Page 5359 – Christianity Today (2024)

Two thousand years ago, a small group of Jewish people carried a special message to the world. They proclaimed that God had kept his word and sent a deliverer to Israel.

The coming of this Messiah meant redemption and salvation, to the Jew first—but also to the rest of the world.

When they took this message outside the land of Israel, Christ’s disciples discovered something profound: they learned that belief in Jesus did not have to be expressed in Jewish ways. His message transcended culture.

The Jerusalem Council (Acts 15) decided that the coming of the Jewish Messiah had some universal implications. According to the council’s decision, Gentiles who came to belief in Jesus were not expected to follow Jewish customs or live as Jews. Instead, they were free to translate “Christian” belief into their own culture.

Somehow, the situation reversed: Jews were made to believe that they had to convert and renounce their Judaism in order to become followers of the Messiah.

But this is no longer the case.

Romans 11 tells us that there are two kinds of branches in the olive tree of God: the natural (Jewish) and the wild (Gentile). Each branch partakes of the same blessings, yet each is distinct in its religious context and worship expressions.

Historically and culturally, the “wild” olive branches began to grow; the natural branches did not keep up the pace. As the number of non-Jewish believers in Jesus greatly came to outnumber his Hebrew followers, the Jewishness of Jesus got lost.

Today, however, the situation is different. More Jewish people have accepted Jesus as their Messiah in the past 19 years than in the last 19 centuries.

Across America, congregations with names like Beth Messiah, Melech Yisrael, Beth Yeshua, B’rit Shalom, Kehilat Maschiach, and Beth Sar Shalom bear witness to the house of Messiah Jesus, the King of Israel, and the Covenant of Peace. These houses of worship are flourishing, ministering to the spiritual needs of an emerging enigma: Jews who believe in Jesus.

Some call themselves Christians; others say they are completed, converted, or fulfilled Jews. Still others prefer the designation Hebrew Christian, Christian Jew, Jewish Christian, or Messianic Jew.

No matter what their religious label, most share a common link: they are New Testament Jews, faithful to Christ Jesus and loyal to their Jewish biblical heritage.

A New Branch Of Judaism?

To the average Jew, Judaism simply translates as Orthodox, Reform, or Conservative. Each is a branch of a religious life in accordance with tradition and rabbinic interpretation of Scripture.

“Orthodox” Judaism maintains as many of the ancient religious observances and practices as possible. “Reform” places little value on ritual and tradition. Instead, it emphasizes ethics and self-realization. “Conservative” Judaism seeks to strike a balance between Orthodoxy and Reform. Hence, Conservative Jews retain those elements they feel are meaningful and eliminate other religious practices they believe are out of place in today’s world.

Belief in a Messiah has always been a basic tenet of the Jewish faith. Theories concerning the Messiah, however, are very different:

• Some Jews believe there is no Messiah, that this is merely a wishful notion.

• Others believe in a Messiah—not as a person, but as an age of peace and prosperity.

• Another group considers Israel to be the Messiah, suffering for the sins of the world.

• Orthodox and Messianic Jews believe in a personal Messiah.

Messianic Jews accept the Scriptures as their final authority on matters of faith and list hundreds of Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah, which they hold are exclusively fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.

While traditional Jews are loath to admit it, Messianic Judaism has become so widespread that it is already considered a fourth—although separate—branch of Judaism. Estimates of the number of Jews who believe in Jesus range from 30,000 to 100,000. There is no membership, and, therefore, data is hard to obtain.

Messianic Jews say that they are “completed” Jews because they have accepted their Messiah and choose to maintain the Jewish identity to which their birth entitles them. Jewish organizations disagree and argue that Messianic Jews have converted to Christianity, abandoning their Jewish heritage.

Messianic Jews insist that Judaism was never meant to be a narrow religion aimed at the Hebrew nation alone, but rather, that even the revered writings of rabbis explain that the teachings of Judaism “were freely meant for all mankind.”

Louis Goldberg, director of Jewish studies at Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, says there is a special function for these Messianic Jews. “Their presence shows that there are Jewish people who declare solidly that the Lord Jesus is Messiah and Savior. The presence of a Jewish believer will often be a decisive factor for the Jewish person who is considering the claims of Jesus.”

Jewish Evangelism

New, more effective techniques for sharing Jesus with Jewish people have produced a large network of literature, music, drama, and communications media with a distinctively Jewish flavor.

“In the mid-1950s, there were just a few Hebrew-Christians,” says the Messianic Jewish Movement International, a ministry chartered in May 1963 and underwritten for its first two years with a $3,000 grant from the Hebrew-Christian Alliance. “Today, there are thousands of born-again Jews … hundreds of Messianic materials … scores of Messianic congregations … annual international messianic conferences … and a world-wide Messianic Jewish Movement borne aloft by the Holy Spirit of God.”

The largest, most visible, vocal, and controversial Jewish missionary organization is Jews for Jesus. “Our group formed not as a result of any particular church body, but rather as an outgrowth of a movement of the Holy Spirit among the Jewish people,” explains Moishe Rosen, the ministry’s founder and director. “By 1973, we had raised a testimony that reverberated throughout the international Jewish community. The reactions and opposition from Jewish leadership were so verbal that they made Jewish people wonder why the rabbis were so upset. People began asking, pondering, and debating the issue of the messiahship of Jesus. The gospel spread rapidly through the Jewish community, where hungry souls were awaiting news of the Savior.”

Jews for Jesus use “broadsides” in sharing with people in shopping centers, malls, college campuses, and on street corners. These colorful tracts use contemporary language, humorous illustrations, and such eye-catching titles as “Christmas Is a Jewish Holiday,” “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Jesus but Were Afraid to Ask Your Rabbi,” and “Jesus Made Me Kosher.”

Beneath the humor there is always a serious discussion of Jesus as the promised Messiah.

Jews for Jesus has placed full-page advertisments in some of the largest-circulation newspapers in America. One ad especially addresses questions of particular concern to Jewish-Christian dialogue:

• Is it possible to be a Jew and believe in Jesus? “Yes!” contends Jews for Jesus. “Because of ignorance and prejudice, some people promote the idea you must be one or the other, that these are mutually exclusive categories.”

• Then how would you define a Jew? A Christian? “A Jew,” the ministry explains, “is a person who belongs to the people with whom God made covenants through Abraham, Moses and David. Under the provisions of these covenants, there was a promise of land, a special relationship and a mission—to proclaim the one true God to all the world.”

A Christian is “a person who has received salvation through the Messiah. There are more Gentiles in the world than Jews. Consequently, the church is largely Gentile in make-up. However, Christianity is not a religion. It is drawn from biblical Jewish concepts, fulfilling the prophecies of Scripture.”

In an attempt to recapture their “Jewishness,” one national ministry, The Messianic Vision, has published the first “kosher” New Testament, a unique Bible that bases its translation of certain key words on Hebrew rather than the Greek. Specifically entitled “May Your Name Be Inscribed in the Book of Life,” The Messianic Jewish New Covenant is jointly published by The Messianic Vision and Thomas Nelson, and it is based upon the New King James Bible. While the ministry says its intent is not to circumvent the inerrancy of the original Greek autographs, it does seek to restore the Hebraic “mindset” to the words. To accomplish this, editors researched the question, “What was the cultural meaning of certain words as used by Greek-speaking Jews at the time?”

Like most Jewish-oriented ministries, The Messianic Vision has made a concerted attempt to raise the “Jewish conciousness” of Christians. Much emphasis is placed on terminology: supporters are urged not to say Christ, to say Messiah; not to say Christian, to say believer; not to say Holy Ghost, to say Spirit of God; not to say converted, to say completed or fulfilled; not to say missionary, to say outreach; not to say Jesus, to say Yeshua.

“As a new believer, I quickly memorized rules for sharing Yeshua with Jewish people, and I formed opinions about good and bad ways to share,” recalls Messianic Vision president Sid Roth. “Gradually, lovingly, God would then show me how he’d confound the wisdom of the wise.

“For instance, I used to unequivocally caution against wearing crosses when sharing with Jewish people. Then I met a beautiful Christian who wore a star of David with a cross inside. She told me that many Jewish people approached her and began conversations about her jewelry.

“Who am I to admonish this?”

Conflicting Theologies

Messianic Jews are often misunderstood by both the church and the synagogue because of their intense loyalty to their Jewishness.

The “Jewishness” problem arises because of structured lines within the Jewish and Christian communities. Through the years, Judaism has taught that when a person “converts” to Christianity, he is no longer a Jew but has changed into a Christian. “Generally speaking, the church, too, would tell the Jewish ‘convert’ that since he is now a Christian, his Jewish identity is no longer valid,” notes Moody’s Louis Goldberg, “and his new faith severs his ties with his former coreligionists.”

Not all Christians have a love for the Jewish people, says Sid Roth. “We call those who do have this love ‘Mishpochah,’ the family with a Jewish heart. Made up of Jews and non-Jews, we are united in Jesus, our Messiah.”

Roth may call this family “Mishpochah,” but other Jews, alarmed at the spread of the Messianic movement, call Jews who believe in Jesus “meshumad”—apostates. Traitors. Destroyers of themselves and their fellow Jews.

In 1972, the Massachusetts Rabbinical Court, ruling on three cases of Christian conversion, decreed that a Jew who joins the “so-called Hebrew-Christian movement” has betrayed his people and has no right to a Jewish marriage or burial. The court, however, also ruled that a person may not “at any time be exempt from responsibilities which membership in the Jewish faith impose on him.…” In essence, the court took the position that Messianic Jews have all of the responsibilities but none of the rights of other Jewish people.

“We must make a clear distinction between the religion of Jesus and the religion about Jesus,” writes Roland B. Gittelsohn, rabbi emeritus of Temple Israel in Boston and president of the Association of Reform Zionists of America. “The religion of Jesus was Judaism; there can be no doubt of that. Christianity is the religion about Jesus.”

Writing in the May 1979 issue of Midstream, Gittelsohn said, “As a Jew and a rabbi, I can accept Jesus, in certain ways the precursor of non-Orthodox Jews today. He held the basic beliefs and practices of the Jewish heritage to be precious, but strove to refurbish and refine them, to adapt them to the needs of his time. This, however, is not the Jesus of Christianity, nor of Jews for Jesus.”

Messianic Jewish Apologetics

Most Messianic Jews would agree. They argue that the religion of the church is not the religion of Jesus, and suggest that Jesus himself would not recognize many Gentile liturgical expressions. The New Testament church was founded by Jews, and early “Christian” worship certainly had a Jewish flavor.

“The problem [between Messianic Judaism and the rest of the church] is not our unity in the Messiah,” declares Dan Juster, spiritual leader of Beth Messiah Congregation in Rockville, Maryland, “but to see a form of worship and practice develop for the benefit of all which would reflect the Old Testament and the Hebraic background of the New Testament.

“To which form of the church is the Jew expected to conform?” he asks. “Episcopalian ritual? Baptist revivalist? Presbyterian? The church is already diverse in form. What is sorely lacking is a valid Hebraic form!”

Juster, 35, is considered by many to be one of the chief architects of modern Messianic Judaism. He is the author of numerous magazine articles and books on the movement: “Messianic Judaism” (Evangelical Beacon), Jewishness and Jesus (InterVarsity Press), and “A Messianic Jew Pleads His Case” (CT, April 24, 1981), among others. His definitive work, however, is Foundations of Messianic Judaism, a 300-plus page treatise now in search of a publisher.

Although his father is Jewish, by traditional reckoning Dan is not. He had only a superficial introduction to Judaism during his early years. Later, he received a B.A. in philosophy from Wheaton College and an M.Div. from McCormick Seminary. He pursued graduate work in the philosophy of religion at Trinity College and spent three years taking Jewish studies at Spertus College of Judaica.

Juster was ordained a pastor by the United Presbyterian Church in 1974 and has been the spiritual leader of Beth Messiah Congregation since 1978. More recently, he was elected president of the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations (UMJC), an umbrella group representing the interests of 42 synagogues in the United States and one in Canada.

“We desire to be a New Testament community in the midst of the Jewish community, which will positively reflect the Jewish background of our people,” he says. Creating “such a large and significantly self-supporting faith in Jesus will enable us someday to gain a level of credibility—if not acceptance—from other Jews.”

Beth Messiah, founded in 1973, is the oldest Messianic Jewish homestead in Washington, D.C. With about 100 committed members (60 percent of them Jewish), the congregation’s weekly attendance is significantly higher. Visitors are attracted by local radio promotion sponsored by The Messianic Vision and Beth Messiah’s well-entrenched reputation.

