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Outgrowing Church? Part 2

Posted in Church Conflict, Current Church Issues, Please Comment! on July 27, 2011| 7 Comments »

When I was at Fuller Seminary a few years ago, I sat under a well-known professor who is also a prolific author.  My guess is that he was in his late sixties when I took the class.

This Christian leader did not attend a traditional church, even though he’s been identified with a specific denomination nearly his whole life.

Instead, he attended a house church of about 35 people on Sunday evenings.

When I first heard him mention this, I thought he was being a bit rebellious.  Weren’t there scores of already-existing churches within a few minutes’ drive of his home?  Couldn’t they benefit from his worldwide teaching ministry?

At the time, I was probably at the apex of my own pastoral ministry.  In fact, our church was ready to start construction on a new worship center.

Fast forward ahead a few years and matters are very different.

In my last article, I wondered if my wife and I have outgrown the local church.  I certainly hope not.  We need to continue to grow spiritually.  We need to hear the Word of God preached.  We need to use our spiritual gifts.  We need to be a part of something bigger than ourselves.

As Joanna Hogg of the Irish group Iona sings in their song “Dancing on the Wall”: “I am part of something that is going to change things for the better.”

We’ll always be a part of the kingdom of God.  And we’ll always be members of the Church Universal.  But what about the local church?

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems that my wife and I have entered that season in our lives when some Christians decide to become part-time churchgoers rather than full-time ones.

Let me share two more concerns about the churches I’ve been visiting (the first three were presented in my last post):

Fourth, there are fewer invitations to receive Christ.  I grew up in churches where the pastor gave an altar call at every service.  He invited unbelievers to receive Christ by asking them to leave their seat and walk to the front of the worship center.  Too many pastors back then used manipulative tactics to force people to “walk the aisle” and implied they couldn’t be saved unless they did.  Although this practice is never mentioned in the New Testament, it was a third sacrament in many churches until baby boomers became pastors.  I was so alarmed at what I saw in some churches that I wrote my thesis in seminary on this practice.

But now the pendulum seems to have swung in the other direction.  I honestly cannot remember the last time I was in a church service and a pastor invited unbelievers to pray and receive Christ.

In the church we’ve been attending, many people are being converted, and although we haven’t gone to the membership class, my guess is that that’s the place where people are being won to Christ.

But what about those who choose not to attend the class?

Pastors have differing views on this issue.  A decreasing number of pastors invite unbelievers to receive Christ after every message.  Some rarely if ever do.  In my case, I did so if (a) the passage called for it, or (b) the Holy Spirit prompted me to do so.

Decades after my own conversion, I’m still thrilled when I hear the gospel preached in a biblical and relevant way.  But I’m hearing it preached less and less.

What have you been noticing along this line?

Finally, too many churches act like they constitute the kingdom of God.  Six months after arriving in the Valley of the Sun (it’s only 104 degrees here today), I visited with a denominational executive.  I asked him if there was any kind of annual convention or larger meeting of Christians in the greater Phoenix area, and he told me he didn’t know of any.  (When I was a pastor in Silicon Valley, for example, the National Association of Evangelicals sponsored a monthly luncheon for pastors.)  This leader told me that Phoenix has a Wild West mentality about it and that it tends to be “every man for himself” here.

And maybe “every church for itself” as well.

I’m a local Christian but a global Christian, too.  I like knowing that there are churches and Christians in Western Europe and Eastern Africa as well as in California and Texas.

But it seems to me that more and more church leaders aren’t promoting much about Jesus’ worldwide kingdom outside the four walls of their own buildings.  In the process, it’s easy for a church to give off the impression that “we are the kingdom of God” rather than “we are just a part of the kingdom of God.”

There are exceptions to this, of course, but this is the trend I’ve been seeing.

My favorite verse about the church is Ephesians 5:25 where Paul tells us that “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her …”  If Jesus loves the church, then I need to love her as well.  And if Jesus gave His life for His people, I need to do the same.

But Paul is talking in context about the Church Universal, not necessarily a local church.

I agree with Bill Hybels that “the Church is the hope of the world.”

But how does that play out in the 21st century?  Must we all attend services in a church building in our community?  If not, is a house church a legitimate biblical expression of the church in our culture?

And what if we choose not to participate in a local church at all?  (Yes, I know about Hebrews 10:24-25!)

I’m not trying to be a heretic, but I am trying to be provocative.

What do you think about the future of the local church where you live?

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Outgrowing Church?

Posted in Church Conflict, Current Church Issues, Please Comment! on July 25, 2011| 14 Comments »

When I was a young man in my twenties and thirties, I met a fair number of professing Christians who regularly missed worship services – either at our church or at the one they attended.  They seemed to have a cavalier attitude about being absent, an attitude that I as a pastor could not relate to.

After all, church was my life.

While I knew that attending church services could not gain salvation for anyone, I believed that it was essential for spiritual growth – and I still do.

But lately, I’ve been wondering.

I’ve attended services at about 25 different churches over the past 18 months, so my observations aren’t based upon going to a mere handful.  I’ve been to small, medium-sized, and large churches, as well as a few mega-churches.

Since growing, cutting-edge churches tend to follow trends, there’s a lot of sameness in our churches today, even though evangelical churches don’t use a common liturgy.

But attending worship is starting to become less meaningful for me, and I’m wondering if I’m all alone on this one.

Let me make some observations about my experiences:

First, the music has been uniformly good.  Most of the churches I’ve attended have bands, and they know what they’re doing.  Some play soft, others play loud.  They all play contemporary praise music, and most mix in a hymn or two.  And I don’t think any band has played longer than 15 minutes, or 4 songs.  In addition, the state of musicianship in our churches has vastly improved over the past decade.

However … too many of the lyrics contain Christian cliches.  What if we declared a moratorium on using words like “praise” and “worship” and “bow” and “adore” and insisted that Christian songwriters quit cranking out songs like they were working for Tin Pan Alley?

Back in the early 1970s, Lovesong, the original Christian rock group, put these lyrics on its pioneer album:

Sing unto the heavens with a brand new song

The one that we’ve been hearing’s been a hit too long

The lyrics sound confused as if they don’t belong

So sing unto the Lord and sing with feeling

I’m starting to get to the point where I’m content to miss the first few minutes of the worship time, and I’ve never felt that way before.  Is it just me, or is there an increasing sameness about worship music today?

Second, the prayers are so short they’re practically meaningless.  In my humble opinion, they sound perfunctory.  To quote Keith Green out of context, “no one hurts, no one aches, no one even sheds one tear.”  I’m non-charismatic in my approach to worship, but the prayers I’ve been hearing lately have one thing in common: let’s get through this prayer quickly so we can say we prayed … and move on to the good stuff.

But in the process, we don’t really touch heaven, and heaven doesn’t really touch us.

Many pastors operate by the philosophy, “When in doubt, pray.”  At one church my wife and I attended recently, the pastor prayed six or seven times during the service – and it seemed a bit much.  But I’m longing for one meaningful time of prayer during the service so we can know we touched the face of God.

