How you end your ministry at a church is perhaps greater than how you begin. It is definitely more emotional. At the beginning, you’re casting a vision. At the end you’re seeing the results of the completed vision. The process is often exhausting, but your hard work gets you through. Whether short term or long, you’re leaving a legacy.
In Acts 20:32-38, the Apostle Paul is giving his final goodbye. His ministry in Ephesus has come to an end. For three years he has poured his life into the lives of others, teaching them the Word and training them to live it out. Like Moses, he now gives a great admonition to those he has been used of God to place into the ministry.
Three years of sweating and laboring, teaching and praying, and rejoicing and weeping has produced a solid group of Elders (Acts 20:17). With emotions of glorious joy and deep felt pain, he says goodbye, praying once more with the fruit of his labors, the rewards to one day lay at his Savior’s feet.
One of the hardest parts of an Interim Ministry or Pastorate is saying goodbye. Because of this, I make it a practice to begin leaving at the beginning of each Interim. The shepherd who does his job well will have sheep that become very close during his tenure.
My shortest Interim was four months. The Pastor Search Committee was moving quickly when I began. Halfway joking, I couldn’t slow them down. At the same time I was needed for the hurt the church had experienced and the healing that needed to happen so they could move forward. And then there was the cleansing. There were some tough days, but God had godly men caring for me. Yes, four months of caring for sheep - up the steep mountain, by rushing streams, through a deep dark valley, and then arriving at the edge of the summer pasture of a green meadow, there to stop and allow the new Pastor to become their shepherd.
The rest of the story - God gave this church a fantastic Pastor. I loved the time God allowed me to have with them. Yes, it was hard to say goodbye, but I accomplished what God sent me there to do. With prayer and hidden tears, I walked away, “finishing my race with joy” (Acts 20:24).
Regardless of how a ministry ends, when you say “Goodbye,” be sure you’ve done your best to point them to the Lord Jesus and leave behind fruit that remains (Acts 20:36-38).
Psalm 23; John 15:5, 16.