ChurchWhisperers.Org

Joy In The Journey

(Unexpected fringe benefits for the interim pastor or “Guys, have your wife read this!”)

 

“Ohhhhh yukkkkk!  That sounds awful!  That’s the last thing I’d want to do!  Oh man, you can have that ministry!”  Those words were the actual reaction of a fellow pastor upon hearing the basics of my strategic interim pastor ministry description: “I move around the country and go to troubled churches that don’t have pastors, helping them change during difficult times.”

 

I’m always kind of shocked to get this kind of response, even though I’ve experienced it many times.  I love my work. It’s a joy.  God has used us far more powerfully than we had imagined He would when we began this adventure six years ago.  I suppose most pastors don’t really have any need to have their misconception corrected; the more pastors who think interim pastoring is awful, the easier it will remain for those of us who do it to stay busy.  But for those of you who are genuinely considering this way of being a pastor or who are sensing a call of God to “hit the interim trail,” I want to offer some perspective. 

Yes, there are some difficult things about being a strategic interim pastor: saying goodbye again and again, learning dozens (or hundreds) of new names, the physical task of moving most or all of your earthly possessions, the harder task (I think) of transferring your “infrastructure” (my term for changing addresses, utilities, banks, internet connections, doctors, dentists, automobile licenses, etc.), trying to lead troubled, grieving, or divided churches through a process of change, seeking to overcome the disrespect with which some greet the interim pastor, etc.  Of course these challenges await the interim pastor, over and over again.  They are the warp and woof of the job description. They require everything we have along with total dependence upon God, again and again.  When your current congregation has been revived and refreshed and the saints have learned how to work out their difficulties with grace, it’s time to move on to the next mess!

You probably know all that already.  What you may not be aware of are the fringe benefits.  These were mostly surprises for me.  I’ve learned that God loves to surprise us with such delights and I’ve also learned to enjoy the surprises more than the benefits I’d counted on.  So here are some of the unexpected blessings we’ve received along the way:

 

* Incredible people.  Each interim pastorate has given us the privilege of meeting some of God’s “choice” servants: saintly saints, colorful characters (inside and outside of the church), people who, for some reason, “adopt us” and love us far beyond what we deserve.  We have experienced lavish hospitality, heard amazing salvation testimonies and powerful stories of God’s grace in the tough lives of now-tender people.  For some reason, some of God’s most delightful children think of us as “missionaries who’ve sacrificed a lot” – though we don’t see it that way at all.  In every town we get to know a few people who become friends for life.  We are blessed and changed by every one of them.

* A post-graduate education.  I don’t mean any disrespect for long-term pastoring; I learned a lot in that role as well.  But there’s something about the ever-changing landscape of interim pastoring that intensifies the transformational experience of being a pastor.  You can’t get stale doing this.  You are challenged constantly by diverse individuals, doctrines, sub-cultures and problems.  Every town is different and every church is different.  In each town I meet pastor colleagues, church board members and some of those characters I mentioned above, who introduce me to new authors, new music and new methods that enrich my life. Each church is an intense new post-graduate course.

* Sights worth seeing. Each stop along our winding trail has enabled us to enjoy a cornucopia of attractions and wonders we would never have seen had we “stayed home.” We believe in taking full advantage of our days off: we leave the house for the whole day and try to go see something we haven’t seen before.  Our time in Benson, Arizona enabled us to see: free rodeos, the sights, sounds and tastes of Tucson, multiple mountain ranges, Tombstone and Bisbee, the Chiricahua National Monument.  Living in Kingman, Arizona allowed us to get to the Grand Canyon twice, the Hoover Dam (many times), mining ghost towns and more.  Hastings, Minnesota put us in proximity to “The Great River Road” up and down both sides of the Mississippi and the museums, parks and restaurants of the Twin Cities.  Here in Waushara County, Wisconsin, we’re situated on a beautiful little lake in a pine woods full of deer.  We’re in the “Christmas Tree Capital of the World” and our rented house has four boats.  I could go on and on but I bet you get the picture.

* Fresh starts.  Before I resigned from my long, long-term pastorate and began interim pastoring, I was encouraged with an observation I heard regarding the military: “A benefit of being in the army is that when you get re-assigned it gives you the chance to cut your losses, learn from your mistakes and get a fresh start.”  Most of us know that most churches need long pastorates from godly, committed, long-term pastors.  But there’s also a place for those of us whose mission is short-term (in the metaphor of I Corinthians 3:10-15 we would be remodelers) and we have the blessing of getting multiple fresh starts.  This allows “finishers” like me – those who like to finish a task as opposed to “processors” who don’t care whether they complete a task or not – to finish the interim process, and in doing it again and again, get better and better at it.

 

* Finally, I have to say a word about flexibility.  By temperament I know I could easily get set it my ways.  I’m reaching the age where this is a greater and greater temptation.  The type of ministry I’m doing simply won’t allow for inflexibility.  I (“we,” actually) have to flex – or break and I appreciate the challenge.

 

Is this a hard ministry?  In some respects, yes, of course.  But any kind of pastoring (I concluded a few years ago) is hard.  And as with any kind of pastoral ministry, there is joy in the journey; there are fringe benefits and delightful surprises from our delightful God.

When Good People Do Bad Things, Part Three

(Note: This is the third of three articles on the subject of "When Good People Do Bad Things.") 

A wise individual once said that “Renewing your church is like remodeling your house…”  If you’ve ever remodeled or attempted to remodel a house you can guess what’s coming…  “Renewing your church is like remodeling your house: it will take more time, cost more money, create more stress and make a bigger mess than you could ever have imagined, but in the end, it’s worth it.”  Having done a bit of home remodeling and been deeply involved in the renewing of several churches, I can testify to the truth of this statement.

One of the hard, messy aspects of renewing a church is coming to grips with the bad behavior of good people, including ourselves. Churches aren’t devastated by the Devil alone, he must have assistance from the inside.  Churches can only be left in need of remodeling by way of the bad behavior of, usually, good people.  This is a hard truth to face but we’ve been wrestling with it honestly in this series of articles.  We’ve seen that good people sometimes do bad things because: (1) they are deliberately defiant, (2) they are self-reliant and weak, (3) they are guilty of envy, selfish ambition, rivalry, jealousy or pride, (4) they stoop to cowardice, compromise or worldliness, (5) they are ignorant or immature.  This brings us to a sixth reason why good people sometimes do bad things.

(6) Sometimes good people do bad things because they confuse unity with uniformity.  In one sense of the term, church unity is an unassailable reality:  “…in Christ, we who are many form one body…” (f/Romans 12:5). But to work out that unity in actual practice we must, as the Apostle Paul commanded in Ephesians 4:3, “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.” So on the one hand, our unity is absolutely unbreakable; in another sense, it’s as fragile as our feelings on a bad day.