Sometimes, the pastor will offer that prayer – and I love to hear a pastor’s heart poured out for his congregation.  Other times, someone else might encourage people to pray silently right where they’re seated.

But let’s do some planning so that prayers aren’t just whizzing by us during a service.

We can pray a little longer, a little more intensely, and much, much better.

Amen?

Third, I long to hear a pastor teach from one passage of Scripture.  I’ve heard messages from Genesis 1, Exodus 1, Joshua 4, Nehemiah 13, Song of Solomon, Luke 22, John 10, Acts 1, and Acts 28 (among other passages) – but I’ve mostly heard topical messages.  (And I can’t recall one message from any of the epistles.)  While I like topical messages – and usually preached a high percentage of them myself – I’m concerned about the lack of biblical ignorance among Christians today.

We don’t seem to know our Bibles anymore.

Let me use the church we’ve been attending as an example.  The pastor does very little exposition of Scripture.  Instead, he preaches topically, referring to and quoting key verses.  There’s a place for that, and he does a great job.  But if you want to study a biblical passage or book, where in the church can you do that anymore?

Can you do it in small groups?  The groups at our church are designed around discussing the pastor’s message from the week before.

Can you do it in Bible classes?  The only Bible classes that exist are unadvertised.

The church encourages us to read our Bibles through in a year – a very good thing to do – but where in the church can people learn how to interpret and study Scripture for themselves?

Instead, it’s done for us by a professional.

Maybe I’m missing something, but it seems as if Protestant churches are starting to go Roman Catholic: only the priest is qualified to interpret the Bible.

What do you think about what I’ve shared?

I’ll share my final few observations next time.

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Pastors and Power

Posted in Church Conflict, Conflict with the Pastor, Please Comment!, tagged , , , , on July 22, 2011| 4 Comments »

How much power should a pastor have in a church?

Should a pastor have absolute power to make decisions?  Or should he implement change only after consulting with other leaders?

I once met with a well-known pastor in the San Jose area.  He had a commanding presence and seemed like someone who knew how to wield power firmly.  He told me that he had two boards in his church.  One kept telling him, “Go, go, go!”  The other one kept saying, “Slow, slow, slow!”

Over my years as a pastor, some people told me that I needed to exercise more power than I did, while others labeled me a dictator who didn’t let others make decisions.  I suppose most pastors struggle with the proper balance here.

Let me share with you five principles about how pastors should wield power in a church:

First, a pastor’s authority originates from God.  A pastor does not gain power through ordination, or by being a seminary graduate, or by attending a conference at Saddleback or Willow Creek.  No, a pastor’s authority comes directly from the Holy Trinity.  The Father, Son, and Spirit call specific individuals to pastoral ministry.

Before ascending to heaven, Jesus told His disciples that even His own authority was derived from His Father: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me” (Matthew 28:18).

And Paul told the elders/pastors of the church at Ephesus that “the Holy Spirit has made you overseers” (Acts 20:28).

Many – if not most – of the men who pastor a Calvary Chapel are taught “The Moses Principle” of leadership.  God spoke directly to Moses, and Moses told the people what God said.  Pastor Chuck Smith is fond of asking pastors if they work for the Lord or for the board.

Since God calls people to be pastors, those pastors always need to be accountable to Him for the way they exercise authority.  While the Godhead truly possesses all authority for all time, a pastor’s authority is both partial and temporary.  Therefore, it needs to be stewarded wisely.

Second, pastors are to advance the kingdom of God.  They are to say with Jesus, “Thy kingdom come,” not “my kingdom come.”  It is the job of a pastor to make Jesus look good, not make himself look good.

Pastors should be content to have people talk about Jesus rather than themselves.  It is unworthy of a pastor to aim to make a lot of money, or to become famous, or to be unnecessarily admired, or to have his eye on a larger church.

I Peter 5:6 is written in the context of church leadership and says, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.”  A humble pastor knows that he is accountable to God and that the Lord will reward him in His own time and way.

In other words, it’s important for a pastor’s motives to be pure – and a true desire to build God’s kingdom usually results in more pastoral power, not less.

Third, a pastor earns power as he serves people.  A pastor cannot stay in his church office all day and earn power by thinking up new projects.  He earns power by touching the lives of hurting people.

In my second pastorate, there was a couple that didn’t seem to like me.  The husband was standoffish and the wife could be caustic at times.  While they weren’t overtly antagonistic toward me, I didn’t really know how to win them over.

Three years into my tenure, the wife’s mother died.  As I ministered to the family in their time of grief, I could sense that things were changing.  Before long, this couple was one of my best supporters – but it took time.

Isn’t this what Jesus said in Matthew 20:26-28?  “Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave – just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

If anyone deserved to exercise authority over people, it was Jesus.  He had the ability to force people to do things against their will – but He identified and met their needs instead.  He never bulldozed anyone over.  He presented His case and let people make up their own minds about His kingdom.

I am eager to follow a leader who says, “I care about you.  Come follow me.”  But I resist following anyone who says, “Do what I tell you to do just because I tell you to do it.”  Uh uh.

Fourth, a church grants a pastor power when it trusts him.  When should a pastor begin to make major changes in a church?  Some experts say, “The pastor should start making changes from Day One.  He’s in his ‘honeymoon period’ and can do no wrong.”  Others counter by saying, “But how can a pastor institute major changes when he doesn’t yet know the congregation or the community?”

For example, Ronald Richardson summarizes the view of Israel Galindo in Galindo’s book The Hidden Lives of Congregations: “A believer in longer pastoral tenures, he suggests that it may take about five years to get to know a congregation well enough to articulate a vision of ministry.  This seems exactly right to me.  During that time, the pastor can become an accurate observer of the congregation, get to know the subterranean forces at work, and make a solid connection with the leaders and members, finding out what ‘church’ means to them.  It is also critical that the pastor find ways to honor and respect the members of this church and what they have created over time.  Within this context, the pastor then courageously upholds a vision for mission and ministry that fits that specific congregation.”

A pastor cannot go into a church and automatically implement an agenda that he’s read about or seen work in another situation.  Every area and fellowship are unique.

The wise pastor realizes that trust takes time.  This is why a pastor’s best years begin after he’s been in a church for at least five years.  The people have learned that the pastor truly knows them, understands them, loves them and wants what is best for them.  He doesn’t view the church as a mass of statistics but as a collection of individuals and families whom he deeply treasures.

If a pastor truly loves the people of his church, then he should retain the title “pastor.”  If he sends off signals that he doesn’t love them, then he should be called “reverend” or “CEO” or “your royal highness” – anything but “pastor.”

That’s a title that must be earned over time.

Finally, a pastor’s power needs to be shared.  While I thank God for all the leaders in the Old Testament, I don’t think that pastors should ever be viewed strictly as generals (like Joshua) or kings (like David) or prophets (like Amos).  While Israel did have elders, the OT is filled with stories of individuals making decisions in consultation with God alone.

