It was a minister's nightmare. The search committee had said there weren't any serious problems, but before his boxes were unpacked, the interim pastor (my husband, Jerry) learned that thirty people had left the church when the last minister was pressured to leave after serving not quite three years.

Why wasn't the last minister acceptable? The secretary, the custodian, and many others complained to Jerry that Brian didn't leave his study doors open. He had even drawn curtains across the window. What's more, the secretary did not always know where he was. That's just not the way Timothy, their former beloved pastor of twenty-three years, had done things.

The more Jerry heard from the secretary and custodian, the more he realized any minister who was not a mirror reflection of Timothy would have a hard time. These two people slanted everything the new minister did differently as bad. They were disruptive and divisive. The negative climate they created had contributed to Brian's ineffectiveness. ...