Pastoral Reviews
Every lead pastor goes through a church/pastoral relationship review with the church they serve. The first review happens two years after the pastoral service begins, and another follows every four years after that. This page keeps the record of those reviews and tells you who is coming due, so no anniversary slips by unnoticed.
Go to Ministers in the top menu and choose Pastoral Reviews. The page opens with two tabs.
Reviews Due
Every current lead pastor on the district and the date their next review is due. This is the working list you check to see what is coming up.
Reviews Conducted
The record of reviews that have already been held, which you can pull for any date range. This is the list to use when the district superintendent needs to report the year's reviews to the District Advisory Board and the general superintendent.
The district dashboard also lists any pastoral review that is overdue or due within the next 30 days, and any pastor appointment whose term has ended or ends within the next 30 days, for anyone who can view pastoral reviews.
This tab lists one row for each open lead pastor assignment at a church on your district. For each pastor you see when their pastoral service began, their most recent review and how many reviews are on file, the calculated next due date, and a status badge.
Appointed pastors are not listed, because they are not on the regular review schedule while they are appointed. See Appointed Pastors below.
What each status means
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Overdue | The due date has already passed. |
| Due Soon | The review is due within the next 90 days. |
| Upcoming | The review is due more than 90 days from now. |
| Unknown | No start date is recorded on the pastor's assignment, so the first review date cannot be calculated. Add a start date to the assignment to fix this. |
| Relationship Ended | The last review ended the church/pastoral relationship, so no further review is scheduled. |
How the due date is calculated
- If no review has been recorded, the first one is due two years after the pastoral service began.
- After that, the next review is due four years after the most recent review.
- An authorized district user can use Set Date to replace the automatically scheduled date. If the day is left blank, the last day of the selected month is used.
- Recalculate Automatically restores the date based on the latest review or the beginning of the pastoral assignment.
- A review that ended the relationship stops the schedule.
Filtering the list
Use the filters at the top to narrow the list by due-date range, by church, or by status. You can check more than one status at a time. The Clear button returns you to the full list.
This tab answers the question "which reviews were held between these two dates?" Enter a start date, an end date, or both, optionally pick a church, and click Apply.
The list shows the review date, the minister, the church, the review type, the result, and who conducted it. Leaving both dates blank shows every review on file for churches on your district.
The Export CSV button downloads whichever tab you are currently viewing, with the filters you have applied, as a spreadsheet file you can open in Excel or Google Sheets. Set your filters first, then export.
Reviews are recorded on the minister's own record. Go to Ministers, then Minister List, open the pastor's record, scroll to the Pastoral Reviews card, and click Record Review.
Church
The church where the review was held. A pastor who has served more than one church will have reviews at each of them, and the schedule is tracked separately for each church.
Review Date
The date the review was conducted. This is the date the four-year clock restarts from.
Review Type
| Type | When to use it |
|---|---|
| Regular review | The scheduled two-year or four-year review. |
| Special review | A review requested by the church board in between regular reviews. |
| Church in crisis review | A review the district initiated because the church is in crisis. |
| Co-pastor review | A review triggered when one of two co-pastors leaves. |
| Appointed status transition | A review held to move a pastor off appointed status. |
Result
| Result | What it means |
|---|---|
| Continued — board did not call for a vote | The board reached consensus and did not vote to send the question to the congregation. The relationship continues. |
| Church vote pending | The board voted to send the question to the congregation, and the church meeting has not been held yet. Come back and change the result once the meeting happens. |
| Continued by church vote | The congregation voted to continue the relationship. |
| Ended by church vote | The congregational vote failed and the relationship ends. |
| Ended by pastor's resignation | The pastor declined to proceed with the vote or to accept the result, which counts as a resignation. |
| Ended by district action | Tenure was terminated by district action. |
Conducted By
The district superintendent, or the elder the superintendent appointed to chair the review.
Church Board Vote and Church Meeting Vote
Record the yes and no counts from the board ballot and, if a church meeting was held, the meeting date and the congregation's yes and no counts. These fields are optional — fill in whichever votes actually took place.
Relationship Ends
Only fill this in when the review ended the relationship. It is the date the district superintendent set for the pastor's service to end, which falls no less than 30 and no more than 180 days out. It cannot be earlier than the review date.
Notes
Anything else worth keeping with the record. Notes are visible to anyone who can view pastoral reviews.
Click any row in the Pastoral Reviews card on the minister's record to reopen that review. Change what you need and click Save Review.
The Delete Review button removes the review entirely and recalculates the schedule, which can move the pastor's next due date. Delete a review only when it was entered by mistake — a review that actually happened belongs in the permanent record.