But our unity, which is to be celebrated, embraced and preserved, isn’t uniformity.  The New Testament idea of unity is organic and spiritual and it includes and allows for diversity.  We are one family, but think of how diverse your extended family is.  We are one body, but think of how diverse your body parts are from each other (while sharing the same DNA).  God’s intention has always been to create, in His masterpiece, the Church, something the world tries to create but cannot succeed at producing: diversity within unity; unity within diversity. We are to be all kinds of human beings divided by many things but united spiritually in one body and acting in sacrificial love for each other, for God’s glory.  While we are to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace, we are not commanded to enforce a phony, external, imposed uniformity.  Ironically, our attempts to create unity through uniformity destroy our unity!  Here are three areas in which well-meaning but mistaken Christians do this:

· Some try to create uniformity on moral issues.  Romans 14:1 through 15:7 is the Bible’s most complete text on this subject. The key words are at the beginning and end of the passage:

“Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters.  One man’s faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables.  The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him…Accept one another then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.” Romans 14:1-3, 15:7

In between these key verses Paul talks about what we eat, what we drink and the holy days we observe.  Nowhere does he try to bring Christians into uniformity of practice on any of these issues. He doesn’t even tell us his opinions on these subjects.  Always the goal is to bring Christians to unity in spite of their diversity.  If you’re in or have been in a church which has tried to produce uniformity – through restrictive covenants, written or unwritten lists of rules, shaming, etc. - instead of grappling with the timeless principles of this passage for preserving unity, maybe it’s time to “dig in” to this important and neglected passage and “dig out” the God-ordained way of handling our differences.

· Some try to create uniformity on doctrinal issues.  This is not a simple matter because Scripture does emphasize the need for uniformity on the most basic doctrines of the faith.  The challenge we have faced for 2,000 years is knowing which doctrines are “fundamental” to our faith and must be adhered to and which are more peripheral and negotiable.  This is a big subject which evokes strong feelings in many but consider two passages from II Timothy as a guideline for a balanced perspective. 

“What you heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching, with faith and love in Christ Jesus. Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you – guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.” II Timothy 1:13,14

By a “pattern of sound teaching,” Paul seems to be alluding to a catechism, a standardized course of instruction which Timothy had heard Paul teach repeatedly which was to be guarded like a treasure and passed on to the next generation without being contaminated.  There are truths which we cannot stray from without endangering the gospel itself.

On the other hand, look at this warning (and there are several similar statements in Paul’s letters to church leaders):

“…Warn them before God against quarrelling about words; it is of no value, and only ruins those who listen… Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know that they produce quarrels.” F/II Timothy 2:14, 23

History bears this out; Thorough teaching of the clear and foundational teachings of the faith produces unity; undue attention to our less vital beliefs or even “stupid arguments” (Paul’s term!) damages our unity in our zeal to create doctrinal uniformity.

· Some try to create uniformity on issues of judgment. Good and spiritual people are going to disagree when facing decisions which are not “cut and dried” Biblically or morally.  Many have a hard time accepting this, believing that two spiritually “in tune” people can’t possibly disagree on who to hire, when to fire or any other subject.  This view is the source of the insistence, found in many church constitutions, that church boards can’t decide anything without complete unanimity. 

In my opinion, this position assumes a level of guidance from the Holy Spirit that the Bible does not promise and leads to needless dogmatism and strife.  “God has shown me that we must hire this man now.”  “Oh yeah?  The Spirit’s telling me that we should do no such thing!” I once admonished a fellow church leader to “Please stop acting like you’re Moses, just descended from Mount Sinai, every time you have a proposal.”

Consider the famous disagreement between the Apostle Paul and his friend and former mentor Barnabas over their young co-worker – and cousin to Barnabas - John Mark (Acts 15:36-40).  Barnabas wanted to bring John Mark along on what we call their “second missionary journey.”  Paul, citing Mark’s return “home to Mama” from their first journey, didn’t want to bring the slacker along.  The dispute resulted in Paul and Barnabas going their separate ways. The text says absolutely nothing about which of the two leaders was “right.”  God continued to bless both of them and John Mark ended up reconciled to Paul (Colossians 4:10) and writing the book of the Bible that bears his name.

In my opinion, the “split,” though probably uncomfortable for all, resulted in the multiplication of the work and perhaps, the best possible outcome for Mark: Paul’s rejection of him was an unpleasant but necessary lesson (Paul was the “bad cop”); Barnabas’ acceptance of him was the encouragement to return to God’s service (Barnabas was the “good cop”).

Here’s a final reason why good people sometimes do bad things:

(7) Sometimes good people do bad things because they are reacting to other people doing bad things.  Biblical examples of this are legion: consider David almost murdering the fool Nabal or Peter whacking the ear off of a soldier who was only doing his duty.  In his rashness, Peter was responsible for damage which Jesus had to repair, a scenario repeated every day (Jesus having to repair our damage!).

In our churches this is all too common.  A good person does a bad thing, followed by a reaction from another person doing a bad thing, followed by another…and another…and another. We hear about the blowup and ask, “Whose fault was this?”  “How did this happen?” It’s eerily similar to our marriage problems and playground scuffles: “He hit me first!”

In our sinful humanness, we want to blame the other guy and we’d love to blame one person: the one with the black hat (we’re wearing white ones). But life isn’t this simple.

In accident investigation it’s called convergence. When an airliner crashes and kills hundreds, the investigation usually finds a convergence of causes, not just one villain.  There is almost always human error, converging with bad weather and mechanical malfunction – sometimes something as simple as a burned out “idiot light.” It’s the same way in our churches; there is seldom one culprit who caused the disaster.

The Biblical principle is simple and tough and wonderful.  With the resource of the Holy Spirit – see Galatians 5:22,23 – none of us have to react.  The Christian life as depicted in the New Testament is wondrously proactive; never reactive.  We have the power to do right, no matter what anybody else is doing.  Every command of the New Testament is a promise because of the grace of God and the Spirit of God. We are each responsible for doing right.  I teach “no excuses Christianity,” do “no excuses marriage counseling” and “no excuses church conflict resolution.”  Thank God that He has given you the power to do right instead of excuses for doing wrong!

This means that if Fred and Ethyl and Pastor Smith and Deacon Jones all sin against you, they’re responsible before God for their sin.  But you don’t have to react.  Christian psychologist Dan Greene says that “You can’t control what others do to you or what others do to others, but you can control what you do to others.”

In this series of three articles we’ve considered seven reasons why good people do bad things. That’s a lot of reasons and represents a lot of human failure. It’s not pleasant to face the sheer enormity of our failure is it?  The good news is that every real Christian has been justified – pronounced eternally innocent in God’s court of law – is completely accepted and dearly loved by God.  Christians who “mess up” and help create the convergence which leads to the “crash” of a local church are still loved, still forgiven and in many cases, still grow up to become truly Godly people.

If you are a good person (a Christian) who has done bad things, humbly accept your forgiveness – for without the grace of God we will never do anything but make messes - get up, dust yourself off and get back into worshipping, growing and serving in a church full of forgiven but foolish people. 

When Good People Do Bad Things, Part Two

 

Note: Elsewhere on this website is an article called, “When Good People Do Bad Things.”  The following is part two (to be followed by a part three).

 

I was in the sixth grade and it was my eleventh birthday, November 22, 1963.  As we were ending our physical education class, the next roomful of kids came pouring into the tiny, elementary school gym/lunchroom/auditorium, everyone shouting at the same time about the President of the United States being shot.  It was a long, strange day.  I received a six transistor radio as a gift, but all I could get was news about the assassination; no “Top 40” music at all.  Before falling asleep I actually cried over the “brokenness of the world,” though I wouldn’t learn that term for many years.

 

Nine years later I was a twenty year old, zealous, hungry, new Christian.  I had found out that “bad people do bad things” because of sin and I had also learned that born-again Christians were people who had received the love of God Himself into their hearts and shared that love with each other.  I walked into a real, evangelical Christian church for the first time and absolutely fell in love with the place.  I remember thinking: “Wow!  These people love God, they love the Bible, they love each other. This is what it’s supposed to be like in a real church!”

