The Graceful Exit: A Pastor's Journey from Good-Bye to Hello

Pastors say goodbye to congregations. Sometimes their goodbyes are timely and sweet; sometimes they are jarring and painful. But as they leave, they face a unique journey of grief, one shaped by their role. They face both the outward grief of leaving people behind and the inward grief of leaving an identity behind. In The Graceful Exit, Lutheran pastor Mary Lindberg shares insights from her experience of ending her service to a congregation, as well as wisdom from other pastors who have changed their life work. Lindberg invites readers to pull apart the strands of self and role, individual and community; confront regrets, confusion, and dislocation; and figure out where and who God is at this juncture in their lives. She offers the book she wishes someone had handed her about finding a new church home, about getting a life, about relating to the colleagues who stayed. She reflects on how to be a pastor in a non-pastoral role, how to find community, and how to be graceful in the midst of the awkward unknown. Lindberg acknowledges that as pastors leave congregations, they have to discern how to wrap up their ministry and get out the door without regrets. She recognizes that most pastors will struggle with the spiritual themes of fulfillment, surrender, community, legacy, and separation. But she also believes pastors can face these challenges together. The Graceful Exit invites them into a community of healing and shows them that God walks with them to a new place, even as God keeps on loving the place they have left.

About the Author :
For more than twenty-five years, Mary C. Lindberg has worked at local, national, and international levels in the world of the church as a parish pastor, magazine editor, missionary, curriculum writer, and chaplain. She currently serves as the congregational liaison for a Lutheran non-profit and has written numerous articles and books, including Weaving God's Love Across Culture, Living the Promises of Baptism, and The Little Lutheran e-column.

Review :
Mary Lindberg’s book is a treasure of practical wisdom, written in a devotional manner that welcomes pastors contemplating new calls or even retirement to understand that one’s leave taking of a ministry is not easily a matter of turning in the keys and walking out the door one last time. We have to embrace our transition with all of its pain and possibilities. Lindberg’s book helps pastors enter into the hard questions and common realities of transition so that one’s inevitable exit will be more about the grace of finishing and moving on than it might tend to for many of us. She offers a variety of helpful questions and exercises for pastors to think through the anticipatory grief of congregations as well as within the departing parson. . . .I am grateful for Lindberg’s book as a deeply needed resource for pastoral ministry and congregational health. Transition is part of ministry. We serve only for a season. We cannot escape the conversations awaiting us in Lindberg’s book. May we read it carefully, thoughtfully and enter and depart fields of ministry with grace abundant made known to our congregations, our households and even ourselves. Whether beginning your ministry, wondering if you can walk through that church door yet again, or at the end of your call, read this book. The author has written the book she wished had been there to guide her from good-bye to hello with grace. Great news: you have it here. Through thoughtful reflections and witty insights drawn from her own experience and that of other pastors, Rev. Mary Lindberg offers practical and profound wisdom for pastors saying good-bye to their congregations. Leaving a pastoral call is complicated—for clergy and their families as well as for congregations. Mary Lindberg has dipped a pen in her own experience to offer a wise and compassionate guidebook for the journey. When Chinese people say goodbye (??), it is not the end. Goodbye is a way of life. In Mary Lindberg I have found a companion who shared her insights and wisdom in how to say good-bye gracefully.