Over the years, Beth Messiah has evolved from a ragtag group of Jewish believers meeting first on Sundays, then on Friday nights and Saturdays, for worship, fellowship, and outreach. To encourage families to spend more time together (and with each other) on Friday nights, the temple’s elders decided last year to substitute a longer Saturday service for the dual Friday night and Saturday morning meetings. This, they hope, will reflect the spiritual dimension of rest that they are intent on bringing to the Sabbath.

Across the Potomac from Beth Messiah, 110 are currently affiliated with Ohev Yisrael, Hebrew for “lovers of Israel.” Of the 60 people who have accepted the Lord at this northern Virginia congregation during its three-year history, 39 are Jewish. Ohev Yisrael is distinguished from other Messianic Jewish congregations in that its worship context tends to be more traditionally Jewish. Torah selections are read at Friday night services, a cantor chants the traditional blessings, and Hebrew is used liberally throughout the service.

“What we’re doing is giving life to the rituals,” maintains David Chansky, Ohev’s pastor, rabbi, and spiritual leader. “We believe Jesus has brought us together in one body.”

Although he was raised in an Orthodox Jewish home, Chansky was not always so committed to his heritage or its mandate to retain a Jewish identity. He became a believer in August 1955 while living in Anchorage, Alaska, and entered the ministry in 1962. Ordained by the Church of Christ in 1968, he remained involved in Christendom until he felt called to a more active messianic ministry to Jews in 1978.

Like other Messianic Jews, members of Ohev Yisrael live in two worlds. “We live in the Jewish community and enjoy our lifestyle as Jews. Ninety percent of our congregation choose to keep kosher,” says Chansky. “Yet, through Messiah, we have been lifted up spiritually, as have all Christians, to sit in heavenly places with Jesus.”

Stumbling Blocks

There are some Jewish people who are willing to call themselves Messianic Jews but eschew affiliation with the developing denomination. Stan Telchin, for instance, is pastor of the Living Word Fellowship in Rockville, Maryland. “I am a Messianic Jew,” he confesses, “but I am not deeply involved in Messianic Judaism.”

Pastor Telchin came to believe in Jesus as Israel’s Messiah following a painful confrontation with his daughter who he believed had been “converted,” betraying her religion’s faith in the uniqueness of the Jewish people and their history of persecution.

In his book, Betrayed!, published by Chosen Books, Telchin tells of the agonizing months he spent studying the Scriptures and wrestling with God to discover the truth. Following his decision to follow Jesus, Telchin faced a dilemma that involved almost all of the Messianic Jews he had come to know. Most of them had been raised in nominally Jewish homes where the reality of God and the Bible were missing from their lives. Once they became believers, they developed a tremendous hunger for roots. They wanted to know more about their identity as Jews and about things Jewish. When pressure or rejection came at them, they felt threatened and turned instinctively to one another for fellowship and support.

The pattern was almost universal and it led to the question: How are we to live now that we believe?

“In some ways, the clock had been turned back eighteen hundred years,” writes Telchin, “as the old question rose again: How are we Jews to function in what is primarily a Gentile world? Do we remain separate from Gentile believers, or do we worship with them? If we are to worship with them, will we have to go into their churches? Won’t this lead to assimilation? Mustn’t this be avoided at all costs? Should we strive to create a synagogue for our worship? If so, which kind—Orthodox, Conservative, or Reform? If we establish synagogues, what will happen to our Gentile brothers and sisters who want to worship with us? Won’t this make them feel like second-class citizens? If that happens, won’t we be violating the Bible, which tells us that we are to be ‘one in the Body’? Is our concentration on preserving our identity as Jews?”

Jewish identity, Telchin maintains, consists of much more than synagogue attendence. “I would estimate that less than 5 percent of American Jews attend synagogue every week,” he says. “But their identity as Jews is strong because of the other Jewish areas of their life: heritage, tradition, Jewish causes, support for Israel, commitment to ethical pursuits, championing of the underdog, and determination to survive.”

While he emphasizes his complete agreement with his people in each of these respects, the major difference between Telchin and other “mainstream” Jews is his commitment to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to the entire Old Covenant, in which the promise of the New Covenant and Messiah is found.

“The New Covenant specifically tells us that the middle wall which separated Jews from non-Jews has been broken down and is never to be restored,” Telchin preaches. “I must allow nothing to become a stumbling block for me. Should a desire well up within me to please others—especially if it means compromising the Word of God—I am in serious danger. The Word tells me that many will stumble at the stumbling stone. Jesus is the stumbling stone.”

Other Jewish Christians are even more vociferous in their belief that Messianic Judaism and its ritualistic trappings are a stumbling block to faith in Jesus, a wall to hide behind. “Too many people are living Jewish traditionalism rather than Jewish religionism,” charges Art Stamler, president and executive producer at ADS Audio Visual Productions Inc., a major production house of public service radio and television announcements.

Stamler has difficulty with evangelicals who use orthodoxy or Jewish traditions to introduce other Jews to their Messiah.

“It hasn’t changed since the days of the Sanhedrin,” he says. “That question—‘What will people say?’—and the Jewish response … maintaining their traditions or losing face with parents, friends and associates … has been the greatest cause of Jewish reticence to Jesus in 2,000 years.”

Raised in an “extremely orthodox” Jewish background, Stamler is now a member of Way of Faith Assembly of God in Fairfax, Virginia. His ten-year commitment to Christ came from direct revelation rather than any evangelical ministry:

“I asked the question. I was open. I received the answer,” he says. And that openness, he believes, is the real key to Israel’s salvation.

Stamler considers himself a Christian, not a Messianic Jew or Hebrew Christian, because, according to Scripture, “in Christ, there is neither Jew nor Greek.” Yet he insists he will never lose his Jewishness: “Being Jewish is all the more reason to be a good Christian.”

And Unto The Jews …?

Messianic Jews are “bageled” between unenlightened members of the body of Christ and unbelieving Jews, asserts Eliot Klayman, spiritual leader of a Messianic Jewish congregation in Columbus, Ohio. “Every time a Jewish holiday is celebrated, some unenlightened [Christian] will rail an accusation condemning Jews for keeping the law. On the other hand, unbelieving Jews accuse the Messianic Jew of departing from Judaism, having rejected the commandments of Moses and of worshiping the man, Jesus.

“Traditional Jews separate from us because we are ‘Christian’ and many Christians remove us from their fellowship rolls because we are Jewish. No wonder God has seen fit to raise up Messianic congregations where we can worship as led by the Holy Spirit, fellowship with those who are like-minded, and live a cultural existence that identifies us as we perceive ourselves to be—Jews!”

Klayman, an attorney, cites several reasons why Jewish believers in Jesus should strive to maintain their Jewish identity. “It is important because we desire with great tenacity to remain what we are—Jews. We want our children to be Jewish, to see them bar mitzvahed, and to give them away in marriage in a cultural setting in which we are comfortable. We want to gather around the table for Passover and other feasts and to witness the excitement of our children and grandchildren opening presents on Chanukah. We want to use Jewish terminology and to worship in Messianic congregations.”

Most Messianic Jews fervently point out that the apostle Paul always identified himself as Jewish when dealing with Jews. “For though I am free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more. And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law … that I might gain them that are under the law” (1 Cor 9:20).

The irony, claim Klayman and many latter-day Jews for Jesus, is not that Jews can be members of the body of Christ, but that Gentiles—contrary to nature—could be ingrafted (Rom. 11:24). “Throughout history, the church has forgotten its spiritual roots and the Jewish context of the Scriptures,” he says. “Throughout history, the church has fallen into paganism and anti-Semitism. As Jewish believers identifying as Jews, we are a reminder of the Jewish context of both the Old and New Covenants. In a sense, we are called to maintain our Jewish identity to keep the universal body honest of its true roots.”

The preservation of these roots—the Jewish people—is a mystery we may never fully understand, although there are attempts at explanation.

“God proclaimed he would always preserve the Jewish people as a distinct witness people,” suggests Sid Roth. “This promise offers the only ‘logical’ explanation for our survival. Even the least observant Jew says in his heart, ‘I was born a Jew and I will die a Jew.’ He may not attend synagogue services, or even believe in God, but he wants to remain Jewish. God has placed this survival instinct in our hearts.”

Regarding this instinct to survive, Pastor Telchin responds: “The history of the last 2,000 years has focused our attention upon man’s inhumanity to man. In the process, the issue became self-preservation. It was critical that we Jews protect ourselves from those who would destroy us. It still is. But the God who formed us, and chose us, and held out his hand to us, and covenanted with us, has not set out to destroy us.

“How do I explain the last 2,000 years? I cannot. But I know this: The real issue is not the secular history of the period. Nor is it the ‘Jewishness’ of those who believe.

“The issue is Jesus. Is he or is he not God’s anointed? Is he who he says he is? Is he or is he not the Messiah of Israel, the Savior of all mankind?”

Tim Stafford is a free-lance writer living in Santa Rosa, California. He is a distinguished contributor to several magazines. His latest book is Do You Sometimes Feel Like a Nobody? (Zondervan, 1980).

Some regard it as idolatry, but it is the cement holding our nation together.

It is the style to decry American civil religion as blatant idolatry—American Shinto. For my part, I thank God for it.

But since that phrase now has so many definitions, we should clarify our meaning: When I speak of “civil religion,” I mean “political and social convictions,” or “political value systems,” or “political philosophy,” or Walter Lippmann’s “public philosophy.”

More technically, I follow many sociologists who accept Emile Durkheim’s definition of civil religion as those convictions and practices that determine the consciences and conduct of a people in terms of politics and general social structures. Some do not call that “civil religion.” Ordinarily I do not, either. But why argue over a term so long as we understand each other?

Value Of Civil Religion

In this sense, civil religion is the cement that holds a nation together. It is indispensable for the nation’s existence, and its nature determines the nation’s character. The Declaration of Independence spells it out explicitly for the new nation of America. In his Farewell Address, George Washington wrote: “Of all the suppositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.”

And our second president, John Adams, noted: “It is religion and morality alone upon which freedom can securely stand. A patriot must be a religious man.” Later he added, “We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and a religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

Tenets

American civil religion is, of course, amorphous. Its tenets and practices are constantly changing. However, certain basic convictions have characterized it since its founding days: government exists for the good of the citizens. Its duty is to seek their welfare, protect them, reward the innocent, and punish the guilty. Its ethical code is roughly comparable to the second table of the Decalogue, prohibiting stealing, adultery, murder, and false witness.

Yet its powers are limited. Government has the right to manage the civil lives of its citizenry, but not their religious lives. All government is under God and his moral law. Every human being has political and social rights—in fact, equal rights before the law. All religions should be tolerated, and all religious practices—so long as they do not contradict public morality (variously defined). Democracy is the best form of government; and therefore, concern for others requires that we should extend it as far as possible by peaceful persuasion. Our part as citizens is to obey our government and respect it. We are to love our country and serve it.

Of course, not every American adheres to all these tenets of civil religion. Those who depart too far from its prescribed practices (murderers, for example) frequently end up in jail. Those who do not adhere in conscience to this accepted civil religion are generally tolerated. Early in American history, New Englander William Livingston stated a principle that has found wide acceptance: “The civil power hath no jurisdiction over the sentiments or opinions of the subjects, till such opinions break out into actions prejudicial to the community, and then it is not the opinion but the action that is the object of our punishment.”

Heresies Of American Civil Religion

Of course, like any religion, civil religion, too, has its heresies. Patriotism descends to chauvinism: “My country right or wrong.” Here, an ultimate commitment is made to the state, which determines its own right and wrong; whatever it does is defended. Or civil religion may become an absolute requirement, so that rejection of it becomes punishable as a crime. For the most part, however, the American people have, at least in theory, repudiated such Fascist-like heresies that deify the state.

How Is It Formed?

So much for the content of appropriate civil religion. But how about its formative principle? What shapes it? For example, Roman Catholic teaching is determined by the church through its infallible pope and universal council. Traditional Protestantism appeals to an infallible Bible. What shapes American civil religion? Originally, no doubt, it took shape under strong Puritan influence, faced by the facts of colonial life. Not every New Englander was a Puritan separatist, and not every Virginian was a loyal Anglican. Yet they shared basic Judaeo-Christian convictions that they had inherited as part of Western culture. Puritans found them in the Bible; deists, in natural theology: All men and women are created in the image of God. Therefore, we must set high value on the personal integrity of every human. He or she must be respected, loved, protected, and served. Justice is due to all. We may persuade, but not coerce others so long as their actions are not destructive of the body politic and the rights of others.

