Orchestra

Real quick… Please keep San Diego in your prayers today with all the fires that are going on. Our church is in a pretty safe location, but there are a few church members who have been affected by the fires. Thanks…

On another note… In my sermon on October 14, I recounted a conversation that someone told me they overheard this past summer. It went something like this:

  • Person A: “So, do you understand what it means to be missional?”
  • Person B: “Not really. But it sounds to me like we’re gonna be doing everything and the pastor isn’t gonna be doing anything!”

I think that’s great! Not accurate, of course, but at least someone out there is being honest!

As I was reflecting on that, I thought to myself, “It’s not that the pastor isn’t doing anything. It’s that the pastor is doing different stuff than what has historically been expected of pastors.” (Click here to see a previous post on the qualities of a missional leader.)

And then the image came to my mind of the pastor as the conductor of an orchestra. Now I’m sure I’m not the first person to come up with this analogy–in fact, for all I know I probably read this analogy somewhere else in all my reading!

But I definitely like that image. The conductor doesn’t play an instrument. The conductor doesn’t make any music himself or herself. What the listener hears and experiences is not what the conductor does, but what the members of the orchestra do. In that sense, one might argue that the conductor doesn’t really do anything.

Of course, we all know that the conductor does do stuff. The conductor (perhaps in conjunction with the orchestra) chooses the music. The conductor leads rehearsals. The conductor instructs the musicians in their playing. The conductor keeps the orchestra together and focused on the goal, namely playing the music together. Without the conductor, the musician’s might play their instruments, but there would be no symphony because they’d all be playing their own thing.

Someone who is more of a musician than I am could probably make even more connections between being a conductor and being a missional leader. And no doubt the analogy breaks down at some point. But this image helps me understand my role as a missional leader in conjunction with the congregation’s role as those who carry out the mission of God.