Helping Pastors Thrive Equips Ministers Throughout Vocational Life Span

At the end of 2018, CBFNC received a $1,000,000 grant from the Lilly Endowment Inc.’s Thriving in Ministry initiative to help establish the Helping Pastors Thrive program.

Since then, CBFNC has been developing and implementing the program, which provides NC pastors with ongoing opportunities and environments for relational learning, spiritual formation, and professional development throughout all stages of their vocation. Helping Pastors Thrive has quickly become a cornerstone in how CBFNC equips ministers and churches.

The program includes three initiatives focusing on three distinct vocational stages: • New Pastors Cohort Program—for pastors in their first three years of post-seminary congregational ministry. • Workshop Retreats for Pastors—for early and mid-career pastors navigating the complex challenges of pastoral ministry in established congregations.

• Pastor-in-Residence Program—for late career pastors who are nearing retirement and desire dedicated time away from their ministries to reflect on the meaning of their vocation, to prepare for their final years of pastoral service, and to share what they have learned with younger pastors.

The New Pastors Cohort program began in 2019 with the launch of an initial two-year New Pastors Cohort that consisted of seven pastors and three mentors. The group setting allows for peer interaction, sharing and learning. A second cohort will begin in the fall of 2020 and applications for participation are currently available at helpingpastorsthrive.org.

In addition to the New Pastor Cohort, the Workshop Retreats and Pastor-in-Residence programs launched earlier this year. Read the stories that follow about those programs.

The Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation, created by members of the Lilly family through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly & Company. Its grantmaking in religion focuses on supporting efforts to strengthen the leadership and vitality of Christian congregations throughout the country and to increase the public’s understanding of the role of religion in public life.

Pastors Examine Leadership in a Time of Social and Political Polarization Both articles by Scott Hudgins Director of Helping Pastors Thrive

Pastors from across North

Carolina gathered at St. Francis Springs Prayer Center in Stoneville to participate in the first workshop retreat sponsored by CBFNC’s Helping Pastors Thrive program. The retreat, a two-day event that included worship, prayer and fellowship, explored pastoral leadership in an age of polarization led by Dr. David R. Brubaker, professor of organizational leadership and dean at Eastern Mennonite University. Dr. Brubaker, an expert on conflict within organizations, recently released a book on the topic entitled, When the Center

Does Not Hold: Leading in an Age of Polarization (Fortress Press, 2019).

Pastors at the workshop shared their own experiences of how the heightened sense of division along social, political and theological lines influences and permeates congregational life. The overarching concern among the group was that ministering to a widely diverse congregation in this moment of our history can be a real challenge. “On the one hand we want to celebrate the fact that God is above partisan politics and the church should be a place where our sole allegiance is to God and