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    A text message arrives from your supervisor after dinner.  “Let’s meet at Starbucks tomorrow morning.”  He informs you that come January 1 your job will be part-time without benefits.  At least he bought the coffee.
    A group of church members requests a meeting with you.  The church has grown significantly, giving is up, baptisms have increased, and a long-awaited worship center sits prominently in the heart of the community.  However, this group doesn’t like the way you do things and demands some changes.  The change they really want is a new pastor to take your place.
    You are called to a meeting with the Personnel Committee during your vacation.  The pastor left for another church.  The music minister took the same route.  You and one other staff member are the only ones left.  The staff needs restructuring, you are told, and you are the odd man out.  The church will vote on terminating your position while you are away.  You are instructed not to return after the vote other than to clean out your office.  Your wife is six months pregnant and you have paid the hospital in full?  “Sometimes life is like that,” you are told.  “Oh, and be out of the parsonage in two weeks.”
    Where do you go from here?  
    If you are normal, you ask God lots of questions.  Why is this happening?  Why now?  Did I miss something?
    You question your calling.  You desperately send resumes and phone friends in the ministry.  You look for some kind of honorable employment that you can do until you find another church.  But how will churches respond to your resume when they see that you are no longer serving in a church position?  Will they consider you damaged goods?  Will they even give you a second look?  Will your resume find its way to the discard pile simply due to this one fact?
    Do you even want to return to a church-based ministry?  Sheep bite!  Maybe it would be safer selling insurance.  It would certainly be more lucrative.  Then you could volunteer at church and become the pastor and staff’s best friend.  You could give significantly and strategically.  
    A pastor mentor offered this thought to his son in the ministry upon such an occasion: “All of us are going to be pushed out at one time or another.  It hasn’t happened to me yet, but it will.”
    He was the most competent pastor in his area.  The church he served doubled in size.  Then it doubled again. A few years later, however, he was on the receiving end of news like that above.  He lived to see his prophecy fulfilled.  
    Recently a verse stood out in the Life Journal daily reading.  Philippians 4:6 in the New Living Translation says, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything.  Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.”  
    Turn worries into prayers.  Tell God what you need.  Thank him for all he has done.  That is a nice sermon outline.  Until you find a place to preach it, preach it to yourself.  Live what it says.
    The man in the situations above at one point spent two long years turning worries into prayers.  Then he found the job of his dreams.  Now he is turning his worries into prayers again as that job becomes part-time in January. Even so, he can look back on finding himself restructured out of a job, pushed out of another, and downsized from this one with a faith perspective.  Why?  Because God has always provided a better next step than where he stood before.  
    When he was voted out of that first church in seminary, he spent the holidays and final months of his wife’s pregnancy giving her the full attention she needed.  He was called to pastor a church when his newborn son was three weeks old.  In his mind, he wasn’t ready to serve as pastor yet, but God had other plans.  
    God led from that small town in the country to a larger town and a larger church.  He led from there to a city in one of the largest metropolitan areas of the country.  He led from there to a ministry of encouragement to pastors and churches through coaching and consulting.  He will lead from there as he has led in the past.  
    “Thank him for all he has done” is about remembering God’s faithfulness in the past.  He is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  He will provide today and tomorrow just as he has provided in the past.  Don’t worry; pray.  Tell God what you need.  Trust him to provide.  
    By the way, I have updated resumes if you need one.