 

About a year later, now a busy and joyful worker in this congregation, I found myself in a business meeting that “blew my mind.”  Men and women who, I thought, loved their pastor like I did, were standing up and making accusations against this man of God who had become like a second father to me.  Within a few weeks the church had split, right down the middle.  Bad people doing bad things I could understand; good people doing bad things was harder to handle.

 

That was a long time ago.  In the ensuing years I’ve learned more than I ever wanted to know about good people doing bad things to each other.  In the first article in this series we explored three reasons why good people do bad things.  The following are three more.  My prayer is that you are helped in understanding all of us and you are helped in forgiving and reconciling with brothers and sisters who have done wrong.

 

(4) Sometimes good people do bad things out of cowardice, compromise or worldliness.  In Galatians two the Apostle Paul tells a sad little story about his friend, the Apostle Peter.  In the early, early church, almost everyone was a Jewish Christian.  These folks had a hard time adjusting to the idea that Gentiles (non-Jews) could put their faith in Jesus and be justified – pronounced eternally innocent - by God, without coming through the “vestibule” of the Law of Moses.  By the grace of God – see Acts 10 and 11 - Peter was actually one of the first to understand the new way in which God was dealing with mankind. 

 

During a visit to the dynamic, ethnically mixed church at Antioch, Peter – understanding his new freedom from the law - mingled freely with the Gentiles who were coming to Christ.  But when some legalists - Jews who thought that there was no salvation apart from circumcision and law keeping – came from the “mother church” at Jerusalem, Peter, in fear of them, wimped out and compromised by separating himself from the Gentile Christians, sending the whole Antioch church into confusion about the true nature of the gospel!  He virtually was denying the faith with his cowardice.

 

It was about this same time that Paul and his friend Barnabas were sent out by the same church – Antioch in Syria (Acts 13) – to proclaim the gospel and start churches.  With them as their “helper” was a younger man named John Mark, a relative (some say a cousin) of Barnabas.  This was the same man who would later write the Gospel that bears his name.

On the island of Cyprus the threesome immediately ran into some tough, strange, scary, occultic opposition, which Paul met head-on with great courage.  From Cyprus the missionaries sailed to what is now the nation of Turkey and headed north into the highlands of the Roman Province of Pamphylia.  Many scholars believe that they headed inland and up to higher ground because Paul had contracted a disease, possibly malaria, which left him with a permanent vision problem, his “thorn in the flesh” of II Corinthians 12:7.

 

Apparently, Satanic opposition and sickness were not what John Mark had in mind when he had signed-on with the missionaries.  He went home.  All the way home to Jerusalem where it is believed by some that his mother, a “woman of means” owned the house with the “large, upper room” where the Last Supper was held and the church was born.  In other words, to put it bluntly, Mark went home to mama.

 

We could go on and on of course with stories like these, from the Bible and our own experiences.  I could tell you about my cowardice, compromise and worldliness and maybe you could tell me about yours.  My point is that we all do these things at one time or another on our rough and tumble path to spiritual maturity.  Good people – like Peter, Mark and the rest of us - do these things.  We fail to share our faith when we have wonderful opportunities to do so. We marry or divorce for the wrong reasons.  We “go with” the wrong side in church splits. We side against our church’s leaders when they are justly and lovingly disciplining a family member of ours.  We get mad at leaders and change churches because we are admonished in love regarding our sin.  Even we pastors get mad and change churches when we probably shouldn’t.  God in His grace doesn’t let go of us, however.  He works with us (and on us). He forgives, restores and many of us wobbling, wandering saints end up as pillars in churches. Since God doesn’t give up on us, maybe we should be a little slower at giving up on each other.

 

(5)Sometimes good people do bad things because they are ignorant or immature.  The recipients of the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians thought they had a really “cool” church.  They bragged about it.  They had lots of spiritual gifts in their church, with signs and wonders in abundance.  As Greeks, some of them had a lot of highly valued knowledge.  They also would have told you that they had lots of love, thinking that their toleration of church members living in sinful sexual relationships was a sign of their open-minded acceptance of diversity.

 

Paul the Apostle who had started this church (I’m not sure he wanted to admit it) had to sit down and tell them that they were babies in Christ: carnal, immature, proud and loveless.  In their childishness they had compared preacher with preacher, talking about which was the most gifted and knowledgeable, even thinking they were capable of judging which preacher was accomplishing the most for eternity. (As I write I’m blushing to remember the conversations around the coffee shop tables back in my Bible college and seminary days.)

 

Getting back to the Corinthians, in their evaluation of their leaders and teachers they were looking no deeper than the level of the flesh.  They were no more able to discern between the godly man and the ungodly man than the ungodly man himself.

 

To make matters worse, the Corinthians were clearly responsible for their own immaturity.  They had learned the truth without letting it change their lives.  They had sought the gifts of the Spirit but had never submitted to the moment by moment control of the Spirit and the transforming work of the Spirit which would have brought them to maturity.  They were good people (see I Corinthians 1:1-9) doing bad things because of their ignorance and immaturity.

 

The Corinthians are not that much different from the rest of us are they? Thank God if you haven’t succumbed to some of the more blatant types of carnality that characterized the Corinthians – neither have I – but I’ve done plenty of foolish and childish things, some of them while parking in the pastor’s parking space! Just like you and the Corinthians, I have some precious memories and I also have some really embarrassing memories. God is the only real hero of church history and His kingdom marches on in spite of – to paraphrase Martin Luther - “the stumbling service of His saints.”

 

As you shake your head over the behavior of some of your so-called brothers and sisters in Christ, remember what God can do.  Aren’t you glad that God is so forgiving?  Aren’t you amazed at His ability to grow “babes in arms” into truly mature, godly Christians? 

"When Good People Do Bad Things, Part Two"

 

 

Note: Elsewhere on this website is an article called, “When Good People Do Bad Things.”  The following is part two (to be followed by a part three).

 

I was in the sixth grade and it was my eleventh birthday, November 22, 1963.  As we were ending our physical education class, the next roomful of kids came pouring into the tiny, elementary school gym/lunchroom/auditorium, everyone shouting at the same time about the President of the United States being shot.  It was a long, strange day.  I received a six transistor radio as a gift, but all I could get was news about the assassination; no “Top 40” music at all.  Before falling asleep I actually cried over the “brokenness of the world,” though I wouldn’t learn that term for many years.

 

Nine years later I was a twenty year old, zealous, hungry, new Christian.  I had found out that “bad people do bad things” because of sin and I had also learned that born-again Christians were people who had received the love of God Himself into their hearts and shared that love with each other.  I walked into a real, evangelical Christian church for the first time and absolutely fell in love with the place.  I remember thinking: “Wow!  These people love God, they love the Bible, they love each other. This is what it’s supposed to be like in a real church!”

 

About a year later, now a busy and joyful worker in this congregation, I found myself in a business meeting that “blew my mind.”  Men and women who, I thought, loved their pastor like I did, were standing up and making accusations against this man of God who had become like a second father to me.  Within a few weeks the church had split, right down the middle.  Bad people doing bad things I could understand; good people doing bad things was harder to handle.

 

That was a long time ago.  In the ensuing years I’ve learned more than I ever wanted to know about good people doing bad things to each other.  In the first article in this series we explored three reasons why good people do bad things.  The following are three more.  My prayer is that you are helped in understanding all of us and you are helped in forgiving and reconciling with brothers and sisters who have done wrong.