But the New Testament applauds a plurality of leaders in a local church setting.  Read Paul’s words to the elders in Ephesus (Acts 20:17-38) or Paul’s instructions about overseers to Timothy (1 Timothy 3:1-7) and Titus (Titus 1:5-9) or Peter’s admonitions to elders (1 Peter 5:1-5).  There isn’t just one governing leader in a local church – there are many.  Some elders are set apart and paid because of their giftedness in leading and teaching (1 Timothy 5:17-18) but every NT church has multiple leaders – not just one.

However, I believe that a pastor needs to set the agenda for a church.  As he reads Scripture, prays, studies the community, and learns the congregation, the Lord gives him a direction for the church.  (If a pastor chooses to implement change without the governing leaders, that’s a formula for termination.)

The pastor then shares his agenda with the leaders.  Unless the pastor is promoting heresy or building his own kingdom, those leaders need to take the time to understand that agenda so they can fully stand behind it.

No church can have a board alone set the agenda.  I can’t think of a single church that is doing anything for Jesus where the board casts the vision.  That’s going nowhere.

Instead, the pastor needs the leaders to help promote and explain and even defend his God-given agenda.

But more than anything, the pastor needs the board’s counsel as to the timing of the agenda.  If the pastor gets too far out ahead of the congregation, some people will become highly anxious and conflict will break out.  If the pastor lags behind the congregation, there may be calls for a new leader!

This is why leadership is an art, not a science – and why your pastor needs your prayers so very much.

 

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More Deadly Board Sins

Posted in Conflict with Church Board, Please Comment! on July 15, 2011| 2 Comments »

Who are the board members in your church?  Do you know their names?  Do you have any idea what they do?  Do you even care?

You should, because the success or failure of your pastor – and your church – is often determined by the people on your board and the decisions they make.

The whole concept of a “board” does not originate from the New Testament but from American corporate life.  The term in Scripture that best describes a church leader is elder.  Over 28 years of church ministry, I worked with deacons, then elders, and finally with a Board of Directors.

I much prefer the term “elders” because it’s a biblical concept and because the qualifications for the office are clearly delineated in 1 Timothy 3:1-7 and Titus 1:5-9, among other passages.

Where are the biblical qualifications for “board members?”  There aren’t any.  Besides, the whole concept of a board presupposes that a church should be run more like a Fortune 500 company than the living body of Jesus Christ.

And it’s transferable.  A church in Eastern Europe or Africa may not understand what a board is but they sure know what elders are.

In my last article, I mentioned three deadly sins that church boards sometimes commit:

First, they fail to view the pastor as a professional.

Second, they side with staff members over against the pastor.

Third, they begin making decisions without the pastor.

Let me now add to this list:

Fourth, they neglect to become accountable to the congregation.  From my early teens through my late twenties, I attended scores of church “business meetings.”  Most of them weren’t productive and caused friction in the church.  Think about the town hall meetings that Bob and Joanna used to attend in their little Vermont town on the Newhart show and you’ll have some idea of what I’m talking about.

Churches in our day can do without the tension, griping, and ill manners those meetings produced.  Most decisions in a church should not be made by the entire congregation but by the pastor, staff, or church board.

However, what about accountability?  The staff are usually accountable to the pastor, and the pastor is almost always accountable to the board (at least humanly speaking).

But who is the board accountable to?

In a congregationally-run church, the board is accountable to the congregation, which sometimes nominates but almost always validates who the board members will be.

Staff members issue either verbal or written reports to the pastor, and the pastor issues a verbal or written report to the board.  But how often does a church board account to the congregation?

In some churches, only once a year: at the annual informational/congregational meetings.

But if the staff have to account to the pastor every week (and they do), and the pastor has to account to the board at least monthly, shouldn’t the board account to the congregation more than once a year?

When a board accounts to the church in a regular fashion, that board is less likely to become secretive and power-hungry.  But when a board keeps its own counsel and rarely if ever reports to the church, it becomes a self-contained unit and groupthink easily becomes the norm.

The reports can be made in the church bulletin or in the newsletter or on the church website or from the pulpit or in an all-church letter.  They can be made monthly or quarterly – but they need to be made.

If a church has membership, the members have the right to attend board meetings and even read board minutes.  The members have the right to know the decisions the board is making and ask questions about those decisions.  While board members do not have to share every thing, they need to share many things, if not most things.

Because one day, the church will have a crisis, and the board members will stand before an anxious congregation, and they will endeavor to explain some decisions they’ve made, and people will whisper to those nearby, “Who are those guys?  Why should we listen to them?”

That’s Deadly Sin Number Four.

Fifth, they become jealous of the pastor.  It’s not easy to be a church board member, especially when there’s a lot of stress in the church.  A friend of mine who is an advocate for pastors told me that when the recession started, an increasing number of conflicts began breaking out in churches over financial issues.

Church board members have to read documents, prepare reports, respond to inquiries, and reguarly endure meetings that begin around dinner time and end close to midnight.

And they do it all for free because they love the Lord and their local church family.

So how would you feel if you donated a lot of your valuable time to your church and nobody ever knew about it?

With some people, that’s okay.  But with others, it’s not.

Even though you put in many hours for your church, whose name is on everyone’s lips, for good or ill?

The pastor’s – and that doesn’t sit well with some people.

In addition, board members often know certain things about the pastor that few others do, so when they hear people extolling the pastor’s virtues, they might think to themselves, “If you only knew the guy that I know.”

This can easily lead to jealousy: “I serve for nothing.  He makes a lot of money.  I’m invaluable.  He’s expendable.  I serve from pure motives.  But him?”

I honestly believe this is one of the reasons why church boards involuntarily terminate their pastor.  They can’t tell the congregation this but their feelings smolder inside.  “Why does everyone know him but nobody knows me?”

Like Joseph’s brothers, they’ve had enough!  So they capture the pastor, throw him in a pit, go home with a phony story, and hope they’ll never see him again.

That’s Deadly Sin Number Five.

Sixth, they opt for making fast decisions when under stress.  There’s a lot of literature out today that identifies anxiety as the primary culprit in church conflicts.  Let’s say that you serve in a ministry where a conflict surfaces.  There are two ways to handle the conflict: the fast way or the slow way.

If you use the fast way, you can eliminate the stress quickly.  If you use the slow way, you may still feel the anxiety for weeks, if not months.

On a church board, there will always be one or two people who do not handle anxiety well.  They will opt for the fast way to handle tough issues.  They just want relief from all the uncertainty.  These are people who often have a lot of anxiety in their personal lives – at work, at home, with their health, and with their finances.  They can’t take any more anxiety at church.

So they opt for shortcuts instead.

This is especially true when the conflict involves the lead pastor.  Regardless of the issues – and because of the strong feelings involved – there are board members who just want the conflict over.

So they short-circuit using Matthew 18:15-20 and 1 Timothy 5:19-21 in their deliberations.  They exaggerate the claims against the pastor.  They don’t let the pastor face his accusers or respond to any accusations against him.

They just want him to leave, the sooner the better.  Then church life – and home life – can return to normal.