The political corollaries of these theological ideas became widely accepted by Puritans of the eighteenth century. They were shared as part of their common faith by many other American Protestants. But they were also shared for the most part by Jews and deists (even Thomas Paine and, of course, Thomas Jefferson). A century later, Roman Catholics were reluctantly admitted into the consensus. All shared a basic commitment to the Judeo-Christian value system, which served as the basis for political and social action, and thus for what has been called American civil religion.

Can Evangelicals Support Civil Religion?

The ultimate commitment of evangelicals is to Jesus Christ. They set their theology by the Bible; can they support a civil religion? Can they, like the ancient Romans, support two deities? Our Lord warned us against dual loyalties: our eye must be single. Can we serve God and mammon? Will not even the slightest hint of civil religion constitute an idol and preclude any genuine biblical faith?

That depends, of course, on the nature of our civil religion. America, like any nation, must be under God. Its laws and practices fall under the judgment of God and should seek to conform to God’s righteous will for the nation. The term may be inappropriate, but civil religion, carefully defined in this sense, is not antithetical to biblical faith, but it is supported and fostered by it. That is why biblical Christians are patriotic and usually obey their government (even bad government). So Tertullian in the ancient world reminded Roman governors that Christians were their best supporters and their most loyal and obedient citizens, upholding the good of the nation. The Bible commands Christians to pray for and honor their rulers. They must for conscience’ sake obey the law (except where it violates God’s laws). They are to participate fully as citizens, rendering to Caesar the full measure of all that is his.

And the Christian’s Jewish neighbor next door can say the same with an equally clear conscience and without lessening his commitment to his Jewish faith. Likewise, an enlightened Roman Catholic neighbor across the street can join in supporting these political-religious values because he, too, shares them and sees no conflict with his Catholic faith.

Of course, if American civil religion at any point requires disobedience to God, the biblical Christian, with Peter, must choose to obey God rather than man. Or if American civil religion becomes the central substance of religious life and thought, an evangelical must reject it as false. Civil religion, even as we have defined it, represents only aspects of biblical faith and is greatly dependent on it for its sustenance. And, of course, the state that dares to challenge the ultimacy of Christ becomes a blasphemous idol.

Dangers And Challenges

Two warnings, from opposite directions, are appropriate for American Christians. They must beware the tendency of any biblically justified patriotism or civil religion to assume ultimate authority, and so free itself from judgment by God’s righteous standard. Patriotism then becomes idolatry—antithetical to Christian faith. But just because we do love our country and honor it, we can easily slip beyond the thin edge of what is appropriate. Then we can commit the blasphemy of what in practice becomes a denial of biblical Christianity.

But in our day, a second danger besets our nation. Americans take their political heritage for granted. This is both wrong and dangerous. In America we have a precious political heritage of great freedom coupled with responsible government. But an alarming trend in America is transforming the so-called American civil religion of the past into an enormously different sort of religious commitment: a politics of selfish individualism.

At the heart of biblical ethics is the teaching that love to God always demands and necessarily results in love to our fellow men. The essence of the Christian life, therefore, is service—loving service to God and others.

But today, in the name of freedom, a great many demand the right to serve themselves. Such a civil religion would destroy us as a nation.

Rather, we must renew our commitment to the basic public values that have guided us in the past. America stands under the judgment of God and must be held responsible to him. And our public and political life, like every other aspect of the truly Christian life, must be a life of service for the good of others.

KENNETH S. KANTZER

Eutychus: Goodbye And Hello

The wit of Eutychus has been with CHRISTIANITY TODAY since its inception. He (or she) has actually been a succession of writers, with custom dictating that each Eutychus be announced upon retirement from the column. We can now reveal the latest Eutychus: Calvin Miller, pastor of Westside Baptist Church in Omaha, Nebraska. A gifted storyteller and natural poet, Miller is the author of many books, including the acclaimed Singer trilogy (IVP, 1979) and his recent If This Be Love (Harper & Row, 1984).

With this issue, a new Eutychus goes to work. For now, we have nothing else to say about him. Or her.

Saint Petro’s

A friend recently wrote about an all-too-common problem:

“My family is having trouble finding a gas station to attend,” he wrote. “After moving here last year, we did a lot of station hopping, but none of the local stations are like our old station back home. Our expectations aren’t unreasonable—we just want a place where the whole family can fill up each week. But finding a station we all agree on isn’t easy.

“I think any station we join should have early service. No sense wasting the whole day. My wife feels the attendants have to be friendly, people you can talk to about normal things, not just carburetors. My son, who’s done just enough reading about station administration to be opinionated, says the order of service is important. ‘No one should wash windows before checking the oil,’ he claims.

“What should we do?”

My friend’s plight prompted me to do some background reading. At one time, I read, people did not have such worries because there weren’t any choices. Standard stations were virtually the only ones you could go to. My parents, I remembered, went to Parrish’s Standard, the only station in town.

But an obscure grease monkey named Marty began pointing out the dangers of indulging a monopoly. Before long, the monopoly was broken up, and different stations began appearing, sometimes four to an intersection, each claiming it offered better service, nicer facilities, higher octane, or some special additive.

From time to time, fads swept the industry. One was down on the institutional station. Younger drivers began saying, “Gas yes, stations no.” They suggested people have pumps at home. These house stations were nice in theory, but no one ever developed one that could last more than a few years.

Lately self-service is the rage, a concept actually based on one of Marty’s original gripes against Standard—every driver should be able to pump his own gas. So far it seems to be working, though some say we don’t yet know the effect this less-glorified role will have on attendants. Some drivers already complain that self-serve leads to apathetic operators. Others point out that when your engine needs work, you can’t go to the local station anymore. Mechanics are specialists now, each with his own shop.

Before I could reply to my friend, he sent a note:

“One of our neighbors is disgusted with all gas stations because ‘they just feud with each other’ and ‘they’re just after my money.’ So he stopped going anywhere. Of course, his tank is always empty too.

“I don’t think that’s the answer. I’m coming to the conclusion that as long as the gas hasn’t been watered down, I’ll keep buying, even if the station isn’t quite like the one back home.”

EUTYCHUS

Weeping Over the Children

After reading Rodney Clapp’s article, “Vanishing Childhood” part I, [May 18], I was easily able to imagine God in heaven, crying over the children of the world throughout history.

REV. BOB GILLCHREST

Olivet Baptist Church

Lancaster, Calif.

The remark Clapp quotes about Charles Lamb was made at a time when Lamb was feverishly ill. Furthermore, nowhere in that letter of April 1833 is it implied that the child in the next room had died; it had merely been removed. Lamb loved children. I should hope that the writings of one whose noble kind spirit has so warmed and encouraged the imaginations of other writers would not be avoided as monstrous on the basis of an uncharacteristic sentiment uttered in private during a moment of weakness.

P. MARTIN SARVIS

Denton, Tex.

I am intrigued by Clapp ascribing fatherhood to Charles Lamb. I’ve always thought that Lamb was a bachelor. In fact, John Buchan in his History of English Literature wrote unequivocally, “Lamb was never married.” Does Mr. Clapp know something I don’t?

GRACE MCCULLOUGH

Sharon, Penn.

Mr. Clapp only said that Lamb had a “common parental experience,” not that he was the child’s father.—Eds

Religion Is Not a Social Club

Unfortunately, the bill Kenneth Kantzer suggested in his Editorial “The ‘Separation’ of Church and State” [May 18] as “an excellent example of ‘accommodation without preference and without coercion’” is not the ideal solution. Religion cannot be compared to social clubs or stamp collecting! Under this bill, children would be actively proselytizing within the school. This could sharply divide students in schools where a diversity of religious groups exist. Problems like this do not occur between social clubs.

THOMAS A. co*ckLEREECE

Rockville, Md.

When Marriage “Dies”

I appreciated very much Walter Wangerin’s attempt to deal with “the sort of grief that follows divorce” [“On Mourning the Death of a Marriage,” May 18]. Too often the church has been so preoccupied with the issue that it has neglected the people who have been deeply wounded by the experience. But I find the logic that claims a marriage is “dead” before the divorce actually takes place dangerous and unbiblical. I see no such distinction in Scripture and am concerned that such thinking will add to the other nonbiblical rationalizations Christians are using to free themselves from the necessity of working through the serious difficulties we sometimes face in marriage.

REV. PAUL B. NULL

Bethel Baptist Church

Aumsville, Ore.

Wangerin speaks of “me” and “you” and “we”; the last being “a living thing—the life in a marriage.” Scripture speaks of “two becoming one flesh. Vows do not make a marriage; vows are a promise to become “one flesh.”

F. VANDERWERFF

Monroe, Wash.

Eschatology and Missions

Your news coverage of the TSFM meeting at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School [May 18] reflected accurately its theme, which had to do with the effect one’s eschatology has on the way he will do missionary work. It is regrettable that early in the report it was stated that “At issue was which view of the millennium provides the best motivation for spreading the Christian witness.” Neither Richard Lovelace nor I tried to present our respective views of the millennium as the best motivation for missions. We were really seeking to show how eschatology affects the nature of missions.

The CT reporter stated that I separated myself not only from amillennialism but also from dispensational premillennialism. Such was not the case. I regret dispensationalists’ tendency to divide the people of God into blocks and to deemphasize the reality of God’s kingdom here and now.

DR. MICHAEL POco*ck

TEAM

Wheaton, Ill.

Philip Yancey Aye and Nay!

Who is Philip Yancey, this Editor at Large? Did he write “The ‘Atrocious’ Mathematics of the Gospel” [Open Windows, May 18] to infuriate readers, or just to get our attention? What on earth could he have in mind, questioning Jesus or the Word? Perhaps I am naı̈ve, but to agree with Judas that to break a pint! (his emphasis) of perfume on the very feet that would be pierced on the cross was bad economics, makes me question Yancey’s point of view.

CAROLE ANN O’CONNOR

Gulfport, Miss.

The first thing I do when CHRISTIANITY TODAY arrives is check the table of contents for an article by Philip Yancey. If there is one, I know I am in for an intellectual and spiritual treat.

ELLEN KLIPP

Eagle, Idaho

I would not mind the article so much if he had merely stated the different values and worths found in the Bible. But he digs into the Gospels and tears apart the dignity in the parables of Christ. If the article were intended to amuse, then Yancey shouldn’t have tried so hard to side with everyone in the parables except for Christ.

PATRICIA JOHNSON

Grand Haven, Mich.

Mr. Yancey suggests readers might try reading his article as satire—which is what he intended.—Eds.

The WCC and Evangelicals

The April 20 Editorial, “Winds of Change in the World Council?,” provides a succinct and helpful agenda for future discussions between the World Council of Churches and evangelicals, however much some of us in the WCC might wish to debate your analysis. Some of us will want to agree with parts of it, while questioning other portions. It may be of some interest that the WCC has a Task Force on Relations to Evangelicals, and I have been appointed moderator.

I agree that our future discussions may well focus on “essential truth,” what the Christian faith really means. I thank God that pure doctrine is not our entry pass to heaven, but that search for the essential truth of Christian faith and action is crucial for us all.

EUGENE L. STOCKWELL

World Council of Churches

Geneva, Switzerland

Contrary to the implication of your Editorial, I took no part in the drafting of the evangelical Open Letter, although I concurred with its positive conclusions.

PROF. RICHARD LOVELACE

Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary

South Hamilton, Mass.

More Church Growth

I read with interest “The Greatest Church Growth Is Beyond Our Shores” [May 18]. I was surprised that you did not acknowledge the work of the Church of God in the areas listed. During the past ten years we saw a 79% increase in the number of churches in Central America. All around this world we are seeing the harvest gathered.

DOUGLAS LEROY

Church of God

Cleveland, Tenn.

The choir rose for the anthem while I fingered the sheet music that had been hurriedly thrust into my hands before the service. The choir director had suggested I bring in the congregation to sing the last stanza with the choir. It was a familiar hymn.

Simple enough, I thought. I put the music aside and prepared for the worship service.

As the choir sang, I sat back and enjoyed the anthem. Shortly before the last stanza, I confidently stepped to the pulpit. With a sweeping gesture worthy of Leonard Bernstein, I signaled the congregation to sing and was met with . . . an organ solo!

If I had been able to read a musical score, I would have seen it-the instrumental interlude. Several seconds later, the choir and congregation began singing at the appropriate time without my direction. By then I was sheepishly hiding behind the pulpit.

After the service, one of the choir members said, “We asked you rather than the other pastor because we expected you would know more about music!”

Expectations! Every pastor knows their weight. If it’s not sight-reading music, it’s being asked to give the invocation at the local D.A.R. even on your day off because your predecessor “always made time for us.”

While frustrating, expectations like these are usually benign. They can even provide a good laugh at the local ministerium.