 

4. Sometimes good people do bad things out of cowardice, compromise or worldliness.  In Galatians two the Apostle Paul tells a sad little story about his friend, the Apostle Peter.  In the early, early church, almost everyone was a Jewish Christian.  These folks had a hard time adjusting to the idea that Gentiles (non-Jews) could put their faith in Jesus and be justified – pronounced eternally innocent - by God, without coming through the “vestibule” of the Law of Moses.  By the grace of God – see Acts 10 and 11 - Peter was actually one of the first to understand the new way in which God was dealing with mankind. 

 

During a visit to the dynamic, ethnically mixed church at Antioch, Peter – understanding his new freedom from the law - mingled freely with the Gentiles who were coming to Christ.  But when some legalists - Jews who thought that there was no salvation apart from circumcision and law keeping – came from the “mother church” at Jerusalem, Peter, in fear of them, wimped out and compromised by separating himself from the Gentile Christians, sending the whole Antioch church into confusion about the true nature of the gospel!  He virtually was denying the faith with his cowardice.

 

It was about this same time that Paul and his friend Barnabas were sent out by the same church – Antioch in Syria (Acts 13) – to proclaim the gospel and start churches.  With them as their “helper” was a younger man named John Mark, a relative (some say a cousin) of Barnabas.  This was the same man who would later write the Gospel that bears his name.

On the island of Cyprus the threesome immediately ran into some tough, strange, scary, occultic opposition, which Paul met head-on with great courage.  From Cyprus the missionaries sailed to what is now the nation of Turkey and headed north into the highlands of the Roman Province of Pamphylia.  Many scholars believe that they headed inland and up to higher ground because Paul had contracted a disease, possibly malaria, which left him with a permanent vision problem, his “thorn in the flesh” of II Corinthians 12:7.

 

Apparently, Satanic opposition and sickness were not what John Mark had in mind when he had signed-on with the missionaries.  He went home.  All the way home to Jerusalem where it is believed by some that his mother, a “woman of means” owned the house with the “large, upper room” where the Last Supper was held and the church was born.  In other words, to put it bluntly, Mark went home to mama.

 

We could go on and on of course with stories like these, from the Bible and our own experiences.  I could tell you about my cowardice, compromise and worldliness and maybe you could tell me about yours.  My point is that we all do these things at one time or another on our rough and tumble path to spiritual maturity.  Good people – like Peter, Mark and the rest of us - do these things.  We fail to share our faith when we have wonderful opportunities to do so. We marry or divorce for the wrong reasons.  We “go with” the wrong side in church splits. We side against our church’s leaders when they are justly and lovingly disciplining a family member of ours.  We get mad at leaders and change churches because we are admonished in love regarding our sin.  Even we pastors get mad and change churches when we probably shouldn’t.  God in His grace doesn’t let go of us, however.  He works with us (and on us). He forgives, restores and many of us wobbling, wandering saints end up as pillars in churches. Since God doesn’t give up on us, maybe we should be a little slower at giving up on each other.

 

5. Sometimes good people do bad things because they are ignorant or immature.  The recipients of the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians thought they had a really “cool” church.  They bragged about it.  They had lots of spiritual gifts in their church, with signs and wonders in abundance.  As Greeks, some of them had a lot of highly valued knowledge.  They also would have told you that they had lots of love, thinking that their toleration of church members living in sinful sexual relationships was a sign of their open-minded acceptance of diversity.

 

Paul the Apostle who had started this church (I’m not sure he wanted to admit it) had to sit down and tell them that they were babies in Christ: carnal, immature, proud and loveless.  In their childishness they had compared preacher with preacher, talking about which was the most gifted and knowledgeable, even thinking they were capable of judging which preacher was accomplishing the most for eternity. (As I write I’m blushing to remember the conversations around the coffee shop tables back in my Bible college and seminary days.)

 

Getting back to the Corinthians, in their evaluation of their leaders and teachers they were looking no deeper than the level of the flesh.  They were no more able to discern between the godly man and the ungodly man than the ungodly man himself.

 

To make matters worse, the Corinthians were clearly responsible for their own immaturity.  They had learned the truth without letting it change their lives.  They had sought the gifts of the Spirit but had never submitted to the moment by moment control of the Spirit and the transforming work of the Spirit which would have brought them to maturity.  They were good people (see I Corinthians 1:1-9) doing bad things because of their ignorance and immaturity.

 

The Corinthians are not that much different from the rest of us are they? Thank God if you haven’t succumbed to some of the more blatant types of carnality that characterized the Corinthians – neither have I – but I’ve done plenty of foolish and childish things, some of them while parking in the pastor’s parking space! Just like you and the Corinthians, I have some precious memories and I also have some really embarrassing memories. God is the only real hero of church history and His kingdom marches on in spite of – to paraphrase Martin Luther - “the stumbling service of His saints.”

 

As you shake your head over the behavior of some of your so-called brothers and sisters in Christ, remember what God can do.  Aren’t you glad that God is so forgiving?  Aren’t you amazed at His ability to grow “babes in arms” into truly mature, godly Christians? 

When Good People Do Bad Things

Over the past few years, several television networks have broadcast reality shows with names like, “When good pets go bad,” “When animals attack,” or “When nice dogs bite.”  The common denominator in these shows is the perplexing problem of seeing normally docile, loveable animals turn mean and ugly. 

 

In my work as a redevelopment pastor I’ve encountered a somewhat similar situation in churches: troubled, perplexed, confused, discouraged Christians who have witnessed some really disturbing behavior from brothers and sisters whom they had thought were really good people.  I’ve seen believers quit serving, quit growing or even “quit the church” altogether because of their confusion and discouragement.  I’m also happy to say that I’ve seen believers and churches come to grips with the devastation they’ve experienced and move onward and upward for God’s glory.   I’ve found that understanding why good people do bad things can really help.  The following are three reasons. More will follow in subsequent articles:

 

(1) Sometimes good people do bad things because they are deliberately defiant.  In the book of I Corinthians we find the apostle Paul writing to a church that was full of good people (see 1:2-9), some of whom were doing very bad things.  The worst thing he mentioned was in chapter five verse one, “It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father’s wife.” That this man was a bona-fide part of the Corinthian church is evident from the fact that Paul commands in verse two that he be “put out of your fellowship” and in verse thirteen, “Expel the wicked man from among you.”

 

This begs the question of whether or not this man actually was “a good person.” In the New Testament a “good person” is one who has been regenerated (or born again) and made (II Corinthians 5:21) “the righteousness of God.” In I Corinthians chapter six, verses nine through eleven, Paul implies that, should this man not repent of what he was doing, he will be demonstrating that he was not a real, genuine, justified believer, which would make him a bad person doing bad things, not a good person doing bad things.

 

But it is possible that he was a real believer because while the believer is justified (pronounced eternally innocent in God’s court of law) and regenerated (made into a new person at the very center of his being), he is still saddled with the power of sin within him and therefore capable of doing some really bad things. I’m sorry to say that a Christian who is not filled with, empowered by, walking in, or in step with the Spirit (I think all these terms mean the same thing) is capable of just about anything that the unbeliever is capable of, though not on an ongoing basis.

 

Our response to the deliberately defiant believer (or professing believer) should begin with humility, because however “spiritual” we may be, look or feel on a good day, we are all capable of doing vile things.  This truth ought to drive us to our knees exclaiming “it could have been me,” where we re-present our bodies to God, because we so desperately need the Spirit of God to control and empower us.