That’s Deadly Sin Number Six.

Finally, they fail to understand the consequences of their decisions.  I recently heard about a church board that made a decision involving their pastor that I believed was suicidal for their church.  After they announced their decision, something horrible did happen, and I thought to myself, “Didn’t they know that was going to happen?  How could they be so blind?”

After all, most people attend a church because of the pastor, not because of the board.

A pastor usually knows his congregation so well that he can predict how a major decision will impact the entire ministry.  But many church boards only know how their families and friends will react to a decision.  They don’t necessarily know the congregation as a whole.

Then rather than admit, “We made a stupid decision,” the board members circle the wagons and find someone else to blame.  It’s classic.

That’s Deadly Sin Number Seven.

Now pastors commit deadly sins, too, I’m sorry to say.  And so do staff members and ministry team leaders and others in the church.  But most of the time, these are individuals who make mistakes and who then must take responsibility for what they’ve done.

But by its very nature, a church board is corporate – and the individuals on the board rarely admit they make mistakes because they made their decisions together.  As a wise pastor once told me, “If you have a tough decision to make, bring it to the board and let them make the decision – and then hide behind the board.”

What you have seen along this line?  What do you think about the seven deadly board sins?

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How Would You Handle This Church Nightmare?

Posted in Church Conflict, Conflict with Church Antagonists, Conflict with Church Board, Conflict with the Pastor, Current Church Issues, Jim's Ten Favorite Articles, Pastoral Termination, Please Comment!, tagged , , , on July 1, 2011| 2 Comments »

The following post is meant to be interactive.  Along the way, I have included some questions that I’d like to have you answer for your own benefit.  Compare your responses to what actually happened in the story.  Thanks!

Yesterday I read a true story about a church that faced a terrible situation.  The story comes from church consultant Peter Steinke’s book Congregational Leadership in Anxious Times.  I do not wish for anyone to be upset by this story, so please know ahead of time that the story turns out favorably for all.

Here’s what happened:

A young girl in a church accused her pastor of molestation.  Two leaders, Tom and Diane, met privately with the pastor to notify him of the charge.  By state law, they had to report the charge to a governmental agency.

The pastor shook his head and quietly responded, “I have never touched her.  Never.”

1.  Which option would you recommend for the pastor if you were Tom or Diane?

  • Stay and fight the charge.
  • Take a leave of absence.
  • Resign immediately.
  • Hire an attorney.

Which option did you select?

Tom and Diane recommended that the pastor take a leave of absence.

However, the pastor eventually decided against that option because he felt it indicated guilt.  He told the leaders, “I need to clear my name, but I don’t want to drag the church through this for months.”

Tom and Diane knew they had to inform the congregation of the charge, and when they did, a group of members thought the pastor should resign.  The leaders of the church were warned that most cases like this one are based in fact.

2.  What should the leaders do now?

  • Insist that the pastor stay and fight.
  • Encourage him to take a leave of absence.
  • Recommend that the pastor resign.
  • Let the process play itself out.

Which option did you select?

The leaders decided to let the process of justice go forward and stand behind their pastor until the legal system made the next move.

The leaders also decided that they would meet every week for prayer followed by a sharing time where they would openly discuss what they were thinking.

Tom shared that he believed the pastor was innocent.

Diane wondered how stable the girl was based upon the fact that her parents had gone through a terrible divorce two years earlier but had now jointly hired a lawyer.

Another admitted that she was being pressured by other members to withdraw her support for the pastor.

The pastor told the leaders that he would hold no resentment if anyone felt compelled to withdraw their support from him.

One leader chose to resign.

Marie, another leader, stood solidly behind the pastor because she had been falsely accused of something at her own workplace.

A few anxious leaders turned against the pastor and condemned him.

3.  If you attended those weekly meetings, what would you as a leader do now?

  • Insist the pastor stay and fight.
  • Encourage him to take a leave of absence.
  • Recommend that he resign.
  • Let the justice process run its course.

Which option would you select at this point?

The leaders chose the last option once again.

Fourteen weeks later, the charges against the pastor were suddenly dropped.

4.  What should Tom and Diane do now?

  • Verbally berate every person who doubted the pastor’s innocence.
  • Encourage all the doubters to return to the church.
  • Shame those who didn’t stand with the pastor.
  • Just turn the page and move on.

Which option did the leaders select?

They decided to personally contact anyone who doubted the pastor (or the leaders) and welcome them to return to the church – no questions asked.

5.  What did the leaders of this church do that was so unique?

  • They stood behind their pastor whether he was innocent or guilty.
  • They ignored almost everything the congregation told them.
  • They waited for the truth to come out before making a judgment.
  • They took the easy way out.

Which option did you go with?

The third statement best reflects the mindset of this church’s leaders: they chose to let the justice system take its course before deciding the pastor’s future.

According to Steinke, many people facing these conditions become what psychologists call “cognitive misers.”  They instinctively draw either/or conclusions: either the pastor is innocent or he’s guilty.  Either the pastor is good or he is bad.

But the leaders of this church are to be commended for not letting anxiety make their decision for them.  When certain people were calling for the pastor’s resignation – and even staying home from services until he left – the leaders stuck to their original decision and let the legal system do its work.

The pastor’s job, career, and reputation were all saved.

The church’s reputation and future were preserved.

The decision of the leaders was vindicated.

Why?  Because the leaders chose to make their decision based on truth rather than (a) unity, (b) politics, (c) groupthink, or (d) anxiety.

Let me quote Steinke on this issue fully:

“Nowhere in the Bible is tranquillity preferred to truth or harmony to justice.  Certainly reconciliation is the goal of the gospel, yet seldom is reconciliation an immediate result.  If people believe the Holy Spirit is directing the congregation into the truth, wouldn’t this alone encourage Christians who have differing notions to grapple with issues respectfully, lovingly, and responsively?  If potent issues are avoided because they might divide the community, what type of witness is the congregation to the pursuit of truth?”

In other words, the church of Jesus Christ does not crucify its leaders just because someone makes an accusation against them.

Think with me: if unity is more important than truth, then Jesus deserved to be crucified, didn’t He?

The accusations against Jesus caused great distress for Pilate, resulting in turmoil for his wife and animosity between Pilate and the Passover mob.

The Jewish authorities had to resort to loud and vociferous accusations to force Pilate to act.

The women around the cross wept uncontrollably.

The disciples of Jesus all ran off and deserted Him in His hour of need (except John).

Jesus’ countrymen engaged in mocking and taunting while witnessing His execution.

Who caused Pilate, the Jewish authorities, the women, the disciples, and the Jewish people to become angry and upset and depressed?

It was JESUS!  And since He disrupted the unity of His nation, He needed to go, right?

This is the prevailing view among many denominational leaders today.  If a pastor is accused of wrongdoing, and some people in the church become upset, then the pastor is usually advised to resign to preserve church unity, even before people fully know the truth – and even if the pastor is totally innocent.

In fact, there are forces at work in such situations that don’t want the truth to come out.

That is … if unity is more important than truth.

