Between a Rock and a Brook

More often than I would have liked, I’ve seen senior pastors pitted against their congregations in a struggle for power. There was a little of this going on at Trinity Heights in Flagstaff as the congregation adjusted to the extreme difference in the personalities of Bill Denlinger and Hal Cowart. Hal, however, was easy going and not all that fond of the northern Arizona climate, so to be appointed elsewhere was not a great catastrophe to be avoided. Richard Carter, on the other hand, came to Rockbrook with plenty of conference baggage that included a reputation of being an “absent minded professor” at best and something of a jerk at worst. There was a pronounced division within the congregation between Dick’s friends and supporters and his detractors. He had angered many by arranging my predecessor’s ouster, an exhibition of the cronyism among district superintendents past and present. Dick took every opportunity to explain to me what had been so unsatisfactory about Pat which I perceived as a tutorial on what I was and was not to do as the new associate. Then there were the disgruntled parishioners who had no reservations about informing me of the myriad of reasons that they didn’t care for Dick and why they wanted to see him replaced. Somewhere in the midst of all this I remained convinced that there was still merit to the life and teachings of Jesus the Christ that deserved to be communicated as gospel.