But expectations are also the taproot of every pastor’s effectiveness and satisfaction. If we’re not offering the kind of ministry our people expect, they will be disappointed, and we’ll feel discouraged and inadequate. When a pastor’s own expectations are violated, even more serious consequences ensue: strained family life, joyless ministry, eventual burnout.

Often overlooked but most important, we are shaped by what people expect of us, especially in the first pastorate. One study by Drew University Theological School of its recent graduates concluded that the primary task of the first five years of ministry seemed to be “to acquire the self-image of being a professional capable of providing the services a congregation declares it needs from its minister.” Rather than fulfilling their own sense of calling, fledgling pastors usually try to satisfy the expectations of their congregations.

Slowly and subtly, for better or worse, we tend to conform to the image significant people have of us. It is crucial to find or develop a church atmosphere that allows us to be the kind of pastor we’re called to be.

We begin to deal with these expectations by realizing they enter our lives in two quite different ways.

External Expectations

Many expectations are external. They’re in job descriptions, memoranda from denominational leaders, and conversations in the barbershop about what kind of person should serve Old First Church. Whatever their form, they’re imposed from outside.

Often the clash of external expectations comes because they are incongruent or even mutually exclusive. Churches want their pastors to be both cloistered, contemplative scholars and aggressive, decisive administrators. Other churches expect their pastors to have specialized skills (preaching or counseling or youth work) and yet be generalists competent in all areas.

In addition to inherent contradictions, external expectations may clash for another reason: competing groups each expect the pastor’s time and energy. Community leaders expect involvement in local affairs, especially if former pastors traditionally joined Rotary or organized the high school baccalaureate. Denominational executives often expect significant involvement beyond the local parish. Local colleagues expect support of the ministerium and its projects. Most church members assume their pastor will be devoting full time to them. And, of course, there’s that often short-changed source of external expectations-the pastor’s family.

It is obvious that we must always struggle toward clarity and consistency in external expectations. Are church and pastor clear on what they expect from each other? Does fulfilling one expectation make it difficult or impossible to accomplish another?

Internal Expectations

Beneath those expectations placed on us by our environment, we have many others within our own minds. These internal expectations often originate from our reference group, those admired and influential people who’ve shaped our image of ourselves as pastors. Some have called this important group our “symbolic audience.”

One pastor described the adjustment difficulties of his new minister of music. Each Sunday’s “highbrow” anthems were far outside the musical tastes of the congregation. After long hours of discussion, the pastor discovered the recent graduate was still trying to please his esteemed professor of music. His music was really selected for his “symbolic audience,” even though the professor was now hundreds of miles away.

Early in my ministry, one of my own deeply admired mentors said it was “intellectually inexcusable” for a pastor to read fewer than two books a week. This internal expectation became more powerful for me than many external ones. Only after several years of guilt and frustration have I finally admitted that it is unrealistic in my current situation.

Most pastors live with unfulfilled internal expectations. For example, one study found that most pastors surveyed named scholars or authors as the people most influential in their lives. Yet the study also discovered that the same pastors spent an average of only 38 minutes a day in sermon preparation and another 27 minutes in general intellectual activity. Internal expectations were shaped by scholarly mentors, yet only an hour a day was spent in intellectual pursuits. What a prescription for frustration!

Perhaps we would each do well to ask ourselves, “Who is my ‘symbolic audience’? What reference groups shape, even subconsciously, my pastoral expectations?”

Until after World War II, most pastors’ reference groups were restricted, I suspect, to local colleagues and friends throughout their denomination or tradition. Certainly for some this remains true today. But with the media explosion of the last thirty years, my guess is that more pastors today take their cues from a core of nationally known “superpastors.” You know them. Their names continually headline seminars and conferences. Their faces appear again and again in Christian magazines. In short, they’re successful. We want to be successful, too, and so we subtly take their expectations as our own.

Several years ago I attended a conference led by a successful pastor whose large church is a national model for evangelism. As he described the intricacies of his program, I wondered if the small church pastors were thinking, How can I ever begin to organize this program in my church? Comments during the discussion period revealed that some pastors felt more discouraged than motivated. By taking the leader as a model, their expectations were raised to seemingly impossible levels.

Most of us need successful role models. Without them to inspire and challenge us, we can easily slide into quiet, comfortable mediocrity. But whether we identify with scholars, superpastors, or beloved seminary professors, it is crucial that we understand how they shape our internal expectations.

It becomes clear that dealing with what others expect is only half the battle. We must also get a handle on what we expect of ourselves. The key is realism. Are my internal expectations realistic in light of my time, gifts, and resources? Or have I internalized an unrealistic pastoral image? Am I trying to please a symbolic audience? How does my reference group subtly shape my expectations?

When Expectations Clash

In a perfect world, the internal expectations that drive every pastor would be entirely understood and realistic. Churches would expect exactly what pastors wanted to give. During the interview process, all expectations would be freely shared, clarified, and agreed upon. Both could then live happily ever after.

In the real world, the opposite often happens. Pastors don’t comprehend their internal expectations. Churches expect pastors to fit into preset molds. Both often wait until the heat of battle to discover what they really expect from each other. Moreover, expectations are never static, never settled once and for all. They are constantly in flux and must be renegotiated periodically as circ*mstances change.

But even in a far-from-perfect world, expectations can be shared, clarified, understood, and resolved peacefully. Here are some strategies in dealing with clashing expectations.

Always get important expectations in writing. Upon arriving at my first church as an assistant pastor, I was told I could expect to be called as an associate pastor in one year if I did a good job. When the year was up, the pastor expressed much appreciation of my work. Yet the elders waited another six months to initiate my call as an associate pastor.

During this period, I felt frustrated, wondering if they weren’t telling me something. To me, I had proven myself. I was hurt and angry that the church was not keeping what I thought was its end of the bargain.

Only later did I discover the one-year benchmark was never suggested by the Session but was only the private encouragement of the pastor. I should have discussed the issue fully during my candidacy and asked for written performance criteria upon which my call as an associate would be based. Times for periodic review of my performance and progress toward that call should also have been spelled out.

The frustration of this period taught me an important lesson. Until that time, I had believed that asking for written confirmation of important agreements communicated distrust and was somehow demeaning and unspiritual. After all, this is the church! Now I’m convinced that written agreements build a solid foundation for pastoral relationship, with less danger of disharmony through needless misunderstanding.

Consider job descriptions. The common attitude “Oh, we all know what the pastor’s job should be” usually means, “We each have our own private expectations which, when added together, would leave in doubt whether Jesus himself could satisfy them!” A written job description forces the church (and the pastor) to wrestle with the fact that no one can do everything well. Both parties can then realistically set mutually agreeable pastoral priorities. An accompanying benefit is that both parties will also realize what the pastor is not expected to do.

Rapid turnover in lay leadership and our natural tendency to hear the same statement with a multitude of subjective interpretations also argue for written evaluations. “We all think you’re doing a good job, Pastor!” says little and can be very deceiving, as some pastors have tragically discovered. Written performance reviews give the pastor concrete help in identifying strengths as well as areas needing improvement.

They are also a silent but eloquent answer to disgruntled members on the warpath because “the pastor is not doing his job” (not doing the job I personally want done). Written objectives and reviews are important insurance that the pastor will only be held accountable to the church board’s clear and consistent expectations. If different factions think the pastor is too heavily involved in one area or slighting another, the problem must be addressed to the board. Rather than the snare many pastors think they are, written objectives and performance reviews set pastors free from trying to please a hundred bosses.

Do not postpone dealing with clashing expectations. The more painful the crunch, the faster it must be addressed. This is what I failed to do when I expected to be called as an associate, consequently enduring months of needless frustration.

A seminary friend went to serve a rural church in Wyoming, where he discovered the previous pastor had done all the church’s janitorial work, from mowing the lawn to cleaning the toilets. He had even purchased all the supplies himself! The church budgeted nothing for upkeep. Believing this expectation inappropriate, my friend immediately confronted the Session with his unwillingness to continue these duties, and other arrangements were made.

Conflicting expectations are like a tight shoe. They begin with a pinch, but if left unattended, they soon become painfully tender to the slightest touch. Despite most pastors’ abhorrence of conflict (including me!), the time to deal with it is at the first pinch. Ignoring it only allows the tension to rub away more layers of good will. Clear communication and calm renegotiation of expectations is much easier before the pain develops.

Be willing to suggest equitable tradeoffs. Often those things a pastor is most gifted or motivated to do clash with expectations of others. Normally the pastor must take the initiative by suggesting fair tradeoffs.

One friend of mine accepted an assistant pastorate that primarily involved youth work. He wanted to retain his habit of regular exegetical study, although he realized that in this position he would not preach frequently. To satisfy his internal expectations, he negotiated with the church board to include in his job description one half day per week to pursue personal studies of his choice.

With a little imagination, many clashing expectations can be turned into win/win situations that both pastor and congregation can accept.

Separate role expectations from personal expectations. Role expectations involve perceptions of the ministerial occupation. Personal expectations involve all the intangibles regarding the pastor as a person: attitudes, personality, mannerisms, dress, everything. Every pastor struggles to draw a line between legitimate role expectations and those personal expectations that are out of bounds.

Upon arriving at a church in the “steel valley” of western Pennsylvania, I was warned by a trustee: “I see you’re driving a VW Rabbit. Of course, you came here with it, but I wouldn’t suggest buying another foreign car around here.” Although said in jest, the message was plain: “We expect our pastor to buy American.” Fortunately, I knew him well enough to joke in reply, “When America starts building better cars, I’ll buy one!” My message was also plain: the car I drive is my own business.

Role and personal expectations clash most often when they are unnecessarily intertwined in the mind of the congregation.

One pastor was called to a church that had for decades been served by a formal and highly proper pastor. The new pastor was also a strong and effective leader, but at first the church had difficulty accepting his hang-loose personality. In time, however, the church began to see the new pastor could fulfill their pastoral role expectations while having a quite different personality from his predecessor. Helping churches appreciate this difference can eliminate much unnecessary conflict.

Realize that some battles of expectations may be entirely within us. A pastor complains that his people expect him to be a saint. In fact, his own aloofness and internal acceptance of a perfectionistic lifestyle have prevented him from hearing his people’s earnest pleas to climb off the pedestal and join them. Another pastor complains that her elders never give her freedom to try new ideas. In reality, a new idea that turned sour in her previous pastorate has frightened her away from taking any more risks. Her board reluctantly filled the leadership vacuum but wishes she would be more assertive.

We can easily project internal tensions onto the screen of our surroundings. Unless resolved, these inner battles are carried along like sandburrs into each new ministry situation. When they begin to prick, we may unjustly lash out at those around us, making a bad situation worse.

One of my own internal tensions concerns my relationship to wealth. Like many individuals raised in middle-class homes during the sixties, I am suspicious of anything that smacks of materialism, yet have never lacked a comfortable lifestyle. I know I have not yet fully come to terms with how money can be used without being abused.

This inner tension sometimes makes me uncomfortable around wealthy people. Part of me condemns their possessions as crass and extravagant while another part secretly craves what they have. I wonder if people in our relatively affluent congregation look down on me because my home, car, and dress do not equal theirs. Usually these feelings have no basis in reality, but it’s easy to project my own hankering for affluence onto my people and then unfairly berate them for not pursuing a simpler lifestyle.

Often an empathetic, objective third party, perhaps a spouse or trusted colleague, can show us which tensions have no sound basis.

Finally, believe that expectations can be changed. No pastor’s image is set in granite. Church members in the 1970s reported a much wider range of pastoral expectations than they did in the 1950s. (See the fascinating research in Donald Smith’s Clergy in the Crossfire, Westminster, 1973). For example, the traditional image of the pastor as “shepherd” personally tending to every need of the flock was challenged by the image of the pastor as “equipper” of the laity for ministry. Today’s expectations are gradually becoming even more flexible.

This flux in pastoral images is good news to any pastor caught in the clash of conflicting expectations. We have a great opportunity to redefine a congregation’s pastoral image.

For example, formulating a written mission statement forced our church’s leaders to set new pastoral expectations more in keeping with where we want to go as a congregation. Careful teaching in new members’ and new officers’ classes, as well as sensitive preaching, have also helped a new pastoral image to take root and grow in our church.

Often pastors can encourage change in expectations by planting the seeds of symbolic gestures that over time will grow in influence.

A friend of mine was offered the previous pastor’s free membership in the city’s most exclusive country club as he began his ministry at a wealthy and prestigious church. Although my friend loved golf, he politely declined the membership because he didn’t care for the image it might project. This single act established quite different expectations for his ministry in the minds of his people.