But if the charges against Jesus – blasphemy against the Jewish law and sedition against the Roman law – were false and trumped up, then Jesus should have gone free even if His release caused disunity in Jerusalem.

The point of Steinke’s story is that leaders – including pastors – need to remain calm during turbulent times in a church.  There are always anxious people who push the leaders to overreact to relieve them of their own anxiety.

If Pilate hadn’t overreacted … if the mob hadn’t … if Jesus’ disciples hadn’t … would Jesus still have been crucified?

Divinely speaking: yes.  It was the only way He could pay for our sins.

Humanly speaking: no.  What a travesty of justice!

20 centuries later, Jesus’ followers can do a better job of handling nightmarish accusations against pastors.

Instead of becoming anxious, they can pray for a calm and peaceful spirit.

Instead of making quick decisions, they can make deliberate ones.

Instead of aiming for destruction, they can aim for redemption.

Instead of holding up unity as the church’s primary value, truth should be viewed that way.

If the pastor in this story had been guilty of a crime, then the leaders would have had to agree on a different course of action.  Sadly, these things do happen in our day, even in churches.

But in this case, the leaders stood strong and did not let the anxiety of others – or their own – determine the destiny of their pastor and church.

They opted for truth instead, and the truth will set you – and everyone else – free.

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Restoring Kingdom Builders Update

Posted in About Restoring Kingdom Builders, Personal Stories, Please Comment! on June 20, 2011| 2 Comments »

I want to thank all of you who read this blog on a regular basis.  Let me share with you some quick updates about how the ministry is going.

First of all, thanks to all of you who read the article “Thoughts on a Scandal” last Friday.  It was the largest number of views I’ve ever had, thanks in part to my friend Kathi Lipp, who linked the article on Facebook.  Kathi is the author of the books The Husband Project, The Me Project, and the almost-published The “What’s For Dinner?” Solution and has, at last count, 2,462 friends on Facebook, some of whom were gracious enough to read the article.

Kim sent the article to Sean Hannity and Mike Huckabee but I haven’t heard anything from them yet!

If you’re interested in Kathi’s Amazon page, here it is: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=kathi+lipp

Next, I had breakfast today with my good friend Chuck Wickman, who just published the book Pastors at Risk.  Chuck was a pastor for 40 years and has been doing research and ministering to pastors who have gone through forced terminations for many years.  He is the founder of Pastor-in-Residence.  His wife’s uncle was John W. Peterson, who wrote gospel songs like Jesus is Coming Again and Heaven Came Down and Glory Filled My Soul.

If you’re in a church where the pastor is hurting – or you know of a pastor who has been wounded in ministry – Chuck does a great job of laying out the problems and offering solutions.  You can order the book from Amazon by following this link: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=chuck+wickman

Third, I’ve completed the manuscript for my book, and six people are reading and reviewing it right now, with others agreeing to read it as well.  Most of the book is in narrative form with the last one-third of the book analysis.  It is my desire to lead a crusade to stop the forced termination of pastors in churches today.  While we can and should minister to pastors who have already been victimized by this epidemic, we also need to work together at preventing this plague that harms pastors and their families as well as churches for many years.

Finally, I want to pay tribute to my family.

For Father’s Day, Sarah arranged for Kim and me to go and see the Giants and Diamondbacks play at Chase Field here in Phoenix last week.  It just so happens that was the last game the Giants won!  Thanks, Sarah, for being such a blessing to your dad and mom.

Also for Dad’s Day, Ryan and his fiancee Vanessa gave me a framed photo of our son – in a baseball uniform – when he was just two years old.  He also wrote a wonderful note in a card that indicated that he is happy that I’m conducting their wedding two months from today.  I can’t wait for that special day to arrive!

Also for Father’s Day, Kim took me to a special place in Scottsdale yesterday where you can watch a movie and eat a great meal – both at the same time.  I am truly blessed to have such a special woman in my life.  We celebrate 36 years of marriage in early August.

To Sarah, Ryan, and Kim: I love you all so very much!

Kim is going on her fourth trip to Kenya next week, so please pray for her ministry there when you think about her.  Her main ministry is coordinating a conference for pastors, many of whom are very poor.

A few minutes ago, I passed 5,000 views on this blog.  While some bloggers get that many views in one day, I’m still learning about the wonderful world of blogging.  Thanks for reading and for all your comments!

And if you would like me to address an issue involving pastors, churches, or conflict, please let me know.  If you’d like, you can email me at jim@restoringkingdombuilders.org.

Enjoy a God-blessed week!

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Thoughts on a Scandal

Posted in Please Comment! on June 17, 2011| 16 Comments »

New York Representative Anthony Weiner announced his intention yesterday to resign from his seat due to a “sexting” scandal.  While he was making his announcement, some in the audience jeered him.

There are many ways to view such a scandal: politically (does he have a future in politics?), legally (did he break the law?), ethically (did he “sext” on the taxpayers’ dime?), morally (how damaging were his actions?) and relationally (should his wife stay married to him?).

Let me add one more perspective: the spiritual one.

I have seen Anthony Weiner on television many times in the past.  In my opinion, one word best describes his television persona: obnoxious.  Whenever I saw him, he consistently talked over people in an argumentative and combative tone.  While I’m not sure that he convinced anyone from the other side of the aisle to adopt his positions, he undoubtedly cheered his own constituents with his relentless rhetoric.

Party politics – and last name – aside, I never liked the man.  And to many people, he seems even more unlikeable – even repulsive – after his recent revelations.

However, we need to remember a few simple truths about anyone – whether we like them or not – who is caught in a scandal.

First, God loves Anthony Weiner.  The same Bible that tells me how much God loves me specifies that God loves everyone, regardless of their politics, height, accent, ethnicity, or spirituality.  John 3:16 settles this issue once and for all.  God loves the world of people, and Mr. Weiner is a person created in the image of Almighty God.

A wise man once said that there is nothing we can do to make God start loving us and there is nothing we can do to make God stop loving us.  If God only loved those who are perfect, He would only love Jesus – and definitely not me or you!

Second, Anthony Weiner is a sinner – just like each one of us.  While many Christians readily admit that they have a sin nature and commit general sins, it’s much more difficult for us to admit that we’ve committed specific sins.  In fact, whenever someone  accuses us of a particular sin, our immediate reaction is either to deny that we did anything wrong or to defend ourselves.

When confronted about doing wrong, few of us immediately admit that we err.  Like Mr. Weiner, we have a tendency to blame others (“someone hacked my account”) for our own indiscretions.  Sometimes we do this because we don’t want others to know what we’ve done.  But other times, we do this because we refuse to admit to ourselves what we’ve done.  We have an image of ourselves that we present to the world, and when that image gets tarnished, we try and convince people that they’re seeing things the wrong way.

Of course, this is the essence of sin: believing that I don’t engage in it.  But I do – and so do you.

While you and I may never be guilty of the offense of “sexting” anyone – much less people we don’t know – we are guilty at times of presenting a false image of ourselves to the world.  For that reason, I saw some of myself in Mr. Weiner’s recent public appearances.  Didn’t you?

