We live in a society that increasingly lacks civility in its dealings with one another. I suppose the current economy has made this worse as people are out of work and losing their homes, but people have been growing more rude and litigious for several years. We see this openly on the radio and television talk shows. A guest is asked a question but is interrupted by the host almost as soon as she begins her answer. There is seldom a civil discussion heard in such settings as each side wants to see who can talk the loudest to ensure their talking points are heard. Less openly, but even more disturbing, are the stories of road rage we read about. Cut in too close to a car and shots might be fired. At the very least you'll probably receive an obscene gesture. There are an abundance of court room shows on TV now that show former friends and lovers suing one another over a television set or a dent fender on the car or some other rather insignificant issue. More disturbing are the family members who sue one another over an inheritance or some other issue. We are a rude and impolite people who look to the courts to settle even the smallest of issues. Unfortunately, the same can be said of many of our churches.
In my 2 1/2 decades of ministry I have seen unbelievable behavior on the part of church members. Business meetings turn into shouting matches because someone doesn't get his way. Parking lots become the informal meeting places for disgruntled members who try to recruit people to their side of the issue. Someone reads a newspaper headline about some action that a denomination or individual took and immediately wants to pull the church out of the denomination without looking deeper into the issue. Chuches run off their pastors without providing a fair severance package that will partially provide for the pastor and his or family during the search process for another church to serve. Churches split over the smallest of issues. Pastors and/or churches hire lawyers to protect their interests from the other side. I know of one church that requested extra police patrols because someone had threatened to burn down the parsonage to get the pastor out. There is something seriously wrong with this picture.
Many people in our society and many of our churches are unable to discuss the issues that divide them. Rather than conducting a civil discussion we immediately go into defense mode. It's like we must defend God on every issue. Believe me, God does not care what color carpet your church installs or what hymnal you use. He does care very much what you are doing to minister to those who are separated from Him because of their sins. He does care about what your church is doing to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and provide shelter to the homeless. He also cares about how we treat one another. The Bible teaches us that the world will know we are Christians by the love we show one another.
Will people in the church disagree? Of course. As someone once said, if two people don't disagree occasionally one of them is not necessary. But we can disagree without being disagreeable. We can speak the truth in love and seek to understand the other person's perspective. We can often find areas of agreement that will allow us to move forward rather than remaining stuck in our positions. As the recipients of much grace in our own lives, we can offer that same grace to others with whom we may disagree. We can certainly be civil to people who have been created in the image of God. And, at times, we may have to accept that we will not agree with others on every issue and find a way to continue to relate to one another with respect.
Jerry Falwell was a lightening rod for much of his life. He was not afraid to speak his mind nor was he afraid to debate anyone on any issue. He may not have always been right in everything he did or said, but he was passionate about his beliefs. One of the interesting things after his death was the number of his critics who spoke so highly of him. They often debated issues with Falwell on the national stage, and they held views diametrically opposed to his, but after his death they spoke of their appreciation for him and for the friendships they enjoyed with him. One reported that when there was a tragedy in his family Falwell was the first person he called. Another said that he was always amazed at how respectfully Falwell treated people even while traveling. Falwell held strong views which he defended, but he defended those views with civility and grace towards those who disagreed with him.
We need to recapture that ability in both our society and in our churches. Shouting matches do not resolve anything. Questioning the character of an opponent does not prove your point. Slurs, put-downs, and rumors do not strengthen our argument. We can once again become a civil society if each of us will work at it. Our churches must return to civility if we want to influence this world for the sake of the Kingdom, and some of us need to begin working on that today.
2 comments:
You said, "Churches run off their pastors without providing a fair severence package that will partially provide for the pastor and his or family [sic] during the search process for another church to serve." Please elaborate and correct me if I'm wrong, but I suppose that you mean that churches should provide severence packages to vocational pastors when they run them off. But is this necessarily Biblical? The Bible tells us to love one another, and that love includes rebuking one another within the church. These days, it seems like everybody's ultimate answer to long-standing disagreements is that "Somebody's got to go."
Should pastors be treated any differently than other ministers or lay members? James told the Twelve Tribes of Judah that teachers would receive greater judgment than others (King James Version James 3.1). The beauty of bivocational ministry is that financial welfare is not part of the equation when a pastorate is challenged. If a church starts to have a problem with a bivocational pastor, that pastor can/should be absorbed back into the congregation (at worst) and another congregant (and ideally, an elder or another ordained minister, but even possibly a layman) can step up. The old pastor's secular welfare is not damaged. With vocational pastors, though, it is of course very different. A vocational pastor actually has to leave the congregation and fnd another to ensure financial welfare. Your words hit home for me because I come from a church where the vocational pastor resigned due to some shady circumstances and went on to be an assistant pastor at another church. Although that pastor viewed it as a "fresh start," I don't think there was any real corrective censure or rebuke in that process, and his new church is none the wiser. I think that it is ultimately better to retain churchmembers and rebuke them than to send them on their way because they don't have a paycheck anymore.
About the general topic of your post... Everybody likes to be right.
I think that an important quality of a church is for congregants, ministers, and congregants and ministers together to agree to disagree when they cannot come to a concensus about an issue. Lively and sometimes even heated debates can be fun and can produce results, but Christians should still be able to walk out of the conference room hand-in-hand at the end of the day.
You wrote, "The Bible teaches us that the world will know we are Christians by the love we show one another." Specifically, Jesus tells his disciples that they will know false prophets by their fruits. Likewise, I believe that we and the world should know true Christians by their fruits: Love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, long-suffering, and self-control. How many of those qualities are present among church members, and to what degree? The current and historical trend (within the past few decades) does seem to be/include dissent, anger, impatience, bitterness, power-hunger, argument, malefection, and roughness. Even if these qualities/fruits are not a general rule, they are at least clearly visible in many churches.
Debate is okay, as long as it is done in a loving manner, and as long as the debaters have loving, Christ-centered hearts.
I think that people tend to fear that if we don't promote our own understandings of God's truth(s) with a vehemence, someone else will do that very thing with lies, fallacy, heresy, and dogma. Be that as it may, we still need to remember that God's truth is what it is, whether or not it is the popular opinion.
You are correct in that I was referring primarily to fully-funded pastors when I addressed churches forcing out pastors without providing a fair severance package. However, bivocational ministers may need such a package as well. I am aware of a bivocational minister whose church check pays for insurance for the family. The secular job does not provide insurance and does not pay enough for the pastor to purchase insurance. This pastor may be forced out of the position after the first of the year, and unless the church provides some type of severance the pastor's family will be without insurance.
Many pastors today are being terminated for various reasons, many of them not worthy of asking a pastor to resign. I counseled such a church a couple of years ago and admitted that the pastor had made a mistake in judgment (this was not a moral issue) but had done nothing that deserved being terminated. I further told the church I would assist this pastor in finding another church to serve, but it would likely take time, and I felt they owed him and his family some severance to help them financially during this period. They did terminate this pastor and provided some severance although less than I had requested.
Even if the pastor needs to leave due to misconduct of some type, I believe the church needs to provide some assistance and not just kick them out into the street. A church could offer to pay for some counseling and a few months income to help the family through an already difficult time. Of course, if the minister moves immediately on to another church there would be no need for the previous congregation to provide financial assistance. As I recently told a church, you can never go wrong taking the high road.
A church should hold its leaders accountable and challenge them when they go wrong. However, such challenges do not have to be mean-spirited, and they do not have to automatically result in the end of one's ministry. A greater measure of civility in our churches would send an important message to the unchurched world and would result in greater redemption for those in our Christian family who do make foolish choices.
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