Pastors are normally elected by the church. The Manual (¶119) lets the district superintendent appoint the pastor instead when the church meets at least one of these conditions:
- The church was organized fewer than five years ago.
- Fewer than 35 members voted at the last annual church meeting.
- The church receives financial assistance from the district, including not paying apportionments in full.
Each appointment is for a term of one or two years. It is made in consultation with the church board and requires the consent of the District Advisory Board. A reappointment follows the same rules, so it is not automatic.
Appointed pastors do not go through the regular two-year and four-year reviews while they are appointed. They are left off the Reviews Due list and tracked on their own page instead: go to Ministers in the top menu and choose Appointed Pastors.
The Current tab lists every appointed pastor on the district with the date they were first appointed, when the current term ends, and whether District Advisory Board consent has been recorded.
| Badge | What it means |
|---|---|
| Ending Soon | The current term ends within the next 90 days. |
| Term Ended | The current term's end date has passed. Reappoint the pastor, move them to elected status, or end the appointment. |
| Pending | District Advisory Board consent has not been recorded for the current term. |
| Transition in Progress | Some steps toward elected status have been recorded, but not all of them. |
The Past tab lists appointments that ended or moved to elected status. Click Manage or View on any row to open that appointment.
- On the Appointed Pastors page, click Record Appointment.
- Choose the pastor. Only current Pastor (PAS) and Parent-Affiliated Congregation Pastor (PASPAC) assignments at churches on your district are listed, so add the pastoral assignment on the minister's record first. If the pastor serves more than one church, also choose the church where they are appointed; they can be appointed at one church and elected at another.
- Check every reason the church qualifies.
- The term start date fills in with the date the pastoral assignment began. Change it if the appointment started on a different date, then choose one or two years. The term end date is calculated for you.
- Enter the date the church board was consulted and the date the District Advisory Board consented. Leave the consent date blank while it is pending, and fill it in later with Edit.
- Click Save Appointment.
The pastor's assignment on their minister record shows an Appointed badge. Click it to open the appointment.
Open the appointment and click Reappoint. The new term starts when the current one ends unless you change it. Record the church board consultation and the District Advisory Board consent for the new term.
The earlier term stays in the Appointment History table, and the page still shows the date the pastor was first appointed.
The Manual (¶119.1) allows a pastor to move off appointed status once the church has more than 35 voting members or has been organized at least five years, and the pastor has served as its appointed pastor at least two years. The appointment page shows a checklist of these conditions. NazTrack does not track voting-member counts, so confirm that one yourself.
The move requires a church/pastoral relationship review, a majority vote of the church board members present, approval of the district superintendent, and approval of the District Advisory Board. Record them in two places:
- On the minister's record, click Record Pastoral Review, choose the review type Appointed status transition, and enter the church board vote.
- On the appointment page, under Move to Elected Status, choose that review, enter the district superintendent and District Advisory Board approval dates, and click Save Transition. You can save each date as it happens.
Once the review, a board majority, and both approvals are on file, the pastor moves to elected status. The later approval date becomes the anniversary for future regular reviews, so the pastor returns to the Reviews Due list with the next review due four years after that date.
When an appointed pastor leaves the church, end their pastoral assignment on the minister record as usual. The appointment ends automatically.
To end an appointment for any other reason, open it and click End Appointment. The pastor then returns to the regular review schedule.
| Permission | What it allows |
|---|---|
| View Pastoral Reviews | See the Pastoral Reviews page, both tabs, the CSV export, and the review history on a minister's record. |
| Manage Pastoral Reviews | Everything above, plus recording, editing, and deleting reviews. |
The same two permissions control the Appointed Pastors page. View Pastoral Reviews lets someone see it; Manage Pastoral Reviews lets them record, edit, reappoint, transition, and end appointments.
Anyone who already had permission to view or manage ministers received the matching review permission automatically, so existing district staff do not need anything re-granted.
A pastor is missing from the Reviews Due list
The list only includes ministers who hold an open lead pastor assignment to a church on your district and who are not archived. Check the Assignment History on their record — if the assignment has an end date, or the role is not a lead pastor role, they will not appear.
Appointed pastors are also left off the list. Look for them on the Appointed Pastors page.
A pastor's status shows Unknown
Their lead pastor assignment has no next review date. Use Set Date, or add a start date to the assignment and choose Recalculate Automatically.
The next due date looks wrong
Use Recalculate Automatically to restore the date from the most recent review recorded for that pastor at that church, or from the assignment start date when no review is on file.