Third, Jesus died for every sin – and sinner – including Mr. Weiner.  I haven’t yet heard any television or radio commentator frame this scandal in spiritual terms, so let me briefly do that.

Jesus died for every sin: for anger, manipulation, interrupting people, gossip, heresy, being judgmental … and thousands of others.  Even though it’s never mentioned – or envisioned – in the New Testament, Jesus paid the price for “sexting” strangers as well.

According to my favorite Bible verse, 2 Corinthians 5:21, Jesus actually became sin incarnate on the cross.  He became anger and gossip … and sexting … to take them away.  To use an Old Testament analogy, Jesus became our scapegoat.  He voluntarily took the blame that we deserve.

Jesus also died for every sinner.  He died for those who loved Him – like Peter, John, and Mary Magdalene – as well as those who didn’t – like the chief priests, Pontius Pilate, and King Herod.  In our day, we might say that He died for Joel Osteen and Rick Warren just as much as He died for Charlie Sheen and Anthony Weiner.

No sin or person is ineligible for forgiveness.

Fourth, Jesus wants to redeem every sinner – even Mr. Weiner.  Jesus wants to redeem his soul.  Jesus wants to redeem his marriage.  Jesus wants to redeem his usefulness.  Jesus wants to redeem his talent, and his relationships, and his life.

Remember John 3:17?  “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”

It’s important that we all learn lessons through this experience.  Don’t send risque photos of yourself to anyone, much less strangers.  Don’t lie to people who trust you.  Don’t blame other people for the things that you’ve done wrong.  These are all legitimate issues for discussion around the family table and water cooler.

However, God does not want Mr. Weiner to be condemned.  He wants to see him redeemed.

Whenever these celebrity or political scandals occur, I’m always concerned that the negative publicity will drive someone to self-destruction – and that would please the devil, not the Lord.

I once read about a prominent pastor who said something stupid to a woman on the phone.  The two of them were not having a relationship, and she lived in another state, but his comment was overheard by his son.  When later confronted, the pastor immediately repented.  While the pastor should not have said what he did, the Christian community became involved and made things far worse.  He eventually was forced to resign.

A restoration team was set up.  The pastor was disgraced.  Before the dust settled, he lost his ministry, his career, and his reputation – and in the end, he took his own life.

I’ve heard people say about this situation, “Well, we just don’t know what demons lurk inside of people.”  But maybe we don’t know what demons lurk inside the church of Jesus Christ, either.  Sometimes we make things worse by trying to make things better.

Some would say, “We all need to be careful.  Be sure your sin will find you out!”  But we all sin – all the time – and most people never find out what we’ve said or done wrong.  It’s enough that we know it, confess it to God, receive His forgiveness, and move on.  It’s Satan who wants to publicize our sins and destroy us.

If Mr. Weiner has truly apologized – and it appears as if he has – then he should not be condemned anymore.  Those who try and jeer and shame a repentant person are guilty of sin themselves.  Wasn’t it Jesus who uttered these words after presenting The Lord’s Prayer?

“For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.  But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins” (Matthew 6:14-15).

Finally, we need to pray for Mr. Weiner.  Some of us have talked about him to others.  But have we talked to God about him at all?  Rather than feeling smug about the fact that we’ve never “sexted” anybody, we should realize that we have our own personal struggles with certain sins.  I know some older Christians who still commit the same sins they committed decades before.  Rather than dump on someone they don’t know, shouldn’t they do something about their own shortcomings?

Let me offer a prayer for Mr. Weiner:

“Heavenly Father, I thank You for the privilege of living in this great land where we elect our own officials.  Lord, one of those officials has been guilty of some serious indiscretions, and although he has asked forgiveness from many people, I pray that he will ask forgiveness from You as well.  Through this experience, may he hear the gospel of Jesus Christ and respond to Christ’s invitation for salvation.  May he receive the help he needs to conquer his personal demons.  And may his friends and family – especially his wife – love him unconditionally so that he may once again become productive.”

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this issue.  Thanks!

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Whatever Happened to Satan?

Posted in Church Conflict, Current Church Issues, Fighting Evil, Please Comment! on June 15, 2011| 3 Comments »

Have you been hearing anything recently from major Christian leaders about Satan?

It recently struck me that ever since my wife and I moved to Arizona, I can’t recall any mention of the enemy in any message that I’ve heard, much less any message about the devil.

He has suddenly become as unpopular as hell.

Maybe there’s a good reason for that.

Years ago, I learned that whenever I planned to present a message about Satan – and it wasn’t a regular occurence – a bunch of weird stuff would happen right before the service.  The microphone wouldn’t work, or the sound would go out, or a key participant in the service would suddenly fall ill.  It was inevitable.  I’d still give the message, but it felt like I was running uphill.

And that’s how I felt last Monday when I tried to make my last point on the blog about Satan.  Suddenly, the formatting went haywire.  I wrote the entire point, quoting both the Apostle Paul and Martin Luther, but things became so messed up that I couldn’t present it to you.  It became so frustrating that I resolved to wait until today to finish.

Satan is real.  We shouldn’t spend too much time thinking about him – as C.S. Lewis said, that would please him greatly – but we shouldn’t ignore him, either.  There’s a lot of stuff going on in this world that can only be explained if there is a devil.

If you haven’t done any reading about Satan, but you’re willing to work up your courage and do so, I recommend Michael Green’s classic book I Believe in Satan’s Downfall.  Green is both a scholar and an evangelist – a truly rare combination – and he writes both eloquently and passionately about the one who forments mischief and evil behind the scenes in both our communities and our churches.

Twenty years ago, I was involved in launching a new church in Silicon Valley.  Our core group settled on a warehouse at a key intersection.  But we ran into all kinds of problems, especially with the city planning commission.  They refused to issue us a conditional use permit to meet there, even after we signed a lease.

So we appealed to the City Council and called for a special day of prayer and fasting.  John, our outreach director, created a one-page flyer on a Macintosh computer encouraging everyone in the church to pray for “our building, God’s will, God’s power, and unity.”  When John looked at the flyer on the computer screen, all the words were right side up.

When he printed the flyer to hand out to our people, the word “Pray” was upside down while all the other words were right side up.

No matter what John did, he could not get the word “Pray” to print right side up.

We eventually handed them out that way, and some of our people freaked out because they had never seen any supernatural mischief before.  But to me, this was an indication that what the devil didn’t want us to do was to pray.  In other words, he had laid out a plan of victory for us.

During this time, Ephesians 6:13 became my go to verse:

“Therefore, put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.”

We did try and do “everything.”  Along with several of our board members, I talked to other pastors, Christian leaders, attorneys, planning commissioners, and City Council members in our city, along with the Mayor.  One of the Christian leaders, who is well-known in the Bay Area, told his attorney to distance himself from our situation because he predicted we were going to lose.

But when our appeal came before the Council, we won an incredible 7-0 vote and received our conditional use permit – the first church in our city to ever go into the light industrial area.

