice of praise.  Heal us, Daddy...please.  In Jesus' name, Amen.