While being shown around the church building during an interview trip, I was appalled to be taken up a narrow, steep, and winding staircase to the pastor’s study in the church bell tower. Talk about ivory tower seclusion! All but the hardiest parishioner were physically denied access to the pastor. If I had taken the position, my first act would have been to counteract the former expectations by moving the pastor’s study to an area of normal traffic flow.

Expectations are the lifeblood of ministry. What others expect of us and what we expect of ourselves determine what we will become. In all expectations, we need to strive for clarity, consistency, and realism. When expectations clash, church boards, denominational executives, individual parishioners, and our own symbolic audience might all play a part. But hopefully the final arbiter will be Jesus Christ himself. It is the Lord’s expectations, when filtered through Scripture and the indwelling Holy Spirit, that provide the guiding compass through the labyrinth of pastoral expectations.

Richard P. Hansen is pastor of Palos Park Presbyterian Community Church in Palos Park, Illinois.

Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

“Barbara, you didn’t have your eyes closed when we were praying. And you’re the pastor’s daughter!” boomed the Sunday school teacher in front of the entire primary department.

How did she know, our oldest child wondered, unless her eyes were open too?

We recently asked Barbara and her two sisters-all of them now married-what they most liked and disliked about growing up in a pastor’s family. They talked about the enjoyment of meeting Christian leaders who came to our home. They cited the greater opportunities to travel, the fun of being the “speaker’s family” at various conferences and camps. They appreciated their insider’s perspective-seeing Mom and Dad in ministry yet also being real people who got discouraged, angry, and needed forgiveness like anyone else.

But our daughters weren’t wild about being expected to bail out teachers or youth leaders stumped by theological questions. More than once they found an adult turning their way to ask, “What do you think? Why did God send Abraham to Israel instead of India?”

For many in a church, the pastor’s family is a peculiar people, more holy than normal, and thus assumed to be uninterested in ordinary human life. Our girls sometimes found out they weren’t invited to friends’ parties because “we know you’re a minister’s daughter and can’t come.” One woman apologized to me (Sally) years later for not including me at Tupperware or Avon parties “because we thought you wouldn’t like what we talked about.”

Three pressurizers

Expectations descend upon pastoral families from three directions:

1. The community in general. Leaders in any field are subjected to more scrutiny and higher demands. Why don’t the news reporters leave Princess Di alone? Because all of Great Britain (and beyond) thinks it owns the royal couple. Many people vicariously live out the fairy tale. Others feel it is their right to know every move Charles and Diana make, since they’re supported with public money.

Some of the same dynamics occur with church leaders and their families. High visibility and responsibility in the community brings with it high expectations.

2. The church. Parishioners react much the same as the general community-but pile on the spiritual dimension as well. Church members almost tacitly agree that while they cannot be expected to have it all together spiritually, certainly the pastor and his family will do so. They are, after all, the visible incarnation of God in their midst.

But at the same time, there’s an undercurrent that says, I bet they’re just as frail as the rest of us. When one of our daughters was in a time of rapid spiritual growth, she would stand almost every Sunday evening to share something God had been teaching her. A woman eventually said to her, “Well, we can always count on you to have something to say in the sharing time. Your dad must put you up to it.”

On the other hand, Becki remembers an argument in school when a classmate challenged her to back up her point of view with a Scripture. Becki couldn’t.

“You’re a preacher’s daughter,” the girl sneered, “and you can’t even quote the Bible!”

“Well, your dad is a plumber,” Becki retorted, “and you don’t know how to fix pipes!”

3. The pastoral family itself. In the same way Princess Di walks one step behind Prince Charles as a self-imposed protocol, so the pastor’s family often legislates unnecessary limitations for itself. Pastors are perhaps the most guilty for setting up standards that in the end strangle everyone in the home.

Our first church after seminary was in a small town where a number of our families were farmers. I (Jim) decided we needed to be up and going when the farmers started their day. At least I wanted the light on in my study before dawn.

But the church also had businessmen who worked into the evening hours. So it was necessary, I felt, to please them by serving late at night with various business meetings, speaking engagements, and visitation appointments.

One day, our preschool daughter said to Sally, “I hate the church, because it takes my daddy away from me.” When I heard that, it was like being stabbed. I was sacrificing my family to make the church happy with me.

The pastor who preaches on the disaster of divorce and the necessity of family solidarity while at the same time working 70-100 hours a week and setting unrealistic expectations for his family is a walking tragedy.

The positive parsonage

Among the things that make for happier pastoral families are these:

Communicate! Talk about each person’s gifts in the family and how those might be developed for the church at large, not necessarily this local church.

It is true that Scripture requires a pastor to be “one that ruleth well his own house” (1 Tim. 3:4). But ruling is not dictating. Ruling is leading. A leader is a facilitator who helps people achieve and develop. This will happen most effectively by open, honest communication.

Don’t live for the church alone. Yes, God is involved in the church, but the church is not God. He is eternal and transcultural. So sell your soul to him but not to the congregation.

Deliberately develop hobbies and friendships outside the local church. We have found other professionals, such as doctors and business people as well as pastors and laity from other churches, to be good stimulators for us. They remind us of what God is doing in the larger world.

Expose your family to other values. Virginia Satir in People-Making says one indication of a sick family is that they view themselves as a cloister of purity, isolated from the evil world around them. They develop a fortress mentality.

Every pastor needs a good atheist friend to challenge him. The pastor’s family needs to be exposed to other systems of thought and lifestyle. Some PKs go from a Christian grade school to a Christian high school to a Christian college to a seminary and then to preach or teach in a Christian institution. They are never seriously in touch with the alien society around them.

Teach children spiritual values that are personal. You can tell a child, “We don’t drink because we’re Christians, the Bible says no, and besides-we’re the pastoral family.” None of those are going to be effective, however, when peers suggest drinking.

Instead, discuss the world’s values and help the child form his or her own. One of our daughters used to say when confronted with alcohol, “I’ve come up with ten reasons why I don’t drink. The first is that it’s fattening. … ” (Further down her list were reasons more “spiritual”!)

Family discussions about such issues need to start at least two years before children are confronted with the real thing. “Sometime down the road, kids are going to ask you what you believe about _______. Let’s talk about it now.” Such conversations are far more fruitful than imposing expectations based on church roles.

Love each other! Author John Powell records that he was in the hospital room when his father died. His mother put her arms around John and said, “He loved you so much. He was so proud of you.” John went to a corner of the room and quietly sobbed.

When a nurse came to comfort him, he said, “I’m not crying because my father died. I’m crying because he never told me he loved me.”

Telling our family members we love them is a way to help them grow and become more confident. It also increases our love for them. God has called us not only to preach and pray and organize but also to love, thereby setting spouses and children free from expectations that bind. If the family is sacrificed for public ministry, we will ultimately lose both.

-Jim and Sally Conway

Fullerton, California

Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

The Hurt and Healing of Church Discipline

Beyond Forgiveness by Don Baker, Multnomah, $7.95

Reviewed by J. Robin Maxson, pastor, Klamath Evangelical Free Church, Klamath Falls, Oregon

“The silence of my study was interrupted by the persistent ringing of the telephone. A longtime friend from a distant city was calling. ‘I’m sorry, Don, but I have some bad news for you—one of your people has been deeply involved in sin for many years. The whole sordid story is just beginning to surface here, and I thought I’d call you so you could deal with it before it comes to you second hand.’

“He described a long series of events with all the confirming evidence that was needed. It was not just one of my people—it was one of my dear friends—it was one of my staff who had fallen.”

With those two paragraphs, Don Baker plunges the reader into the real world of a sinning saint and of a church whose entire ministry was jeopardized by that sin.

Twenty-six months and two weeks later, Baker, senior pastor of Hinson Memorial Baptist Church in Portland, Oregon, addressed the offender before the congregation that had shared in the ordeal of discipline. What he said was staggering: “God has possibly made you better qualified to minister today than anybody I know.”

The dramatic events are narrated by Baker in a gripping book that shows how church discipline can go Beyond Forgiveness to full restoration.

The man in question had been on Hinson’s staff for two years, in ministry for twenty-five. He had been married for twenty-eight years to a wonderful, supportive woman. They had three grown children, all believers. His record was blemish-free; his ministry effective. But over a period of thirteen years, “Greg” committed adultery with ten women in three churches, including Hinson.

The facts were confirmed, the offender confronted, and a course of action determined. Eighty-three hours after the phone call, the exposed church leader made public confession before the assembled church.

Greg’s ordination was revoked, and he resigned his position. But he was not excommunicated. On the contrary, he was enjoined to remain in the church, to submit to the direction of the church staff, to accept professional counseling, and to commit himself to the total process of restoration regardless of cost. This he agreed to do.

Beyond Forgiveness is a book more experienced by the reader than studied. It is a clinic in church discipline done right. The confusion, the anguish, the dilemmas, the study, the strategy, the implementation, the mistakes, the suspense, the outcome are all revealed in sequence. Doctrine (wonderfully summarized in two concise chapters) is unfolded in the context of application. As a reviewer, I wrote down every question raised by the evolving scenario: What about . . . ? What if . . . ? Why didn’t you . . . ? Which passage . . . ?

Most were answered en route.

“It has been extremely awkward for me to find the sensitive balance between the biblical demands for purity and the equally powerful biblical commands to love,” writes Baker. “The primary purpose of discipline is restoration—not retribution.”

That focus was reiterated when I asked Pastor Baker to identify the most common mistake local churches make in applying discipline. “We approach the sin problem in a judgmental way. I used to say, ‘If you don’t quit what you’re doing, we’re going to have to take action against you.’ But our first response should be one of compassion because probably nine out of ten sinners in the church are hurting more than we imagine.”

How has his approach changed? “I’ll put my arm around a man and say (in private), ‘Jim, I’ve heard some things about you, like . . . Is there any truth to this?’ Often he’ll just break down and acknowledge it. But my key question is ‘How can I help you?’ It usually takes them by surprise.”

For Baker, the personal confrontation is normative and usually decisive. “We privately pursue the problem and help people out of their hole as quickly as possible. I’m very confrontive; that’s our responsibility—but always in private.” So usually no discipline is required. “Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11 that if we judge ourselves we will not come under God’s judgment. There’s no need for church discipline when there’s self-judgment.”

What demanded the extraordinary measures in Greg’s case was his position of leadership in the church. Baker writes, “His immoral relationships with numerous women disqualified him for ministry. … He had acknowledged his sin, [but we] could not tell if he was truly sorry for his sin or just sorry that he had been caught. … Like a new believer, Greg needed time to reestablish himself in the church—time to prove himself.” And in just over two years, that’s what happened.

Why did it work? Because the leaders at Hinson had already thoroughly studied church discipline in the Bible. Because the church does not reserve discipline for only sensational crimes; caring confrontation is routinely practiced as a style of ministry. Because the man’s wife forgave, stood by him, and participated in the agonizing process of recovery. Because five laymen supported him through a weekly breakfast. Because he got the kind of therapy he needed from a competent psychologist. And because Greg himself never gave in to the temptation to abandon the church.

Greg completed the process, but as Baker is quick to acknowledge, it doesn’t always work. And, though the book does not specifically address the issue, he is aware of the threat of lawsuits over applied church discipline.

“My son-in-law is an attorney, and we’ve been discussing this lately. It’s going to be increasingly difficult for the church to maintain its position in the area of church discipline without some infringement of a church member’s civil liberties. And the civil liberties are always going to take precedence over strict adherence to religious truth [in court].”

What are the ramifications for our practice of discipline? “When we confront anyone, we’re going to have to view it with the idea that some day it might be tested in court. And always consult an attorney before a final accusation is printed or read publicly.”

How about spelling out expectations and procedures at the point where people join a church—say, in a membership class? “That should be included. But we err even more in not giving an individual advance information in the initial confrontation.” Baker handles this by going through Scripture with the person. “I don’t assume a person knows that what he did was wrong. I’ll say, ‘Maybe you’re not aware of what the Scriptures say about this. Let me show you.’ ” If there is resistance, then passages on church discipline are included in the study.

I asked Baker if he struggled with any unresolved issues in this area. “Yes, mainly in the area of divorce and remarriage. I still haven’t resolved what to do with those in a questionable remarriage.”

What is he doing?

“We spend a lot of time in staff meetings discussing it. Usually when there has been a divorce and remarriage in situations not explicitly covered in the Bible, we ask the individuals to step out of leadership positions—at least temporarily.”

Beyond Forgiveness doesn’t attempt to solve every problem, but it provides a large dose of insight in less than 100 pages. It ought to be required reading in seminary. Even for church leaders hip-deep in alligators, this book could be the survival manual they need to find higher ground.