I didn’t know it at the time, but we had situated ourselves smack in the middle of the devil’s territory.  No wonder he fought us so hard the entire time we were there.

Years later, I learned that the intersection where our church was located was a haven for drug dealers.  And across the road was a massage parlor that, like the House of the Rising Sun, ruined many a poor boy.  (As our church was getting ready to relocate from that intersection, a man called to ask me to do whatever I could to close down that massage parlor because, he said, it had ruined his life.)

During our whole time together, the church stayed united against outside forces that tried to assail us – and they were continually trying to do so.  I have never been in a church that was so effective at winning lost people to Christ – or a church that endured so much external suffering.

We were successful in defeating the devil time and time again, but he was relentless, and in the end, he and his minions wore us down.  When our church was forced to relocate five miles away, I knew I was going to need a long break away from church ministry.

After years of putting it off, I finally did a series on controversial social issues, including homosexuality.  The night before I planned to give that message, all hell broke loose in my home and in our church.  In fact, it was so bad that I typed out a resignation letter because I felt too weak to deal with the assaults anymore.  (However, I never gave it to the board.)

The next day, I did give the message I had planned to give, but only after making peace at home.  I have never, ever sensed spiritual warfare like I felt the 24 hours before I gave that message.

And the truth is, I never want to feel that way again.

But when we invade the enemy’s territory, we never know what’s going to happen to us.

Twice in Ephesians 6:13, Paul encourages believers to stand.  By contrast, the devil wants us to run and hide (like Jesus’ disciples did the night before He died), or to deny Him (like Peter did), or to hang (like Judas did).

But Jesus wants us to stand.

The only way we can stand against Satan is to do it together.  The strongest pastor in the world cannot fight the enemy by himself.  Even Paul ended this passage by telling the Ephesians, “Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains.  Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should” (Ephesians 6:19-20).

Let me make four quick points about Satan:

First, he is real.  He tried to take Jesus’ life as an infant through King Herod the Great.  He battled Jesus in the wilderness, infiltrated His disciples through Judas, and was behind most of the events in the final 24 hours of Jesus’ life.  Jesus said that Satan exists, and that should be good enough for us.

For an interesting take on Satan, read the lyrics to Bob Dylan’s song Man of Peace.  They ring true.

Second, he hates God.  Most of the hatred directed against God in our country doesn’t come from the ACLU or a certain political party or candidate or from godless late-night comedians.  The hatred originates with Satan.  He influences people to hate God and even injects thoughts into their brains, but as many Christians have pointed out, godless humans are not the real enemy, but victims of the enemy.

Third, he hates God’s people.  So he deceives and destroys – often among Christians – so that he can divide us and negate our united front to the world.  I have noticed recently that many younger evangelicals view older Christians as their enemies, embracing the culture while condemning other churches.  When any of us succumb to this hatred, we are doing the devil’s work for him – and we are all susceptible to it.

Finally, he has been defeated.  We all know this – we just need to be reminded.  He cannot overthrow God, or undermine Jesus, or take out the Spirit – so he focuses on frail humans like us.  But I love the way the writer to the Hebrews puts it:

“Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death – that is, the devil – and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death” (Hebrews 2:14-15).

Jesus’ death defeated Satan.

Let’s let Martin Luther have the last word in A Mighty Fortress:

Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing;

Were not the right Man on our side, the Man of God’s own choosing;

Dost ask who that may be?  Christ Jesus, it is He;

Lord Sabaoth, His name, from age to age the same,

And He must win the battle.

Amen?

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What We All Want from Church

Posted in Current Church Issues, Please Comment!, tagged , on June 8, 2011| 2 Comments »

When I was a pastor, there was one thing I wanted for my church more than anything else.

It wasn’t increased attendance, or above-the-budget offerings, or even mass conversions.

I wanted the blessing of God on our church.

It’s possible to manipulate people into coming to church and giving – at least for a while.  But the divine blessing cannot be manufactured by humans.  It can only come from above.

Whether they articulate it or not, most Christian pastors want the Lord to pour out His blessing upon their church.  God’s promise to His people in Ezekiel 34:26 sums this up well:

“I will bless them and the places surrounding my hill.  I will send down showers in season; there will be showers of blessing.”

Some of us used to sing this chorus in church:

“Showers of blessing,

Showers of blessing we need,

Mercy drops ’round us are falling,

But for the showers we plead.”

What does God’s blessing look like in a local church setting?

First, the people come to church expectantly.  They aren’t forcing themselves to show up; they want to be there.  They arrive as early as they can, greet their friends in Christ, look around for guests they can minister to, and sit down early to focus upward.  They don’t cross their arms and inwardly say to their pastor, “Tell me something I’ve never heard before.”  Instead, they eagerly await the worship time and prayerfully look for God to speak to them.  I like the way Dr. Luke puts it in Acts 2:43 when he says that “everyone was filled with awe.”

Second, everyone senses the presence of God.  D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones served as the pastor of Westminster Chapel in London for decades.  He was such a great biblical expositor that I’ve read his entire eight-volume commentary on Ephesians and loved every minute.  When he came to the United States, he would visit various churches, and sometimes when a pastor would get up to preach, he’d look out at the congregation and see Dr. Lloyd-Jones sitting there – and he’d want to trade places instantly!  Lloyd-Jones was asked once what he looked for when he heard other men preach, and he said that he wanted to sense the presence of God.  What a profound answer!

When God is blessing a church, people sense His presence in the music, in the message, and in everything else.  They sense that God is present and that He that He is comfortable in that particular location.  When God appeared to Jacob at Bethel, he said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.  How awesome is this place!  This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven” (Genesis 28:16-17).

Third, people value right relationships.  When I was a youth pastor, I took various youth groups to retreats in mountain cabins.  As we all drove up the mountain, the group would become fractured as students insulted other students and formed exclusive cliques.  But by Saturday night, a few students would become convicted about how they were treating their peers, and they would break down and ask for forgiveness.  This made the ride down the mountain more joyful and unifying, and at least for a little while, the students would experience God’s blessing in abundance.

If only the adults could learn from the youth.

Young people aren’t very good about hiding how they really feel about anything, including the other kids in their group.  But as those young people become adults, they learn how to mask their true feelings as they interact with people they don’t like.  So it’s possible for two Christians to be cordial to each other in the church patio and turn around and verbally knife each other in the back as they drive home from worship.

Sometimes these kinds of relationships are what prevent God from blessing a church.  If we could learn the practice of keeping short accounts with each other, God’s presence would become clearer and His power would become greater in our midst.

And let me be honest here: oftentimes the greatest relational problems are buried inside the leadership of the church.  If we want God’s blessing, we have to humble ourselves and seek restoration with those with whom we serve.

Finally, spiritually lost people find the Lord.  When God is blessing a church, unbelievers come to faith in Christ in a natural way.  It’s not because the church launches an evangelism campaign, or because they hold an evangelistic crusade, but because believers are sharing their faith with their unbelieving friends and inviting them to church.  The Lord obviously blessed the first church in Jerusalem, and as the people loved God and each other, we’re told that “the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47).

