Today’s post is written by Joanna Smith, a subscriber to 2×2.

Joanna Smith is a Christian and an observer of the good, the bad, and the ugly within the Church. She may be reached at jcsmith19027@yahoo.com.

Dedicated Christians or Power-Crazed Christians?

If the Church is the body of Christ, why do so many of her leaders act like the road to successful church growth is paved with her amputated head and limbs? Click to tweet.

Recently, I was staffing a booth at a regional denominational convention where I had the chance to speak to a pastor who had been put in charge of revitalizing what was considered a declining church in a medium-sized town in Pennsylvania.

This town, like many others across the country, was facing the challenges associated with contemporary American life: changing ethnicity, the rise of secularism, and–let’s be frank—the effects of sin and evil.

This pastor, who also worked in construction and sported a military-style buzz cut, was charged by the denominational leadership to “turn around” this small city church.

“Go in there and act like the Marine. You already look the part,” he was told.

Like a good soldier he followed orders. During the beginning days of his tenure at the church, senior lay leadership made it clear that they were not happy with the changes he was proposing. He pushed back. Hard. And made it clear that changes would be made and that if they didn’t like it, they would be free to leave.

“They are the old line power-hungry elite who are standing in the way of church growth,” he said forcefully. “They’ll find another declining church to join where they can play their power games.”

Expendable Members. What A Way to Grow A Church!

The strategy, which has been proposed by others, was to hound the offending laity until they ended up saying their prayers alone in their living room on Sunday morning.

Talk about wolves in shepherds’ clothing!

What that pastor was saying has an element of truth.  There are people for whom church leadership is a means to power. Quite a few, it seems, end up becoming ordained. Click to tweet.

Most lay people who stay in “declining” congregations are those who teach Sunday School, who sing in the choir, and who serve at the church suppers when there are fewer and fewer people to take on those tasks. They may have held their congregations together through decades of neighborhood unrest and possibly through several poor ineffective pastoral solutions presented by their regional body.

Most likely they were married there and their children were baptized there. Probably their parents were, too.  They were the ones who stayed and put up with the theological experimentation—which at times bordered on heresy—the same denominational leadership who was now trying to force them out.

They are the faithful backbone of the church—the ones you can count on to show up with their sleeves rolled.

I’m no doctor, but I think that it’s considered malpractice to treat a limping patient with a sprained ankle by fracturing his back.

Servanthood in the Church

Christ doesn’t treat His Church that way. In Ephesians, Paul compares the Church to a bride and says that Jesus “gave himself up for her” and “nourishes and cherishes” her.

Jesus called himself the Good Shepherd and said that he would leave the 99 and go after the one lost sheep. He also said that He would never leave or forsake those 99. Any earthly hireling shepherd that would purposely scatter the herd in his charge would be a dangerous fool and should be fired by his employer.

Perhaps today’s church leadership should emulate the Marines, whose motto is semper fidelis for whom honor is sacred. Perhaps we should live by the marine’s primary rule of engagement: never leave one your own behind. 

It would be biblical. Jesus told his flock that he would never leave them or forsake them.

Jesus had some very harsh words for his hired hands: “Anyone who causes even the least of my own to go astray, it is better that he wears a millstone around his neck and is thrown into the sea.” 

I was paging through the New Testament the other day looking for the chapter and verse where Jesus said that it was okay for people to throw others out of his church, abandon and demonize the most faithful, lock doors, claim property and declare their actions to be righteous and praiseworthy—while anyone who might think differently can go eat cake.

Can you find it?

Related post of a successful, more loving (Christian) alternative approach

Cartoon by 2×2

NOTE from 2×2: Thanks for your heartfelt contribution, Joanna.

A career pastor who made a mission of reviving congregations, spending five to seven years in each, once told me the first thing a transformational pastor must do is “nothing for one year.” Getting to know the parish and forming relationships with lay leaders takes that long, he advised. After that, when you’ve proved that you love the congregation and have their interests at heart (as opposed to your own or that of the regional body) begin to introduce ideas, gently — not like a Marine. Until solid relationships are formed, lay leaders are well within their rights to be resistant and suspicious. All clergy would have to do is practice the Golden Rule. How would you like it if someone treated you like your home would be better without you in it? Lay caution is natural and usually based in love for the church—not a lust for power.  Their caution is prudent.

Lay people with an insatiable lust for power don’t hang around in small churches.

Clergy get away with their self-serving attitudes because they count on lay leaders to have no voice. 2×2 is trying to change that.

We’d love to check back on that Marine Pastor in a year or so to see if his approach worked or if he found himself the shepherd of a closed church.

Thanks, again, for your view coming from a different denomination. Judy