 

Our response should also be one of outrage – Paul “breathes” it in I Corinthians five and six – because our professing brother has brought disgrace to the name of Christ.  Paraphrasing J.I. Packer, God is jealous for His name so we must be zealous for His name. It is right, not self-righteous, for us to be upset about anything that gives a “black eye” to the name of Christ.

 

Finally, our response toward the deliberately defiant professing brother should be one of compassionate action.  Sooner or later, this person is going to suffer for his sin and we are no more worthy of God’s love than he is.  Following the command of Galatians six, verse one, we need to join other caring Christians and “get in the face” of this person to try to rescue him from his sin.  What we must not be is weak, passive or defeatist in the face of such sin.  The spirit of the “church discipline” found in the Bible demands that we confront destructive behavior in the church with the same “calm, assertive” behavior with which Cesar Milan (the Dog Whisperer) confronts the most aggressive canine: “No dog needs to be ‘put down;’ no dog is too much for me to handle; any dog can be rehabilitated.” If Cesar will put himself at risk to “redeem” dogs, surely we must put ourselves at risk for the sake of people!  Here’s a second reason why good people do bad things:

 

(2) Sometimes good people do bad things because they are self-reliant and weak.  This may sound surprising.  You would expect me to write “self-reliant and strong.”  But the Christian is a creature who is weak when he is self-reliant and strong when he has a desperate dependence upon God. As the proverb puts it “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” (Proverbs 16:18).  Wisdom dictates that we live in the spirit of the great old hymns, “I need thee every hour” and “Spirit of God, descend upon my heart.” 

 

On a plaque in a cabin where I enjoy monthly retreat days is a great prayer: “Dear Lord, So far today I’ve done alright.  I haven’t gossiped, lost my temper, been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish or over-indulgent.  I’m thankful for that.  But in a few minutes God, I’m going to get out of bed. And from then on, I’m going to need a lot more help.  Amen.” It’s funny, but it’s also theologically “right on.”

 

The brother or sister I’m describing now is not deliberately defiant of God’s authority like our friend above (1); this person is deceived by his own heart (Jeremiah 17:9), means well and does wrong, like Peter on the night of Jesus’ arrest and trials, denying Jesus three times, or like Paul’s description in Romans seven of himself at his worst, doing the very things he abhors. 

 

If we can forgive Peter and Paul for their failures – and most of us are pretty good at forgiving ourselves for our own – we can and must forgive the brother or sister (or even the pastor) in our church, who in a time of foolish, self-reliance, did or said something really stupid.

 

Since I’ve raised the subject, let me be frank about pastors.  We are human.  We ought to be the most godly of men but this is not always the case.  Pastors can get seriously depressed.  Pastors can get sinfully entrenched in power struggles and “slide into” sinful, reactive behaviors while thinking they’re “on the battlefield for the Lord.”  I know.  I’ve been there.  I wish I could go back and get a “do-over” on a resignation I did.  While totally convinced that I was doing it well, I can see now that in my “weak, self-reliance” I hurt some people with some foolish and unnecessary words. 

 

Ten years ago I led a completely independent church to join a fellowship of churches, in part, because I believe that pastors can get into some pretty sinful behavior without even knowing it.  Accountability to a church board isn’t always enough.  Sometimes we need a firm and loving voice from a church leader from outside our church to pull us back from the brink of disastrously carnal behavior.

 

Here’s a third reason why good people do bad things:

(3) Sometimes good people do bad things because of envy, selfish ambition, rivalry, jealousy or pride.  I find this truth to be rather shocking.  It’s an ugly truth to face.  As the Apostle Paul writes to the Christians at Philippi, he speaks about people in Rome, probably pastors, who are preaching Christ with some of the worst possible motives: envy, rivalry, selfish ambition and even the malicious desire to hurt Paul while he was in chains.  I think this means that some of these men were “ramping up” their ministries with Paul in jail, with the idea that they could take over the position of influence he had held.  Others may have hoped that Paul’s case would turn out worse for him because of the increased attention that was being paid to these “ladder climbing” preachers in Rome.

 

Here’s the awful truth as I’ve seen it: The best of us are capable of doing the best of all possible deeds, with the worst possible motives.  As if that isn’t bad enough, the best of us are also capable of doing the worst of all possible deeds, with the worst possible motives. 

 

From chapter two, verses three and four of the same letter, the Apostle’s pleas reveal more evil motives with which good people can take action, in the church: “selfish ambition” (the joy of being “a big fish in a small pond”), “vain conceit” (a desire to show off) and looking “only to your own interests” (“this is my Sunday School room” or “this is my slice of the budget”).

 

Even though he is writing to a vibrant church of which he has the fondest memories (1:3-8), Paul returns to the subject of bad behavior among the Philippians for a third time in chapter four, verses one through three.  Two extraordinary ladies in this church, fellow workers with Paul who had “contended at his side” in the work of the gospel were “on the outs” with each other. No issue is mentioned by Paul.  No sin committed by either of them is referenced.  Neither is a heretic.  It looks like a simple case of rivalry, an old-fashioned ugly, petty, power struggle. Somebody Paul calls his “loyal yokefellow” is urged to help these - apparently in some ways great - ladies to work it out. In contemporary language, Paul calls for mediation and pleads for all involved to demonstrate to all the sweet-reasonableness (a more literal translation of the word “gentleness” in verse five) of Christ.

 

Where have you seen yourself in this article?  If there are behaviors you need to repent of you can do so with joy, knowing that God will joyfully forgive, cleanse and grant you a fresh start.  Perhaps God wants you to respond to defiant, self-reliant (and weak) or carnal brothers and sisters around you with more humility.  Perhaps it’s time to forgive.  Perhaps God is nudging you to confront a brother in the loving spirit of Galatians six, verse one.  Aren’t you glad that God has forgiven you?  Aren’t you glad that He has promised the grace which turns every command of the New Testament into a promise?  Are you glad that, in His way and time, He can turn misbehaving Christians into real pillars in their churches

Working Yourself Out Of A Job

(How interim pastors can help their church’s pastoral search committees)

 

Of the many projects I’ve undertaken as an interim pastor in several churches, helping these church’s long-term pastor search committees has been among the most satisfying.  The help I have given has been greatly appreciated, the task of leading these groups has been comparatively easy (if leadership is ever easy) and the long-term results of the projects (all three pastors called were very good “matches”) have been gratifying.  On top of that the long-term pastors who’ve succeeded me have become personal friends.  Each time the process has left me feeling that if the only thing I had done for the church was this guidance of their search committee, it would have been worth the effort on the part of the church to have me there.  As John the Baptist discovered before us (John 3:29), there is real joy in being the “bridegroom”!

 

Here’s what has differed in the three churches in which I have helped their search committees:

 

* The “delivery method” of the help I’ve given has differed.  During my first interim pastorate I was with an organization which would not allow me to meet with the search committee at all.  In this church I served like a coach who’s been tossed out of the game: I coached from the locker room.  Before each meeting of the committee I “did breakfast” with the search committee chairman and thoroughly discussed the upcoming meeting with him.  In my second church I was the official chairman of the committee, but worked hard at keeping my personal opinions out of their process and excused myself from the room during some crucial discussions.  In the third church I again met with the chairman before each meeting and then sat beside him as a coach at each meeting.  I would do any of these scenarios again; they all “worked” in their own way.

