Senior Pastor

The Lawndale Baptist Church of Philadelphia is a congregationally led church that has been in existence for over 85 years in their Northeast Philadelphia Pennsylvania community. We have been blessed throughout the years to see God’s faithfulness. We are currently seeking a Senior Pastor to lead our congregation as our current Senior Pastor transitions into retirement. In this full-time role, the Senior Pastor is to be the representative of the church in the community, be involved in the life of the church, and assist in the outreach to the community.

Being the representative of the church in the community and an ambassador for the Gospel, a deep understanding and passion for the Word of God and alignment with our doctrinal statement is a requirement that is of utmost importance. He is responsible for the general oversight of the work of the church and will preside over meetings of worship. In this role, the Senior Pastor is responsible for delivering a sermon each Sunday at our 10:30am Worship service, serving communion (typically once a month), presiding over and conducting baptisms, and developing and overseeing ministries to increase faith amongst the congregation and opportunities to outreach to the community. The Senior Pastor serves an ex-officio member of both the Deacon and Trustee Boards and all committees of the church.

The Senior Pastor is to be involved in the life of the church. This includes the ability to conduct special services such as weddings, funerals, membership services, counseling, and prayer meetings. While not needing to be involved in every ministry of the church, the Senior Pastor should also be aware of, in prayer for, and active within some ministries of the church. Currently, our ministries include AWANA (Bible memorization and discipleship program for youth; see www.awana.org), Youth Group, seasonal choir, community Bible studies, prayer meetings and weekly Bible studies, and Sunday School. The Senior Pastor should focus on building relationships between members, attendees, missionaries, and visitors to the church. Responsibilities will also include the capability to counsel, encourage, pray for, and disciple congregants and community members, along with assisting with church discipline as situations occur. This also includes visitation to the sick and shut-in members of our church community. These relationships within the church lead to a strong partnership amongst the Pastor of the church, the elected leadership of the church, members, and attendees to ensure that Christ is kept at the center of all we do while being congregationally led.

Assisting in the Outreach to the Community involves the ability to work with church leadership in developing opportunities to better fulfill the Great Commission throughout our community. As a church, we don’t want to limit ourselves in current ministries, and want to ensure opportunities exist for our members to be involved in serving the Lord in ministry. The goal is to spread the Gospel to our neighbors and increase fellowship amongst evangelical churches in the community.

Educational and Positional Requirements

• Bachelor's or master's degree with a preference with the degree in theology or divinity.
• Deep understanding and passion for the faith
• Experience working for a church as Senior Pastor, associate, or youth, preferably in an urban setting.
• Experience writing and delivering sermons
• Oral presentation skills
• Experience in building relationships amongst churches of like faith

Process

1. Upon receipt of resumes, the search committee will review towards moving forward in the process.
2. Upon concurrence to move forward, the search committee will provide our current Church Constitution (with Doctrinal Statement and By-Laws), Community Profile, and a Questionnaire to be filled out by potential candidates. The questionnaire will be used to gather further information at a deeper level than what is found within a standard resume.
3. Upon review of the returned questionnaire, if concurrence is reached to move forward, the search committee will reach out towards conducting an interview either in person if feasible due to location, or over video conferencing (Zoom or MS Teams).
4. If both parties agree to move forward after the interview, the candidate will work with the search committee to meet with the leadership boards of the church (Deacon, Deaconess, Trustee, and current Pastoral staff) and determine a time to allow the selected candidate to preach to the congregation and provide a time of fellowship to work towards building relationships. It is at this time that we will conduct a background, financial, and drug test.
5. After the candidate preaches for the predetermined period of time and opportunities for fellowship have occurred, the congregation will hold a special congregational meeting to determine if the candidate should be called to the Senior Pastor role. The church constitution lays out this process in more detail.

Notes:

1. At any time, either the Pastoral candidate or the Search Committee can terminate the process for any reason.
2. While the search committee will be reviewing and interviewing multiple candidates at a time, only one Pastoral candidate will be brought to the congregation at a time to ensure cohesiveness and community. It is not our wish to be a disruption to the work of the church by having more than one individual before the congregation.
3. If brought to preach before the congregation as a candidate, a guest speaker love gift offering will be given to the candidate.
4. The search committee has pledged to keep names and relationships of individuals that have applied confidential throughout the process. We wish to do no harm to the body of Christ by allowing rumors, gossip, or leaks of candidates to impact churches or positions currently being held by candidates.
5. Any questions can be sent to PastorSearch@lawndalebaptistchurch.org, which has been set up for access to only members of the search committee.