Finding Right People for the Right Jobs

How to Mobilize Church Volunteers by Marlene Wilson, Augsburg, $8.95

Reviewed by David Shelley, pastor of discipleship and worship, Sun River Church, Rancho Cordova, California

Any churchgoer can tell you the horror stories of lay involvement—and noninvolvement—in the church.

“Ten percent of the people pull 90 percent of the load,” moans a pastor.

“I offered to help out once,” a layman says in defense. “I got stuck with a class of fourth-grade boys. I don’t know how to teach, don’t relate to kids, and I couldn’t get a replacement.”

Marlene Wilson knows all the stories. But after years in secular volunteer placement work, she began to see how effective and satisfied volunteers were in YMCAs, nursing homes, Red Cross, and so on. Why then the dissatisfaction in her church and others?

Wilson directed a voluntary action center in Boulder, Colorado, for seven years, recruiting and placing volunteers in about ninety nonprofit agencies. Then in 1976 she began her own company, Volunteer Management Associates, to lead workshops in volunteer management throughout the country.

After applying the principles in her home church, Atonement Lutheran in Boulder, and learning from her mistakes, she began to train churches in effective use of volunteers. Churches now account for about half her work.

I asked her what response she’s gotten.

“Some pastors dislike the term ‘volunteers,’ ” she says. “They suggest ‘disciples.’ ” She doesn’t argue; she insists all God’s people are to be ministers.

The first chapter, her theological basis, points out that the doctrines of the priesthood of all believers and spiritual gifts give us reason to be uncomfortable with the practices of many churches.

She then describes an all-too-common situation: church “pillars” burning out, “pew-sitters” feeling unneeded and left out, and empty job slots receiving more attention than the people who are already working.

“The two major dilemmas I find,” she says, “are churches who want the pastor to share more of his work, and he won’t, and the pastor who would like the congregation to pick up more.”

Jane Whosit agonized over what to write on her stewardship form, turned it in and waited . . . and waited . . . and waited.

Mrs. Oldstandby, who leads the women’s group, sits on the church council, and sings in the choir, was asked to help out in the church office. She said yes for fear of letting down the pastor, then lay awake wondering how she would manage this with everything else.

“No one means to overlook Jane Whosit or burn out Mrs. Oldstandby, but it happens all the time,” writes Wilson.

The most effective leader, she argues, is the one who enables other people to minister by involving, supporting, and training them. “The basis of success is not how many hours I put in, but how many people I involve.”

The church serious about overcoming these problems will organize a program to recruit, train, supervise, and evaluate volunteers toward effectively applying their ministry gifts.

Wilson explains clearly the necessary steps to create such a structure. She also provides thirty pages of forms, checklists, sample job descriptions, lists of obstacles and characteristics, and planning sheets to get the program started.

She emphasizes clear job descriptions. People need to know what is expected of them and for how long. Too many people have been burned by endless tasks they never knew they accepted.

Sometimes overwhelming jobs can be broken down into more manageable segments. Perhaps small jobs can be combined into more important roles. New jobs can be created to put the unique gifts of certain members to use.

If this all sounds very businesslike, in many ways it is. But it is anything but impersonal. Wilson emphasizes, not minimizes, people and spiritual gifts.

“First,” she writes, “there is the intentional recruiting of a person for a specific job because he or she has demonstrated the gifts needed.”

She adds, “Be prepared to allow the person to say no gracefully. If a person says yes because he or she feels pressured to do so, the commitment you get may be grudging or half-hearted.”

Don’t assume a negative response to one request means that person wants no involvement. “Very seldom is any follow-up done to see where the individual would like to serve,” she observes.

She recommends an interview, not only to determine whether the person is qualified but also what that person is most eager and suited to do. “The year before we used job descriptions and interviews we had three sign up for the evangelism program,” says Wilson. “The year following we had thirty.”

She’s also willing to take some risks. The freedom to fail often leads to remarkable successes.

Out of her experiences Wilson offers a chapter of the most frequently asked questions:

“What if the wrong person volunteers for the job?”

Answer: “First of all, the person isn’t wrong, the job is wrong for that person. I repeatedly emphasized the importance of matching the right person to the right job. … “

Question: “How can I get out of a volunteer job I’m tired of doing (especially one I’m good at)?”

Answer: “This is where having definite time commitments on the job description helps. … “

These and other answers help clarify both the concepts and the necessary attitudes for this type of work.

What influence does she hope the book will have?

“I would like to see more people ministering outside the church with the church’s encouragement, in scattered ministry rather than gathered,” says Wilson. “The church ought to be celebrating that, not feeling let down.”

Wilson is now working with pastors and lay leaders in “almost every major denomination.” The book discusses the cautious steps necessary in implementing such a new process in a church full of traditions. But, she says, “New churches are the most enthusiastic about it, because they say, ‘If we set it up right we won’t have to undo things later. We want to involve people as they come into the church.’ “

Marlene Wilson has thought creatively, systematically, and seriously about motivating and utilizing individual members in the church. This book can help a lot of us think that way.

A Nondefensive Defense of Small Churches

The Smaller Church in a Super Church Era edited by Jon Johnston and Bill M. Sullivan, Beacon Hill, $5.95

Reviewed by Mark R. Littleton, Millersville, Maryland

“Small is beautiful,” says one pastor.

“Forget it,” says another. “If you stop growing, you’re dead.”

“You’re wrong. Small is for the spiritual.”

The argument could go on and on. But eleven sociologists, all members of the Church of the Nazarene, have jumped into the fray and possibly begun peacemaking instead of haymaking. Their little book (152 pages) not only punctures a lot of hot-air balloons but also provides some zeppelins of its own—of challenge, encouragement, and joy.

What the editors of The Smaller Church want to accomplish is both destructive and constructive. They want to destroy the two extreme assumptions about small churches (less than 150 members). As Bill Sullivan says, “People generally think every small church should grow into a superchurch or it’s a failure. On the other end are those who claim ‘Small is more beautiful than big.’ “

The eleven writers strive hard to explode the myths about little churches that remain little. Those unfair conclusions range from “assuming a severe lack of dedication to making insinuations about a lack of know-how.”

Constructively, the authors want to show that small is not better or worse; it has both strengths and weaknesses, and wise pastors will capitalize on the strengths.

What are these strengths? Intimacy. Family atmosphere. Accountability. Involvement. Small churches are a breeding ground for leaders—young people are given ample opportunity to serve. Simplicity. The quality of worship depends on real worshipers, not actors prancing on a stage. In addition, there’s often a great sense of excitement about a single convert (in contrast to large churches, where an altar call that yields only two is a failure).

As I talked with the editors by phone, I sensed their concern and excitement. All the contributors have been pastors or members of small churches or else closely connected with them. They say unabashedly, “The small church has a long history and a great future.” Jon Johnston loves the intimacy and the challenge of the smaller church.

“You can participate without being perfect,” he says. People are real in small churches. It’s hard to fake it.

The book has a scholarly feel without being professorial. Its contributors all presented papers on the small church at a recent conference of the Association of Nazarene Sociologists of Religion.

These authors want to communicate and motivate. “Throughout history . . . the majority of congregations have had fewer than 100 members.”

The book also has a pastoral bent. “The greatest discovery a smaller church can make is not some organizational strategy or programmatic method but the spiritual power of the Holy Spirit.”

While somewhat repetitive because each author is speaking independently of the others, each writer brings a unique perspective. One chapter by Paul M. Bassett outlines a cameo history of the small church from the days of Christ. Another by B. Edgar Johnson discusses the case history of the Church of the Nazarene as an example of one denomination not only capitalizing on its smaller churches but actually promoting them.

The book is effective as a word of encouragement and challenge. But it will frustrate some readers for its lack of strong biblical theology (not necessarily in substance but in citation) and its apparent jumpiness. Often you feel there’s little connection from one chapter to the next. This is a common fault of anthologies.

If you’re a pastor or member of a smaller church, this book is helpful. First, in making you feel better about yourself (though I think the authors may carry the “small-church complex” to the point of making you feel you ought to have a complex even when you don’t). Second, to give some practical ideas about making your church work at optimum service potential.

Bill Sullivan summed it up well by saying, “No matter what size the church, nothing really happens till someone accepts Christ.” And that can happen anywhere.

Your Best Resource: The People You Know

You and Your Network by Fred Smith, Word, $8.95

Reviewed by Terry Muck, editor, LEADERSHIP

“For sixteen years, Jarrell McCracken (president of Word, Inc.) has been telling me I should write a book. I finally gave in,” said Fred Smith when asked why he wrote You and Your Network. It’s fitting that he wrote in response to a friend’s request, because that’s what this book is all about: how the people you know make a difference in your life—as heroes, models, mentors, peers, friends, enemies, and family.

Smith writes from the point of view of an experienced businessman who has been very active in his local church, as an adviser (to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, Youth for Christ, and Christianity Today, Incorporated), a regular contributor to LEADERSHIP Journal, and a public speaker.

“One of the themes of my speaking and teaching has always been to encourage people to recognize the resource other people can be. Few people adequately think about the effect of their relationships unless they’re negative. I try to get people thinking about how they can be mutually helpful, how they can organize their own private network to live a more effective life.”

Each chapter takes one group and analyzes the importance those people can have in your life. The underlying assumption is that the way you relate to each group determines a great deal about the way you approach life. for example, in the chapter on heroes, Smith writes, “Heroes are the personification of our ideals, the embodiment of our highest values. A society writes its diary by naming its heroes. We as individuals do the same.”

Of models he writes, “Heroes we idolize, models we emulate. A person is easier to emulate than an essay. We are able to query our models and share in the dynamism that drives them. We borrow from their motivation.”

Of mentors: “As we climb the mountain toward the peak the way gets narrower and steeper, and our need for a sure guide is greater. Three areas of life need greater discipline: nobility of spirit, stability of emotion, and intellectual maturity. These cannot be taught by an outsider—they must be shown, lived, and developed.”

Of peers: “Few of us escape peer pressure. Adults talk about its effect on young people, but I find it everywhere. It simply takes a different form with adults.”

Of enemies: “Enemies are the opposite bank of our stream. They help define our existence, often more nearly or clearly than we could or would do.”

Of friends: “Someone jokingly said that you can tell a real friend when you call him from jail. If he asks ‘Where?’ he’s your friend. If he asks ‘Why?’ he isn’t.”

Of family: “If your wife doesn’t treat you as she should, be grateful.”

The cumulative result of these chapters is a recognition that each of us has a network whether we use it or not. We can either use it to our advantage or work around it—but we can’t ignore it. On the down side, that means that despite our attempts to be independent, all the people we know make a difference in our lives. Positively, though, we can take that influence and use it to our benefit.

For local-church leaders, the implications are clear: we need to be sensitive to our personal networks as much as anyone. Even as we are helping others, they are influencing us. And we are not exempt from needing their help. We need to develop ways to maximize that help.

Smith tells one way he did it: “(I developed) a personal board of directors. I picked out eight qualities for my life which I saw personified in various men I knew. I asked them for an autographed picture which I framed and placed in a circle which I could see every day. It sounds corny now, but knowing how deeply I felt about this, I probably would do it again. … I also framed a plain mirror, putting it at the bottom where I could look at myself and then look at these others and consider my growth in the particular qualities which I felt were needed in my life.”

However it’s done, networking can make a difference. You and Your Network can help you think through some of the issues and decide how you can best tap yours.

Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

My brain, like yours, is remarkable. Sometimes it astounds me by creating a string of words or a solution to a complex problem. Yet it also embarrasses me. It’s clumsy; it malfunctions with names and simple tasks.

With names I am like a five-year-old trying to master addition. I seldom have trouble with faces. I can generally remember the emotional setting of a contact and the person’s role and attitude. But in trying to recall the names of even close friends, my brain at times shorts out.

I once felt guilty because of the theory that those who don’t remember names don’t care about people. I gained a bit of comfort when I read an article attacking that idea, but I was even more comforted by incontrovertible proof that the theory is muddle-headed: twice now I have literally forgotten my own name. You without this weakness may think I jest, but for at least two seconds my brain impulses detoured, and I simply couldn’t remember “Harold Myra.” Knowing my strong interest in myself, that devastated the theory.

Actually, our remarkable brains all have weaknesses. A friend described an experience during graduate training in psychology. The professor warned that a series of tests the class was to take might be disillusioning. “You’ll probably find you are brain-damaged.”

My very bright friend was startled. What an odd prediction! But afterward, he and his classmates found that parts of their brains were indeed less than completely functional.

Maybe that’s why I can’t remember names. Or maybe it’s because I have such an abstract brain it always wanders off into broad implications.