As a pastor, I always sensed God’s blessing when people were becoming Christians, but wondered what was wrong when we went for weeks without a single convert.

What are some of the other indications that God is blessing a church?  What have you seen?  I welcome your comments!

Next time, I’ll discuss what the leaders of a church can do to secure the Lord’s blessing.

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What’s Great About Church

Posted in Current Church Issues, Personal Stories, Please Comment! on May 27, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Most of the writing I do on this blog concerns pastor-church conflict issues, although I try and write more for lay people than anyone else.  By necessity, this means that I’m focused more on the dark side of the church, and it’s hard to think about that all the time.

So today, I want to shine the light on what’s great about attending a local Christian church.

While I might have missed a few, I believe that I’ve attended at least 14 different churches in my lifetime: 8 before I became a pastor and 6 afterwards.  Since I grew up in a pastor’s home – and I was in church every Sunday – a safe estimate is that I’ve attended at least 2,500 Sunday morning services, not counting Sunday evening or Wednesday night extravaganzas.

So here’s what I like about church:

First, there is a minimum of one solid hour to focus on God.  The closer we get to God, the more life comes together.  The further we get from God, the more life starts unraveling.  We all know we need to interact with our Creator more often, but the routine intrusions of life can make this challenging.

But when we attend a church service, outside intrusions are largely eliminated.  The phone doesn’t ring (okay, there are exceptions), we aren’t watching TV (although many churches now have monitors), we’ve left our favorite books at home (unless they’re on our Smart Phone), and household chores cannot be transferred to a worship center (thank God!).  While we can sleep, it’s generally discouraged, and while we can read, the Bible remains the preferred literature.

The praise and worship time, the testimonies, any video elements, the various prayers, communion, and the pastor’s message all point us in a heavenward direction.  Even for the best Christians, it’s possible to go 167 hours without looking up too often.  A worship service specializes in a vertical relationship with God – and that’s a very good thing indeed!

Second, you’re hanging around others who also love Jesus.  When I worked for McDonald’s, I was assigned primarily to the grill area.  Although I knew how to cook meat and dress the buns, my primary role was toasting the buns.  One night, while doing just that, I decided to share Christ with Matt, my co-worker who was cooking meat.  I asked him, “Hey, Matt, who is Jesus Christ to you?”  He replied, “One in a cast of thousands.”

I never followed up with him.  I didn’t know what to say after that.

There may have been Christians working at McDonald’s, but I don’t recall meeting any (except the boss’ mother Myrtle, but she wasn’t a co-worker).  So, like most of you, I was surrounded by unbelievers at work.

But when I went to church, there were believers everywhere!  In fact, we assumed you were a believer unless we heard otherwise.  While I was only at church for a few hours each week, it was relaxing and fulfilling to hang around people who believed as I did – and many of those people helped me grow in my faith.  There is nothing in the world like a concentration of Christians in one place.

Third, you make lifelong friends at church.  My first friends lived in my neighborhood.  I met the next wave at school.  And I made a host of friends through playing sports.  But I always enjoyed a deeper friendship with my church friends than any others.

When I was in ninth grade, my three best friends and I were all officers in the Honor Society.  I signed a few hundred yearbooks on the last day of school.

Three years later, on the last day of high school, I signed three yearbooks.  (And I didn’t buy my own, either.)  Why?  Because nearly all my friends were at church.

My good friend Ken invited me to his church and I stayed.  Then I eventually invited our mutual friend Steve.  I met and married Kim, and Steve met and married Janie.  While I haven’t retained all the friendships I made at that church, I have retained many of them, and they continue to enrich my life to this day.

Sixteen years ago, the church held its 40th anniversary reunion.  That night felt like a taste of heaven.  I saw friends I hadn’t seen in more than twenty years, and nobody seemed to remember the bad stuff anyone had done – we only remembered the good.  I’ll never forget one young man who was in my youth group.  He told me that I was the first man he had ever met who was both an athlete and a Christian, and that my example is what kept him following Christ.  (He was married with four kids, as I recall.)  The whole night was like that.  Where else can you find that kind of friendship?

Fourth, church is where we discover and develop our gifts.  As a kid, I read to my class at times, and had a few things I’d written read for me, but I hardly did any public speaking.  In fact, I rarely spoke up in class at all, even when I knew the answer.  But I learned to speak in church.

My first message was on the friendship between David and Jonathan.  It was on a Sunday night in July (when experimentation was permissible).  I did not study adequately for it and really didn’t know what I was doing, but one has to start somewhere, and my church provided a safe place for me to test my gift.  Fifty or so messages later, a church called me to be their pastor.  That only happened because I was allowed to practice preaching on three church families.

The same is true for so many of us who know Jesus.  We first learned to teach kids and run events and sing songs and lead groups and pray with people not at home or at school, but at church.  In the warm, safe environment of God’s people, we tried and failed and tried and failed until we found an area where we had success.  Since it’s hard to experiment in a megachurch that expects perfection, experimenting is best done in the myriad of small and medium-sized churches that dot our land.

Fifth, we are exposed to Scripture and all its wonders.  With its various complexities and ambiguities, many of us still love the Bible.  No book contains more wisdom, or power, or grace.  No book has better stories.  No book possesses such powerful lessons.  From Abraham and Esther through Peter and Paul, where can anyone find such characters in literature?

I thank God for every person who taught me the Bible.  With a few exceptions, I remember them all.  They influenced my life in countless ways.  If you want to attend seminary, you have to have one near you and pay out the nose.  But there are thousands of mini-seminaries all over the world found in local churches.

And while I appreciate every pastor who preached God’s Word, the most influential teachers are the ones who teach the toddlers and the fifth grade boys and the high school group.  They keep the kids inside the church so that the preacher can later reach them as adults.

Finally, church is the source of the greatest music in the world.  I had breakfast yesterday with a dear friend, and he mentioned that George Beverly Shea, the soloist for Billy Graham’s Crusades for so many years, just turned 102!  When he mentioned Shea’s name, I instantly started singing the song he co-wrote with Rhea Miller:

I’d rather have Jesus, than silver or gold,

I’d rather be His than have riches untold

I’d rather have Jesus than houses or lands

I’d rather be led by His nail pierced hand

Than to be a king of a vast domain

Or be held in sin’s dread sway

I’d rather have Jesus than anything

This world affords today

Where did George Beverly Shea first sing that song?  In church.  Where did many of us first hear it?  In church.

It’s the same place we heard “A Mighty Fortress” and “Great is Thy Faithfulness” and “How Great Thou Art” and “Lord I Lift Your Name on High” and “Shout to the Lord” and “My Glorious” and hundreds of other great songs.  Unlike Mozart, Bach wrote his masterpieces first for church use.  And so many entertainers got their start by singing in church.  (It would be great if they would go back to church, but that’s another story.)

Those are just a few of the reasons that the local church is so great, but I’ve barely scratched the surface.

What is great about church to you?

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