Dear OFBC Family,
I officially began to serve as your Transitional Pastor on July 14. It was a typically hot and muggy Lowcountry Sunday morning. Since then, temperatures have slowly fallen, like stubborn golden leaves on a big hickory tree. Either summer wanted to selfishly overstay its welcome, or fall forgot to look at the calendar! I don’t know, but I do know that change is hard to understand, at times, and even more difficult to navigate.
The idea of the Transitional Pastor model is to help churches transition from one season to another. For the Transitional Pastor, the first several months are usually devoted to getting to know the people, the culture, and something of the church’s story. I was given some background and insight into some recent history, but not long after arriving, some challenges began to surface that required our attention and energy.
I’m happy to say that with your help, we recently received a significant amount of very helpful input from our Church Health Assessment tool. We are still in the process of tallying that information and will provide you with an initial report soon.
Our next step in the Transitional Process will come after the first of the year. This will be the formation of the Transitional Task Force. The makeup of this working group has yet to be determined, but perhaps you might be praying about your involvement. You’ll be hearing more about this as soon as we can pull it together.
I can tell you that for the next 6 months or more, we are all going to be hard at work prayerfully seeking God’s Vision for our church, sharpening our Mission, affirming our values, setting goals, and building strategies for the coming years.
I have decided – and I invite each of you to join me in this – that God in his eternal wisdom and knowledge knows what is best for His people. I have decided that I can serve you best as Transitional Pastor, by not getting in the Lord’s way or by trying to do His job. I have decided to follow Jesus, the Shepherd and Overseer of our souls, who will always lead his flock in the way they should go. Let’s decide to go together!
For the sake of the Gospel,
Dr. Hal West