Brains are not like bones or kidneys or fingernails. They’re radically different-like Picasso contrasted with Renoir, the Beatles with Bach.

I find it oddly comforting to think of us all going about life with damaged brains. It puts us at one with the mentally handicapped, the socially inept. It helps us think more compassionately about people in prisons who often started life genetically aberrant or were damaged by childhood abuse.

It also may make us a little more relaxed with the brilliant. My son has difficulty with spelling. I happened to mention that to Fred Smith once, and he said, “I have the same problem. They gave up on me at school. They just excused me from spelling. I still can’t spell many simple words.” I was astounded. Fred is one of the most brilliant and successful men I’ve met.

In the book The Soul of a New Machine, programmer Neal Firth is described as a man who could write up to three hundred lines of code in his mind but had a hard time remembering his own phone number He kept his number on a slip of paper in his desk drawer.

As Jay Kesler, president of Youth for Christ, says about both our minds and personalities, “We’re all a little odd. If you rolled any one of us down a hill, we’d flop, flop, flop all the way to the bottom.”

This is not only an aid to both humility and hope for us odd ducks, but it also hints at a mosaic of beautiful interconnectedness.

Fred Smith once also told me a psychiatrist friend had said to him, “You never read a book through, do you, Fred?” This time it was Fred who was astounded. How could the psychiatrist know that? Fred acknowledged that he dips into books for bits and pieces, catching the flavor and key ideas. Fred’s brain works extremely well, but totally different from mine.

My wife, Jeanette, has brilliant intuitions and perceptions, and our brains are about equal in intelligence, but they are as different as an orange and a pear.

All of the above may help explain why a carefully crafted, prayed-over sermon may not hit all brains the same.

To some, the reaction will be like putting a key in a lock. For others, the message is like something in a different language, or at least something with a heavy foreign accent.

All of us tend to think the universe runs its axis through our lives and that our way of thinking is the prime reality. If we’re into Narnia and Middle Earth, we tend to dismiss the line-by-line Bible study crowd as uncreative and parochial, whereas the Bible studiers dismiss the mythopoeics as shallow and less biblical. Part of this is the way our brains work. We all need to be thoroughly Christ-centered and biblical, but can we allow for fully diverse minds and respect each other?

We might be helped in this if we would: (1) probe minds different from ours and learn how they think; (2) accept the fact that despite our best efforts, we may not communicate well with everybody; (3) relax with our limitations.

We need a correct assessment of ourselves. Clark Clifford once observed that Harry Truman had virtually no affectations and no inferiority complex. Though his roots were in the farm and haberdashery, he saw himself neither above nor below his Yale and Harvard-educated Secretary of State, Dean Acheson.

As we with considerable humor learn the truth about ourselves, we can relax with the fact that God made us as we are and has equipped us for our specific tasks. Diversity in a congregation should not be an irritant or a cause of either inferiority feelings or pride. Instead, it should enable us to say with Paul, “I thank God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel” (Phil. 1:3-5 NIV).

Harold L. Myra, President Christianity Today, Inc.

Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

PROTECTING THE CHURCH TREASURER

Don’t ask me how it happened, because I honestly don’t know.

The facts are these: after several months of stable, predictable giving, the income of Sunrise Christian Fellowship mysteriously dropped 40 percent. Our commitments to people and programs were suddenly pinched. Church leaders naturally turned to their treasurer (me) and began asking questions.

It was then I realized the folly of my being the sole person in the church to count, record, and deposit the offerings. I knew I hadn’t had my hand in the till-but how could anyone else be sure? Although no accusations were raised, I was still uncomfortable. I was also greatly relieved when church giving returned to its normal level the next month! We never did figure out what caused the dip.

Many church treasurers are, like me, accountants or businessmen by profession. We view this position as a chance to use our professional skills in God’s work. However, unless some financial controls are in place, our integrity may be jeopardized.

Even the apostle Paul touched on the importance of good church money management in 2 Corinthians 8:20-21 (PHILLIPS): “Naturally we want to avoid the slightest breath of criticism in the distribution of their gifts, and to be absolutely above-board not only in the sight of God but in the eyes of men.”

Here are some practical procedures worth considering:

Have at least two people present whenever offerings are counted. That way nothing irregular can occur, honest or otherwise, without being observed.

If at all possible, separate the functions of record keeping and cash handling. In other words, the treasurer, who likely keeps the church books, should have another trusted person make the actual bank deposits. This way the treasurer cannot be accused of stealing money and then doctoring the books, nor will the depositor have incentive to steal, because he has no access to the books where he could hide the deed.

Require two signatures on checks larger than a certain amount, say $100. Again, the purpose is not so much to prevent fraud as to protect the treasurer’s integrity.

Persons with responsibility for handling cash should be specifically designated by the governing board. They should be elected to their posts if at all possible, in order to avoid the impression of self-serving appointments.

Separate the functions of receiving cash and disbursing cash. Those who count the offering should not be the ones to write and sign checks for disbursem*nt.

Use banking facilities as much as possible. Keep minimal cash on hand.

Record and deposit all cash receipts promptly.

Disburse all funds by check.

The above guidelines help safeguard the church’s money, which is the asset most susceptible to theft. In addition, it is good stewardship to have as much church money as possible earning interest. By using interest-earning checking accounts and money market funds, it is fairly easy to do this, even if the money is to be spent shortly. Church treasurers who have not recently studied the type of bank accounts now being offered should do so, as changes have been rapid in this area in the past two or three years.

The conscientious church treasurer will also appreciate a clear delineation on who is authorized to spend the church’s money and for what purposes. The membership in general, although well-meaning, should not be allowed to purchase items for the church and then present the treasurer with the bill. This puts the treasurer in a difficult position if the item is questionable. In addition, the member has no way of knowing whether the cash was available or whether this was the highest-priority use of the cash at the time.

A middle road is to authorize one person in each area of ministry to make limited purchases. Such persons-and this includes pastors-must be diligent to turn in organized, complete records so all monetary transactions can be traced and verified as proper. The treasurer should have the ability to prove his or her innocence if necessary.

Even though such procedures may be more time-consuming, bothersome, and expensive, the treasurer’s integrity and reputation are at stake. For the small church to apply all of these principles may be difficult. However, many of these are easy to implement at little expense in time or money.

In addition, most church members consider financial integrity a must. Their feeling of security in the proper handling of their offerings has a direct relationship to how freely they give.

One final suggestion: If possible, make your treasurer a part of the inner circle of leadership. Let this person sense and help develop the vision for the church, praying with you over key decisions and problems. This tells the treasurer that his key role is more than tending ledger sheets; it is caring for people.

The role of treasurer is certainly one of the spiritual “gifts of administration” (1 Cor. 12:28). The office of treasurer is thus a position of spiritual leadership within the body.

When the people view the treasurer in this light, it tends to negate any “appearances of evil.” They see this person as committed to the core motives and goals of the church, not just a detached money handler.

The church treasurer performs a necessary and important function. The pastor and governing board can make the job more enjoyable and less dangerous by following these ideas. Most importantly, the treasurer can help move the church forward in its basic mission of caring for the flock and reaching to the community.

Dan W. Hess is assistant professor of business at Seattle Pacific University.

PASTORAL CARE ANYTIME, NO QUESTIONS ASKED

As one way of showing the church’s young people he loves them-with no strings attached-Pastor Dwain Olson of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Waukesha, Wisconsin, periodically prints this invitation in the church newsletter:

If you are in a jam . . . call Pastor at home, 547-2420, or the office, 542-7665.

A while back, a girl was killed in a one-car accident. Her date was drunk, and he slammed into a tree, killing her instantly. If you are ever in a situation where things aren’t what you think they should be . . . leave. Better to lose your “friends” than your life or your virginity.

If the party is going bad . . . leave. Call your parents to come and get you. If no one can be reached, call me collect (you can call collect from any pay phone), and I’ll come and get you NO QUESTIONS ASKED.

You are a member of this family, and that is what it means to belong to a family.

Olson reports: “When the note was originally written, I was thinking about our young people. But the first person to take advantage of the offer was a middle-aged church member who had been picked up by the police. He was allowed one phone call, and since he knew his wife wasn’t home, he called me, tersely saying where he was and asking me to get his wife and bring cash to bail him out.”

For the next six hours, Olson and the man’s wife sat in the station, wondering what had happened and waiting for the police to finish the paperwork.

“When he was finally released, he said, ‘I’m too ashamed to talk about it,'” says Olson. “I reassured him of what I had written; he didn’t need to explain anything to me. If he ever wanted to talk about it, that was his privilege.

“The next day he returned the bail money I’d loaned him, and weeks later he was ready to talk about the incident with me.”

Since then, Olson says, he doesn’t assume young people are the only ones who need such help. He’s rewritten the note now for a broader audience.

“I don’t do it to be dramatic,” he says. “I just want to illustrate what unconditional love is all about.”

MOVING RIGHT ALONG . . .

There’s less talk and earlier adjournments these days in the monthly Session meetings at Key Biscayne Presbyterian Church in Florida. That’s because many of the routine approvals are now handled by “Decision Memos.”

“Each elder with oversight of a certain department is authorized to fill out a form telling what he’s decided,” explains Cathy Wyatt, the church’s administrative assistant. “The form includes a description of the particulars plus ‘Reasons For’ and ‘Reasons Against.’ A copy goes in every elder’s mailbox, and if no one speaks up in seven days, the action proceeds.”

For example, if the elder in charge of Christian education talks with the staff and they decide they want to show the James Dobson film series on the family, he fills out a Decision Memo giving dates, costs, promotion plans, and why he feels this would be a good event for the church.

Any fellow elder who thinks otherwise will see the memo and phone the first elder to raise a red flag. The two of them work it out or else ask Wyatt to put the matter on the docket for the next Session meeting-which rarely happens.

“The memos are used for things that are fairly certain to be approved,” she adds. “The system took some clarifying in the beginning, but the longer we use it, the more we appreciate its advantages.”

THOSE WITH AN EAR (PLUG) TO HEAR

Several members of the Locust Street Church of Christ were complaining they couldn’t hear. Turning up the P.A. still didn’t produce enough volume, and the small church couldn’t afford to wire a special system for the hearing-impaired.

J. Richard Lewis, minister of the Johnson City, Tennessee, congregation, discovered a creative solution for less than $100.

“We bought a small FM wireless microphone from Radio Shack for under $25,” he says. “It’s half the size of a matchbox, and we mounted it on one of our P.A. speakers.” The church also purchased four small FM radios with ear plugs for approximately $15 each. (“Those with an adjustable tone control work best,” says Lewis.)

Because it’s difficult to explain to those with hearing difficulty how the system works, the tuner is preset to the right frequency and covered with tape. “Otherwise they might be listening to rock ‘n’ roll,” Lewis says with a grin.

“The system is great. You can hear anywhere in the building. And when one of our members had a back injury that prevented him from climbing stairs, he listened on his FM car radio in the parking lot.”

JOYFUL GIVERS

Offering time at Vacation Bible School usually doesn’t net much, simply because children don’t have cash on hand, and parents forget to send some.

Last summer, Trinity United Methodist Church in Clermont, Georgia, came up with a better idea. “We were searching for ways to make the daily offering more meaningful,” says Pastor Roger Bourgeois. “Jean Braselton, our VBS director, suggesting collecting food for needy families instead of the usual nickels and dimes.”

A flier went home with the sixty children on Monday explaining the change, “and the response was fantastic,” says the pastor.

“The enthusiasm and joy at offering time was beautiful. The value of the offering tripled what had been our usual experience,” resulting in $50 worth of nonperishable items that filled a large box.

The cans were exhibited the following Sunday to stimulate church adults to do likewise. Then the food was given to Gateway House, a local shelter for battered women and children. The VBS youngsters had also brought dog and cat food, which went to the humane society.

Trinity plans to expand the approach this summer, bringing in special speakers to make brief presentations to the children about hunger.

A side benefit: non-Christian parents of VBS attenders respond more positively to this idea than to the church once again asking for money.

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Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

I rose early for devotions, but it wasn’t starting off well. I read for the third time the Swahili letter from one of our national pastors telling me he was leaving his church and moving to another area.

For five years I had worked with this young man, teaching him the Scriptures and helping him start his church in the bush area of Kenya. It’s not easy to find willing, educated Turkanans to be pastors. I regretted his decision, but my overwhelming concern was for Pastor Diyo himself. His letter expressed the feelings of so many servants of God, regardless of where they live-discouraged, defeated, unhappy.

My mind wandered back over my fifteen years in the ministry. I knew what Pastor Diyo was feeling. I know what it’s like to work hard but never feel I’m accomplishing anything worthwhile for the Master. I could sympathize with his frustration of working with people whose response and spiritual growth was very slow.

