Avoid divisions if you want to accomplish anything significant

In John 17 Jesus prayed for himself, for his disciples, and for all believers. One of the things he prayed for all believers was that "they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one." Jesus understood that if the church was to accomplish its mission it had to be united.

Divisions within the church will always cause the church to be ineffective. A divided church cannot enjoy any kind of meaningful ministry to its community because it is too focused on itself. Warring parties in a divided church are working hard to protect their turf and their private interests. They have little to no interest in anyone outside their little group.

A church without a unifying vision that the congregation owns will be a divided church. A church without such a vision will go nowhere and accomplish nothing. Even if they wanted to move forward, they wouldn't know where to go without a common vision. Some would want to go in one direction; others would want to go in a different direction, and there is where the division begins. Too often, both sides believe they are following the will of God so they are unwilling to compromise so the division leads to conflict.

BTW - the same is true of any organization. A family that cannot agree on finances will find itself in debt with no savings and in constant turmoil due to finances. A business that isn't certain what business it is in will struggle to find a loyal customer base. Soon they are trying to be all things to all people and end up seeing their competitors taking all their customers.

This week Congress returned to work and the childish behavior has already begun. The Republicans want one thing; the Democrats want something else, and both sides spin and lie trying to convince the American public they are fighting for them. It's no wonder that the approval rating for Congress remains in the low teens and that people are sick of both the Republican and Democrat parties. We have a divided, dysfunctional political system that cares only for its lobbyists and large donors, and as a result our nation is going down the tubes. I wrote before the election that few incumbents in Congress should be returned to office. Most were, and this first week back has proven that I was right. Maybe one day, if there is anything left of this country, voters will decide to vote for people who truly love this country and want the best for it more than they want to protect a political party that long ago became irrelevant.

Of course, this is true as well in the church. Until the church becomes more committed to the mission God gave it than it is to its controllers and unites around a common vision it will remain irrelevant to the Kingdom of God and to the community it has been called to serve.

Most of the things that divide the church today are minor compared to the task God has given us. It's time we determine what's really important and focus on those things and let the other things slide. Once we do, we'll find God's blessings again and begin to experience His blessings on our ministries.

The problem of small churches and too much money

In yesterday's post I discussed the problem of smaller churches and their often heard complaint about not having any money. Today, I want to address another financial problem sometimes found in smaller church; the problem of having too much money.

One small church that averages about 12 people each week told me they had over $100,000 in savings. An even smaller church has nearly double that amount. A third small church was struggling a few years ago to find a pastor. I told the search committee that they needed to increase the salary they were going to offer if they wanted a pastor. The committee chair finally admitted to me that they had a "rainy day" fund. Although he wouldn't tell me an amount, from the way he said it I felt it was fairly sizable figure. I responded, "Look outside. It's pouring. The church is going to have to use some of that money if it is going to attract someone to serve as their pastor."

I realize that fear drives a lot of this. People see their attendance figures and giving going down. They are afraid their little church may have to close so they reduce their expenses to a bare minimum and start stockpiling money. Maybe they had a building fund they've converted over into a savings account, and they hold onto those funds with clinched fists.

Unfortunately, those clinched fists do more than hold onto the money. They also strangle the ministry of the church until it's no longer even a church. It's reduced to a small wealthy club that provides services to its members.

This is poor stewardship of God's money. That money was given in the past by faithful members of your church to support the ministries of the church. There is nothing wrong with a church having money in savings. There is much wrong with a church having large sums of money it never intends to use for any purpose other than ensuring its own existence. Such an attitude dishonors the purpose for which it was given and dishonors God.

There is a second problem with small churches having inordinate amounts of money in savings. People stop giving. They see no reason to give their hard-earned money to a church that has lots of money it's not going to use anyway. Since the church has demonstrated it's OK to hoard money the members believe they should hold onto their own money or at least use it for their own pleasure.

We teach stewardship by our actions as well as through sermons and lessons. Because the church I pastored believed in and taught people to tithe we demonstrated that in our church budget. Ten percent of our offerings went to our denominational mission support program. After I served the church for a few years and we became a little more financially sound, I encouraged the church to increase that to fifteen percent. We did that by increasing our mission giving one percent a year for five years. As our mission giving increased so did our general church giving.

If you are in a small church with a large savings account you're not using, you need to do something with that money. If you're not going to use it for Kingdom work, then give it to a ministry that will. Pay your pastor a decent salary. Give part of it to your denominational mission program. Support local mission work even if it's being done by other churches or ministries in your area. This money was given for ministry, and it needs to be used in that way.

Controllers will kill your church

In yesterday's post I commented on churches that close and pointed out that when a church no longer has a vision for ministry it should consider closing. Some of the churches are already spiritually dead and remain alive thanks to endowments, denominational support, and the fact they don't need much to stay open.  Such churches might better serve their communities by becoming a legacy church and giving their resources to another ministry that is better ministering to the community. To learn more about legacy churches I recommend an excellent book, Legacy Churches.

There is another type of church that should consider closing its doors. This is the church that is led by controllers in the church. In some churches, the same controllers (or controlling family) has ran the church for decades. Such churches often have a revolving-door pastorate as the ministers soon recognize the dysfunction that exists in the church. New people may come but seldom stay long until eventually the congregation consists primarily of family members of the controllers. When this happens, no one is going to confront the controller, and the dysfunction only grows.

Sometimes pastors believe they can survive the controllers, but this often requires so much compromise that the pastor has to leave to maintain his or her integrity. Some pastors think they can challenge the controllers only to find themselves terminated as others who thought the same thing experienced. These churches are responsible for many pastors leaving the ministry disillusioned, hurt, and angry.

Jesus told his disciples that they would go to some places where they would not be received. In such places, they were to shake the dust from their feet and move on (Mt. 10:14). I believe there are churches when this advice still applies today.

I have seen such churches do great harm emotionally, physically, financially, and spiritually to the pastors and their families. I have seen some wonderful pastors beat down trying to turn-around a controller-led church. More than once I have told pastors that they were doing harm to themselves and their families and needed to leave before things became even worse.

Unless the congregation wants the controller stopped and is willing to confront him or her, nothing in the church will change. A new pastor will not successfully challenge a controller, and most pastors won't remain long enough to do so. It is my belief that such churches can only be turned-around by the congregation, and most congregations do not have the stomach for the fight that will be required to change things. After all, they've already lived with it for all these years so why would anyone think that they are going to challenge the controller now.

These churches do need to close. They give the church a bad name in the community and do great harm to the cause of Christ. Unfortunately, they are unlikely to close as long as the controller lives or other family members are willing to take up the cause and become the next generation of controllers. About the only thing we can do is to recognize their dysfunctions and stop supplying them with pastors. At the infrequent times they do ask for help denominational leaders need to offer them the help they really need and refuse to resource them further until they begin to take steps towards health.