 

* The extent of the help I’ve given has also differed.  The first church needed my guidance desperately.  The second church needed and received my help extensively. The third search committee needed and received my help moderately. 

 

With that said, here are some specific ways I was able to help the three churches:

 

1.  I helped each church to get the right people on the search committee.  This is a crucial role in which the interim should always play a part because having the best people possible on the committee is “key” to a great result.

 

2.  I had more time than any of the church’s lay leaders to study the search committee materials ahead of time and “get a handle” on the process as it was recommended to me by the Evangelical Free Church district leaders I was working with.   The committee members still had to read the handbooks but they had a “native guide” with them (me) who understood the “pastor-speak” in which they were written and was able to make as many phone calls as necessary (during the day) to our district leaders.

 

3. In each situation I took the church through a thorough-going strategic planning or ReFocusing process before the search committee was even formed.  This means that when the search committee began its work, more than one third of its mission was already completed.  This was very encouraging for each group, as you might imagine.  It was also immeasurably important for each of these churches to go through most of the aspects of a strategic planning process – through which they wrote or re-wrote a mission statement, core values, vision statement and chose a target group - before they began working on formulating the profile of the pastor they would be looking for.  (For some thoughts on strategic planning materials, see my Resource page.)

 

4.  All through the process I was able to help the committee members to understand pastors.  I explained, as mentioned, the language used in the search committee guidebooks, the jargon used in resumes, the nomenclature used in the “MinisterConnection.Net” computer data base (computer dating for pastors and churches, if you’re not familiar with this tool) and the “Ministry Match” pastor profiles. At many points along the way it was my joy to diffuse offenses and correct misunderstandings which arose from lay persons not understanding the language of pastoral resumes.  Examples?  How about the search committee that thought that a pastor must be a Rick Warren “clone” because he used the term “purpose driven”?  Then there was the search committee who thought that an E-Free pastor who had attended a liberal seminary must still be a liberal.  In this case, my personal knowledge of the candidate was a big help!

 

5.  To a certain extent I served as secretary for each search committee, making copies, taking minutes, channeling paperwork to church secretaries, etc. As a highly organized person I know I helped these groups to stay on track.

 

6.  Because I see many churches and study church health, I am probably better able than the folks in the church to see their congregation and area objectively and write honest and accurate church histories and community and church profiles.  This helps to ensure that the right man “falls in love with” the congregation and is not disillusioned by what he finds when he arrives on the scene. 

 

7.  Because I am a pastor myself I have been able to help the committees to draft good questions to put to their candidates in their phone and personal interviews.  I trust that I have also been able to help the pastors the committees have considered by protecting them from unnecessary paperwork, letting them know quickly if they are no longer being considered by the church, sparing them from unrealistic candidating trip schedules etc.  In turn, my wife has helped me tremendously in this process by reminding me of what is unfair and burdensome for pastors’ wives and children.

 

8.  At times I’ve served as spiritual leader and peacemaker in the committees.  Sometimes having the church’s senior leader in the search committee room has been very helpful for gently correcting bad behavior. The leaders of the two groups which I did not officially lead were sometimes bowed down by the weight of the task; I’m grateful I was able to hold up their arms and strengthen their hands at crucial junctures. We became really good friends in the process. 

 

Are there dangers involved in the interim pastor being involved in the process?  Of course.  Here are a few:

 

(1) First and foremost, the interim should resist the temptation to make himself a candidate for the position.  I know that this can work out in unusual circumstances, but for the most part, the interim pastor needs to declare his “non-candidacy” from day one of his pastorate and stick to it.  Making himself a candidate will “muddy” the process, making it impossible for the committee to do its work objectively.  To choose someone other than the interim (and the same scenario applies to pastoral associates within the church) amounts to a rejection of the interim pastor; something most search committee members don’t have the courage to do. 

 

(2) Some interim pastors unduly control the process and virtually hand-pick their successor.  If the interim has too strong a voice in the process and the new long-term pastor isn’t a good fit, the interim pastor (and the concept of interim pastorates) will be blamed.

 

(3) The interim pastor will be tempted to push the committee in the direction of getting someone like him, instead of getting the kind of man they need. I always end up telling the churches that “I may have been the best man on the planet for this church over the past eighteen (or whatever) months, but right now and in the future you need a man with gifts that are different from mine.”

 

(4) It’s tempting to steer the committee in the direction of someone whose doctrinal or philosophical biases please the interim but make him a poor match for the church. 

 

(5) It’s certainly possible for the interim to do too much for the committee and its chairman, robbing them of the growth that God wants for them and the experience they’ll need at some point in the future. (More than likely I'm guilty of having done this!)

 

In short, the guidance of the search committee is one of the most satisfying things the interim pastor can do for the church and one of the best reasons for churches to call interim pastors.  Like the harbor pilot spoken of in the article (at this site), “Metaphorically Speaking,” the experienced interim can help guide churches through the dangerous waters of pastoral transitions before joyfully surrendering the “helm” of the church to the new long-term pastor.

 

Do We Have To Have These Business Meetings?

Many  pastors enjoy church business meetings as much as root canals.  A trip to a proctologist or a funeral for a thither is a more welcome event on the calendar.  "Do we have to have these business meetings?" they groan to no one in particular. Far too often these necessary-but-evil events turn out too long, too boring and too contentious.  While in most cases we do indeed have to have them, there are some things we can do to make them more pleasing to all involved (including God!).

• You might be able to have fewer meetings.  Churches that are "very congregational" sometimes have constitutions/bylaws which demand monthly meetings.  In other cases, it's just tradition that they are held that often.  In the worst cases, congregations are led to believe - by virtue of their frequent meetings - that the "inmates" have the right to "run the assylum."  Some churches have to decrease the number of meetings to change this mindset - and it isn't easy.                                                                                                                                             
• You might need to have more meetings.  No kidding. I like to use a big triangle to illustrate three basic types of church government.  One point is labeled "congregationalism" (democracy), another is labeled "elder rule" (oligarchy) and the third point is labeled "episcopal"  (dictatorship).  My observation is that no church is "purely" practicing any of these three; we are all somewhere on that triangle, between the points.  Savvy observers have pointed out that, in truth, every church is at least somewhat congregational.  If the leaders pay no attention to anyone outside their ranks, the followers will quit giving and quit following and the leaders will have no one left to lead. The people will be heard, whether we're listening or not. If your church has only one official meeting a year - and it's not pleasant - you may need to increase the number of meetings to give your people an outlet for tension and a  chance to be heard.  One interim pastor has a quarterly update meeting - every time there's a fifth Sunday in a month - to let folks know how the interim process is going and get their questions answered. Even though I'm uncomfortable with folks making speeches "from the floor" in an effort to sway their fellow members to adopt their viewpoints, I believe there's a time for this.  What we don't let folks say "from the floor" they will say in some other venue, oftentimes with a more negative attitude.  Better yet,

• Challenge your people to re-think the whole concept of "business meetings" as we have practiced them.  Think about it.  At 10:30 AM we're in our favorite chairs or pews worshipping God with "reverence and godly fear."  A few minutes later we come back to the same room which has now magically become a town hall.  The pastor or other leader up front has become "the enemy" and we now find it acceptable to be disrespectful, cynical and rude.  I have found that when I challenge this whole paradigm, God's people respond, repent and change their behavior dramatically.  Instead of just "preaching this" through a prayer at the beginning of a meeting (you know you've done this!), take the time to really teach it.  Challenge the assumption that there is a time or place when it is acceptable for us to treat each other like political adversaries. 