My first pastorate was in an air force town. Equipped with a zeal surpassing all common sense, I set out to build my ministry for God. Each time our church finally got the right personnel to fill the positions necessary for growth, Uncle Sam would transfer half the teaching staff. Every six months we’d slide back to square one. After three years I left, discouraged and defeated.

Discontentment in the ministry is certainly not unusual: in fact, it’s probably the norm. Contentment doesn’t come naturally, and not all situations are conducive for it, but the last seven years of my ministry have been most fulfilling, a marked contrast to my first pastorate.

What makes the difference between a servant who is frustrated and one who is content? Here’s what I’ve learned.

Contentment comes in exercising your spiritual gifts. The average pastor is expected to be a jack of all trades with the ability to master them all. But the Scriptures clearly teach that all Christians, including pastors, are only given certain spiritual gifts for the profit of the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:4-7). Discontentment sets in when people want to minister, but their gifts don’t coincide with their duties. Many pastors are performing tasks, day after day, that they don’t enjoy and are not spiritually equipped to perform.

Though I like people, I am not a “people person.” My gift is not gab, and though I worked at them diligently, my pastoral visitation and counseling left a lot to be desired.

Some people love to stand before a congregation to preach. When I have to preach, I get the bends. Yet, as a pastor I preached twice a Sunday for six years. Is it any wonder those years were filled with discouragement?

Most missionaries are builders, workers with their hands. I am not gifted in this area; I have trouble driving a nail straight. Though I travel hundreds of miles in the desert alone, if my vehicle broke down, I would be stranded, for I’m no mechanic. There was a time I felt discouraged about this, but then the Holy Spirit showed me that not all his servants must be carbon copies. I began to see that the Lord wants me to exercise my gifts, not fret over talents I don’t have.

My strong suit, my spiritual gift, is teaching. As a pastor, the only task I really enjoyed was teaching my Sunday school class and Wednesday night Bible study. Here in Kenya I spend most of my hours writing study materials in Swahili and teaching in a Bible institute. I’ve never been so content. Why? Because I’m doing a job I’m equipped to handle.

Contentment comes when you enjoy your ministry. You only enjoy a ministry when you’re doing the work the Holy Spirit has equipped you to do.

Contentment is enjoying your ministry right now where you are. If you cannot enjoy the daily ministry, it’s a cinch you won’t enjoy the accomplished goal. If you don’t have satisfaction in the journey, you won’t be satisfied when you reach the destination.

I wish I’d been able to see thirteen years ago that the air force wasn’t sabotaging my ministry-it was extending it around the globe!

Contentment is financial stability, not financial security. My salary when I entered the pastorate was $57.50 a week. From that handsome sum I paid our rent, utilities, food, car expenses . . . everything. Of necessity I learned the importance of managing finances. Looking back on those lean years, I honestly don’t know how we made it. The Lord was gracious. Though we didn’t have much, we were never in debt.

The number one killer of contentment is financial instability. Many pastors never settle into the ministry of Christ because they are married to their credit cards. Financial stability does not come with an increase of money supply. Government spending is a classic example that throwing more money into a program does not insure stability.

Blessed is the man who learns the art of money management. Regardless of his annual income, he will know contentment.

Contentment is knowing the true value of things. Lack of self-control is a sign of instability, especially in the area of possessions.

I have a pastor friend who is obsessed with clothes. I’ve accused him of spending more time in men’s shops than in his study. He’s never content with his wardrobe; there’s always something he must buy.

Another pastor I know would be absolutely red-faced driving last year’s model.

Another pastor finally saved enough money to purchase his own home. Unfulfilled, he continued to invest his money until he finally left the ministry so he could keep up with his investments.

Perhaps it was necessary for me to move to Kenya and work with destitute tribes before I could understand the meaning of Agur’s prayer, “Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is my portion” (Prov. 30:8).

There’s never a time I enter an American church that I don’t think of the Christians in Kenya meeting in their mud buildings. Each time I look into my closet filled with shirts and trousers I think of those in the desert who have nothing. At meal time I think of those who go to bed hungry.

Forgive me for sounding like a missionary, but I’ve learned that things, though nice to have, are not really all that valuable. Happy is the man who can say with Paul, “If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content” (1 Tim. 6:8).

Contentment doesn’t mean a problem-free life. Paul was in prison when he wrote, “I have learned to be content whatever the circ*mstances” (Phil. 4:11). Contentment is a state of mind. We determine our outlook on life by our attitude. Or, as Abraham Lincoln said, “A man is about as happy as he makes up his mind to be.” If a person has his priorities straight, he will be content, even in the midst of a storm.

Contentment doesn’t mean a person is lazy, lacks goals, or is not self-motivated. The pastor exercising spiritual gifts will never be content with mediocrity. If there is a tribe yet to be reached, a book yet to be written, a visit yet to be made, the minister of Christ will not rest until the task has been completed. It is actually discontentment that destroys self-motivation. Discouragement saps energy and the desire to set goals.

The fear of contentment is a cultural disease. A Chinese philosopher stated, “The most outstanding characteristic of the Eastern civilization is to know contentment, whereas that of the Western civilization is not to know contentment.”

Contentment is something not easily or quickly learned. The late Dr. Noel Smith told an old friend from his hospital bed, “Just about the time a man learns how to live, it’s time to die.” Sadly, for some people, they never learn how to live. They never learn, as 1 Timothy 6:6 says, that “godliness with contentment is great gain.” That balance is also the way of effective ministry.

-Richard Lewis

Kitale, Kenya

Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

My first experience in small-group ministry is now over-sooner than I expected. But I still believe in the concept. Even though I made so many mistakes, I intend to go out and try again. In fact, I’m already involved in a second small group, and I’ve taken steps to safeguard against the problems I’m about to describe.

The first group started after my Sunday school class complained that forty-five minutes wasn’t enough time to do the text justice. I suggested we meet on some weeknight in addition to Sunday morning.

One couple volunteered their home, and before long, their living room was filled with young adults we never could have coaxed out of bed for Sunday school. More important, the teaching enjoyed an efficiency over tortilla chips and cola that somehow had hit snags coming over a pulpit or lectern. The church had given me a license to preach, but the small group gave me license to minister.

We made some serious blunders, however. What were they? Here are several.

Prone to Clone

Having never been a guru before, I had no idea how easy it is to abuse your position of prominence and clone others in your image.

Our group granted me the positions of Discussion Leader, Teacher, Information Clearinghouse, and Interpreter of Holy Writ-and I too readily accepted.

At first I praised the Lord for a group so responsive to my discipling, but I started hearing things that scared me. People began quoting me the way I quoted C. S. Lewis and C. H. Spurgeon. I heard not only my words, illustrations, anecdotes, mottoes, and doctrinal positions being repeated, but also my attitudes and prejudices. It wasn’t so bad that they adopted my soteriology and even my eschatology, but they were assuming my personality! I wondered if Jim Jones started out this way.

What precautions should I have taken?

I should have insisted that others in the group lead the studies with gradually increasing frequency. I should have asked fewer questions with “right” answers. I should have gradually extricated myself and forced them to go on without me as their role model.

Resisting My Natural Bent

Allowing myself to become the long-term leader played against my natural strengths. I’m a starter, not a sustainer.

Our original plan was for me to start the group, leave it in the hands of whatever leadership God raised up, and move on to launch another group. But I was swayed from my better judgment.

Yes, we started a spin-off group for people who couldn’t meet on Tuesdays, but it never really took off. Instead of leading that group myself, I delegated the missionary task to two young men I’d been meeting with one-on-one. They were good students, willing “missionaries,” but the fact remains that I was the more gifted spark plug. The main group would have done fine under their leadership; the second group would have done better under mine.

Leading a Bible study over the long haul is like pastoring-you become a marriage counselor, demonologist, and psychotherapist. My living room became a refuge for the romantically disturbed. Since my gifts are more prophetic than pastoral, I was playing a role God hadn’t intended me to play. I wound up tired, frustrated, impatient.

This wouldn’t have happened if I’d stuck to my plan of starting but letting others sustain.

People We Didn’t Expect

When word gets out that something significant is going on in so-and-so’s living room, you’ll attract two kinds of people who can spell trouble: (1) those with emotional or psychological problems who see your group as a crisis intervention center, and (2) offbeat theological nomads looking for a group to take over.

Our group didn’t do so well with those looking for psychoanalysis. I read Gary Collins, Jay Adams, and every other counseling expert I could find, but I ended up referring the troubled souls to local ministers who had doctorates in counseling. The troubled souls merely drifted through in their search for a couch.

We did better with the traveling heretics. If you measure success by the ability to drown dissonant voices, we were most impressive.

One night several cultists dropped in and wanted to challenge me on two or three basics of orthodoxy. For once I was glad I’d cloned myself among the members of the group. I just sat back and listened as two of the guys I’d been meeting for breakfast over a systematic theology text soundly out-debated the outsiders. The nonnegotiables of orthodoxy were well defended without me opening my mouth. If I hadn’t done much else right, at least I’d developed a couple of better-than-average apologists for the faith.

An Informal Institution

The nonchurchy, spontaneous atmosphere of our group was its most basic appeal. It was my fault we lost it. In an effort to develop cohesion and identity, we developed too many trappings of an institution.

One of my early mistakes was bringing in outside speakers once a month. I thought it would give us access to the best possible teaching. But attendance dropped on those nights, the group voting their disapproval by their absence. Those who came were hesitant to open up with questions or comments.

Another mistake was trying to give the group a name. Being identified with a catchy name and logo would draw us closer, I thought, but the group saw the innovation as churchiness. They continued to call our group simply “the Bible study.”

The whole group was at fault for yet another feature: we behaved like jealous lovers when one of our number left for another activity or ministry. The heart of institutionalism is demanding self-interested loyalty, which should never characterize Christians, whose only justifiable loyalty is their allegiance to Christ. We would never say so, but we began feeling ours was the best, if not the only, game in town. We forgot our purposes of discipleship, evangelism, and Bible knowledge. We just wanted to preserve our group.

We even had a liturgy of sorts. We ate junk food at a certain time, prayed at a certain time, shared, and of course, I taught-all in proper order. We lost our initial spontaneity and became so rigid that visitors felt like outsiders and didn’t come back. We no longer offered the cozy supplement to the church; we had become our own church.

The End of Our Beginning

I once heard J. Vernon McGee say something to the effect that most organizations get started because there’s a real need that ought to be met, but many groups perpetuate themselves long after the goals have been met. They outlive their usefulness.

From the beginning I viewed the Bible study as a temporary work that would meet some needs, fill a gap, and then pass away when no longer needed. I often thought of Amos the prophet, who rose from obscurity to speak the words God gave him and then, his mission completed, had enough sense to shut up and go back to his herds. I vowed I would be like Amos and disband the small group when my prophetic mission was accomplished.

Eventually came the day when I felt the Bible study had outlived its purpose. Most of the people were in churches that, for the most part, met their needs, and the few who hadn’t yet joined organized congregations were spiritually strong enough to survive without the weekly spoon feeding. Of course, there were a few who relied on the group heavily-too heavily, I thought. I suspected they would grow more if made to fend for themselves.

The first time I suggested we disband, the group protested. I gave it more time but urged them to pray for God’s direction and to examine their motives for seeing the group continue.

The next time I suggested dissolution, there were nods of agreement. We met one more time, and then called it quits.

Two Words of Warning

Ministry in a small group requires a solid ecclesiology. Without it, two pitfalls become real dangers for small-group leaders.

First, people can make you feel you have to start a church, if not formally, at least informally, complete with polity, clergy, and other trappings. The danger is losing sight of the original purpose; the group can begin to exist for its own sake.

Remember Amos. God may be raising up a neighborhood Bible study or a young-adult sharing group just for a certain time. Meet as long as you see fruit. Quit when the purposes have been fulfilled.

A second pitfall is thinking that because you’re not a church, you can get by with less commitment and preparation. The difference between an organized church and a home Bible study is often no more than people sitting in pews or on sofas. The body of Christ is anatomically identical whether in a living room or a cathedral. It requires our best effort.

Don’t confuse the wineskins with the wine. Whether the wineskins are organized churches with pews and payrolls or home Bible studies with coffee and questions, the wine is the same.

So small groups are sometimes fraught with dangers-largely in the temptation to make them something they’re not or in not respecting them for all they are. But don’t allow the perils to dissuade you.

Despite my less-than-perfect experience, I still believe the small group is the best vehicle available for the full employment of all the spiritual gifts and blessings in the church.

Joe Higginbotham is a layman in St. Albans, West Virginia.

Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.