• Challenge the use of "parliamentery procedure" as found in Robert's Rules of Order.  Many congregational churches have constitutions that demand the use of "Robert's Rules..." so you may be stuck with them for a while.  In other churches it's just a tradition. My view is that Robert's Rules are fine for the actual town meeting or the Lion's Club but that they have no place in the church of Jesus Christ.  Robert's Rules, if genuinely followed, allow the newest church member to make proposals from the floor which are then voted on.  I believe this is just plain, flat out unscriptural.  In the church as found in the New Testament, good ideas can come from anywhere, but leadership comes from mature and godly leaders.  Mature and godly leaders may, in fact, love the idea proposed by the newest church member "from the floor" of the meeting, but wisdom dictates that they thank the member for the suggestion and then talk and pray about it carefully the next time they meet as a board.  A simple reminder that "in our church, proposals that we vote on in meetings come from the board, but we're open to suggestions from anyone" is usually sufficient.

• Include prayer, praise, worship, celebration and appreciation of people in the meeting. Try to make your meetings a celebration of what God is doing.  "Isn't it wonderful that we have to buy a larger van for the youth group?"  All but the most task driven people in your church will appreciate your "sweetening" your meetings with some of these elements. (Let those "most task driven" people stay home; they aren't going to be happy no matter how you do the meeting.)

• Do laborious presentations - like the new church budget - in advance of the real meeting. This diffuses tension, gives folks a chance to ask good, hard questions, find errors and make great suggestions.  The few folks who are really interested in the nitty gritty details of the budget can attend this meeting; the many folks who aren't don't have to listen to the endless questions at the annual meeting. Some people have to find errors and point them out publicly; let them do it at some time other than the official annual meeting.

• Don't surprise people. Nobody likes having a new idea thrown at them with the idea that they will immediately accept it and vote "yes."  For most of us, when we are presented with a new idea and asked to vote on it at the same session, the vote is going to be a resounding "no." 

• Don't vote if it's not going to pass.  The experience of the followers rejecting the proposal of the leaders is unpleasant for everybody.  Lead by concentric circles.  Typically, this means that the pastor has the great idea (I'm assuming a lot here!), he convinces his staff and board members, together, they convince a wider circle of leaders.  Informal surveys are taken to guage the readiness of the church to follow their leaders. In most cases, following this methodology, negative votes on proposals just don't happen.

• Avoid votes that create winners and losers. I should have listened to a wise elder before I engineered a vote on a change of worship service format.  This is something we could have simply decided as elders - carefullly, of course - or had the congregation vote on our proposal: 9 AM Worship Service and Sunday School and 10:30 Worship Service and Children's Church (or whatever).  Instead, we had the church vote on several options.  We ended up with winners of course, but a lot more people who had voted for the losing options than the winning one - and a lot of grumpy attitudes. 

• Don't let people behave badly.  As Cesar Milan, the Dog Whisperer would say, "be the pack leader." Again, teach people that the business meeting is not a format where it's okay to act like unbelievers.  It isn't.  Teach about how we should treat each other - everywhere and always - and when someone violates this, gently call them on it.  Remind them of what you've taught and offer to "hear them out" in some other venue. Practice a line or two which you'll use to stop bad behavior.  Almost everyone will deeply appreciate your willingness to do this and your meeting attendance will improve.

• Change your own attitude.   First of all, stop seeing the glass half empty and start seeing it half full.  You can choose to believe that meeting attendance is low because people don't care about their church or you can choose to believe that meeting attendance is low because the followers trust their leaders.  In many churches the latter is definitely the case.  You can thank God that people trust you! Beyond the way you view the glass, following some of these suggestions can greatly improve your meetings and greatly improve your attitude toward them.  I've come to see the meetings of our interim pastorates as milestones, important, celebratory events where vital, future-shaping decisions are made. Some of the meetings we've experienced in interim ministry have left us shaking our heads in wonder and joy over what God has done in our midst.  "Can you believe such and such a church just voted unanimously to ___________?" Donna and I exclaim to each other.  We've come a long way since we were asking "Do we have to have these business meetings?"

Traditions or Trends: Which Should We Follow?

 

Most of the readers of this blog know about the dangers of traditionalism.  Yale University professor Jaraslov Jan Pelikan has been credited with saying that “Tradition is the living faith of those now departed.  Traditionalism is the dead faith of those now living” [emphasis mine].  A “dead faith,” I’m sure Pelikan meant, because the traditionalist follows his traditions without knowing why; it is loyalty to nothing more than a concept, a memory. Traditionalism is continuing a practice for no other reason than the fact that it is a tradition – and that’s not much of a reason.

God’s friend Tevia in the great film “Fiddler On The Roof,” claimed that it was tradition that kept our lives balanced, even so far as being able to keep the fiddler from falling off the roof.  But most viewers of the movie would agree that Tevia’s traditionalism kept him imbalanced, loving his traditions themselves at least a bit more than he did his family.  Unable to search the Scriptures himself to discover which traditions were grounded in God’s will and which were grounded on thin air – like marital matches being made by a village matchmaker – he clung to every tradition he knew with equal tenacity.

Maybe we can concede that Tevia had a point: tradition can keep us from too quickly and mindlessly following a crowd.  Before we scrap a tradition maybe we should make sure we know why it became a tradition – for there was probably a good reason - and what we might be losing by discarding it. Paul told the Christians at Thessalonica in II Thessalonians 2:15 (KJV),  “Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle.”

At times, traditionalism is more comic than harmful.  There are other stories to illustrate this, but my favorite is the one about the newlywed wife whom her husband found cutting off the end of the roast before putting it in the roaster.  “Why,” he queried “are you doing that?  It looks like it would fit just fine.”  “My mother always did it this way, but come to think of it, I don’t know why she did.”  A few hours later her curiosity caused her to call her mom and ask the now-burning question.  “Well, I guess, because my mother did,” was the reply.  The young bride’s curiosity was now greater than ever.  She called her grandmother, told her the story and asked her why she always cut the end off the roast.  “Oh, don’t you remember honey?” grandma answered, “my roaster is such a little thing, I’ve always had to cut the end off the roasts to get them to fit.”  Would that our traditionalism never caused any more trouble than a wasted slicing of a roast!

At its worst, however, traditionalism is deadly.  Millions are headed for an eternity without Christ because their faith is grounded on the religious traditions they have been told to rely on.  The young Saul of Tarsus was murderously zealous for the traditions of his fathers (Galatians 1:14).  Jesus spared no one’s feelings (Mark 7:1-23) when he denounced the traditionalism of the Pharisees which involved breaking the commandments of God in order to slavishly follow the traditions of men.

But we can be just as foolish in the following of trends.  A lot of young men are going to be plenty embarrassed someday when they see family photos of themselves with their pants falling down!  Eventually, removing tattoos and repairing body piercings will be a big business.  Ephesians 2:1-3 depicts lost mankind as blindly following the “ways of this world” and the “ruler of the kingdom of the air.”

Sadly, as pastors, we can be almost as foolish - and we don’t have the excuse of being under the Devil’s sway. Every few years a new church becomes the “hot” place to go for “how to do it like we do” conferences.  If it’s bringing in multitudes in Chicago or Los Angeles, it must be something God wants me to do in Omaha. We fly in by the thousands and fly home with our shiny three ring binders telling us how to do ministries that might be perfect for the host church and disastrous for our own church.

Donna and I have had the privilege of visiting churches on Sunday mornings the past couple of months.  It’s been enjoyable and encouraging but I can’t help smirk a little bit that so many churches have departed from having “traditional worship.”  That would be fine in and of itself but why is it that in our departure from traditionalism, we’re all doing pretty much the same thing?  It sure looks like a new set of trendy traditions to me.

One of our interim pastorates was with a church that considered itself very non-traditional.  I pretty quickly found out that they had their own, non-traditional traditions which were sacred to them.  I’ve now concluded that the non-traditional church can be just as traditional about it’s non-traditional traditions as the traditional church is traditional about its traditional traditions.  Is it really any better to follow trends than it is to stick with traditions?

Here’s what I’ve concluded so far, and you’re welcome to add to my understanding with your response: Traditions and trends can both be good if they are Biblical and effective.  Traditions and trends can both be worthless, or worse than worthless, if they are unbiblical or ineffective.  We should hang unto our traditions at least until we know what they were for and if they are working.  The latest trends, likewise, should be considered and evaluated with open hearts and open minds and forced to face the same test: Is it consistent with Biblical principles and purposes?  Will it work in our context?

Let’s not be traditionalists or trendishionalists.  Let’s be like the God-impassioned, no-longer-tradition-bound Apostle who said “I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some” (I Corinthians 9:22).

Issues and Emotions During The Interim Time - Download

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Characteristics Of The Interim Congregation - Download

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Metaphorically Speaking...

The new paradigms in interim pastoring can be hard for people to understand. The “new wave” interim pastor isn’t an intern, a fill in, a substitute or something less than a “real” pastor; I’m thinking of the visitor who heard me a couple of Sundays and then told me that I was good enough to be a “real pastor”! It doesn’t help that those of us who practice it can’t figure out which term to use - transitional, transformational, strategic, redevelopment, restoration, interventionist – I’ve used them all right here in this blog. 

A lot of people are helped in understanding this confusing new type of ministry by the use of the following metaphors.  I hope you’re blessed – and “unconfused” – as you read.

The Strategic Interim Pastor Is Like:

A “This Old House” crew member - If you’ve seen the long-running Public TV show you know the routine: A couple of homeowners sit down with the “This Old House” leaders and share their dreams for the remodeling of their home.  After listening attentively, the crew members inspect the house carefully from bottom to top.  After some figuring, they sit down with the homeowners again and tell them about things that need to be done to their house that they may not have known about.  It’s often kind of a shock to the homeowner who wasn’t dreaming about a new furnace or roof, but after some “reality therapy” and discussion, a plan is agreed upon.  Then everybody gets up from the table and the “This Old House” staff gets to work and transforms the old house.

In much the same way, the strategic interim pastor listens to the dreams of church members, studies the church carefully and then presents an action plan for what needs to be “remodeled” (not usually the building itself but sometimes the building reflects the condition of the church).  The willingness of the church members to let God change their church and to work hard with God in the process is the equivalent of the cash the “This Old House” homeowners are willing to spend. Ideally, everybody gets to work (with God) and a year or two later “This Old Church” often ends up significantly transformed. 

This metaphor is solidly grounded in Scripture, as Jesus said He would build His church (Matthew 16:18), Paul described himself as an expert builder who laid a foundation when he planted the Corinthian church (I Corinthians 3:10) and spoke of other Christian leaders building on this foundation (I Corinthians 3:12).  The strategic interim pastor, in Paul’s metaphor, would be an expert remodeler.

A Dog or Horse Whisperer - Cesar Milan, The Dog Whisperer (on the National Geographic Channel) doesn’t believe there are any bad dogs.  He believes that many good dogs have been poorly trained and managed by their owners.  Thus, he says, his job is to “train humans and rehabilitate dogs.” 

My viewpoint is that there aren’t any bad Christians because Christians have been regenerated by God and God doesn’t make any junk.  There are Christians who behave badly and many churches are dysfunctional (in need of rehabilitation) because Christians who behaved badly or foolishly have made them dysfunctional.  My passion is like that of the Apostle Paul who wrote in I Timothy 3:14, 15 “…I am writing you these instructions so that, if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.” When Christians get trained in how to “do church” God’s way, their churches get rehabilitated. At the end of one of our interim pastorates a wonderful and spunky little lady exclaimed to me “You really straightened us out!” – and it was a meant as a warm compliment.

A Special Forces Unit – This one comes from our son Jesse, who was joining the Army at the same time we were going into strategic interim ministry.  His observation was that what we were doing was like a special forces unit which parachutes into a dangerous situation, gets a difficult job done and then moves on to do it again elsewhere.

A Surgeon – A surgeon is not your normal, long-term physician.  Instead, at a time of special need, your family doctor “hands you over” to the surgeon who makes significant changes in your body and then hands you back to your long-term physician when he/she is through.

An Emergency Room Physician – Some interim pastorates require decisive, drastic action taken right away to save the church.  The ER physician doesn’t have to have much for bedside manner; he/she needs to be knowledgeable, confident and decisive. Fortunately, most of us interim pastors don’t have to act like ER physicians in most churches – but we do in some.

The Harbor Pilot – The harbor pilot is not a ship’s captain, though he could be.  Instead, with all the skills of a captain, he becomes an expert on a particular, dangerous, harbor (often a river mouth).  When a ship reaches the harbor entrance, the pilot climbs on board, exchanges pleasantries with the captain and then temporarily takes command of the ship, guiding her through a perilous channel.  He does the same when the ship leaves the port a few days or hours later, joyfully handing the vessel back to the captain.

The interim pastor seeks to be an expert on the dangerous waters of pastoral transitions.  This metaphor breaks down where the pilot hands the ship back to the captain, as the church has secured a new captain when it leaves the port. 

The Middle Relief Pitcher – When I was a kid (Twins fan) I only knew about two kinds of pitchers: starting pitchers and relief pitchers.  As in so many fields, there are more specialists than there used to be.  The interim pastor isn’t a starter (church planter) or a closer (nobody wants to do this!) but something like a middle reliever who “gives it all he’s got” for a couple of crucial innings in the middle of the game.

“The Miracle Worker” – I’m not saying that the interim pastor is a miracle worker, I’m talking about the extraordinary Anne Sullivan who moved in with the dysfunctional Keller family and took over the care of the very troubled and troublesome blind and deaf family member, Helen.  After transforming both Helen and the functioning of the family, Anne packed up and went her way. 

Some of our churches have members who are as out-of-control and unpleasant as Helen.  No one has taught them how to behave.  They are allowed to disrupt the entire church and scare away its guests and all of this is done in the name of “grace” or “unconditional love.” Interventionist interim pastors are used by God to restore such churches to peace and harmony for the glory of God.

“Nanny McPhee” – Nanny McPhee is the unusual nanny with supernatural powers in the movie of the same name.  She’s sort of like Mary Poppins on steroids.  She is hired by a desperate widower with a houseful of nasty children.  Initially, she looks extremely ugly to them, but as their attitude toward her changes, her appearance changes as well.  By the end of the movie the kids don’t want her to leave.  The key line of the movie (at least I thought it was) was Nanny McPhee’s statement: “When you need me but don’t want me I must stay; When you want me but no longer need me I must go.” This is exactly how some of our interim pastorates work out so I call what I do “Nanny McPhee pastoring.”

I hope these metaphors have helped you to understand what interim pastors do.  Does your church need one of these specialists to help it through a troubled time? If so, it will be some interim pastor’s great joy to help you.