No one cares about your church

[James Nored]

I was asking a young woman in Starbucks the other day where she went to church. Her name is Katie.

Katie said that she had started going to a church. She had only been only been going one time, but she liked how the minister was interactive and applied to lesson to real life.

 

Her co-worker asked her, you don't know which church it was or it's name?

 

She said, "Does it matter?"

 

Three things struck me about this conversation. First, though she had only gone once, this young woman said that she "going to this church." Church "attendance" is at an all time low, particularly with younger people.

 

Second, this girl could care less about the church's denomination. Denominational loyalty is also at an all time low, including my own fellowship ("Church of Christ"). If we think that we can make denominational appeals to younger people and that they will care, think again. They care about Jesus, social justice issues, mission, practical daily living, that type of thing.

 

Third, we have no conception of just how low the appeal of "going to church" is today amongst most younger people. It takes a burning, passionate, Christ-centered church that meets people where they are to reach them. And even then, they may be perfectly content to worship once in a blue moon and feel that they are a part of that church.

 

What trends do you see in church "attendance" and church loyalty amongst younger generations?

[Timothy Tien]

Terry, I agree there is no 'professional Christian', but there can be a called, sanctified, elder/overseer/shepherd who does not work outside the church for money.  I see plenty of scriptures that would justify that, and none that would disallow it.  We may have distorted biblical polity (we have) but I think 'professional Christian' is a strawman.

[James Nored]

Well said, Timothy! Thanks for the discussion and the spirit offered here.

[Timothy Tien]

Once again, James and Terry, careful exegesis.  Do either of you know if any or all elders worked exclusively for a church, and did (or did not) take paying jobs outside the church?  And how did they go about calculating the 'double honor', and thus, implicitly, the 'single honor'?  We do know that Paul rejected wages--to which he was entitled--from some churches but accepted financial support from others.  The part/full time thing might be a falser dichotomy.  We also know that Paul worked--pretty hard at times, not in ministry--providing goods in exchange for pay while doing ministry.  We might be able to infer from 1 Tim 5 that the elders in Jerusalem were getting paid from gifts and offerings.  Certainly, I don't come away thinking that Jesus wanted Peter to go back to the fishing business, after saying to fish for men instead.  We have a hard enough time interpreting and understanding what the Bible explicitly says.  Let's try to minimize iron-sharpening-iron on what it is effectively silent.  I am sure we all know what the NT says about arguments and philosophies--they are quickly depreciating.  I am probably quite guilty of stepping over the line, I hope you can forgive my crude and rushed attempts to defend the authority and relevance of scripture in our cultural context.

[James Nored]

Paul said, "For Scripture says, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain," and “The worker deserves his wages” (1 Timothy 5:18). Paying someone or not paying them does not make 1st and 2nd class citizens. If that were the case, then Paul would not have said this.

Luke records this:  
"¹ After this, Jesus traveled about from one town and village to another, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve were with him, ² and also some women who had been cured of evil spirits and diseases: Mary (called Magdalene) from whom seven demons had come out; ³ Joanna the wife of Chuza, the manager of Herod’s household; Susanna; and many others. These women were helping to support them out of their own means" (Lk. 8:1-3). Jesus and the Twelve were supported by these women. I'm sure that Jesus would not have allowed this to happen if he thought that it would make them second class citizens or it was somehow wrong to support people in ministry--whatever you call it.

[Timothy Tien]

James, I appreciate your thoughtful and biblical response, and am inspired by your life testimony.  To be clearer, I was not talking about physical comfort.  I was talking about cultural comfort that is not easily connected back to scripture. 

 

Just as our society was culturally comfortable with slavery (see the original Constitution's 3/5ths slavery language), sexism, racism, etc.  we are culturally comfortable with pastorism today.  It is a lesser violation, of course, but one none the less, I contend.

 

I know many doctors and many pastors, and the latter are much more comfortable, if we ignore how comfortable cars and real estate can be.  Pastors have better hours, more vacation, the ones who don't deal much with social justice don't have to deal with the germs, halitosis, other secretions ... that doctors and other medical professionals do, and do not live under the accountability--legal, liability, risk, fatality, malpractice, regulatory--that doctors do.  Because pastors are idolized in our culture, pastors don't have spiritual accountability.  Tim Haggard comes to mind, but I can assemble a list if you'd like.

 

I love my pastor and respect him and he is extremely gifted in preaching and teaching.  What is important, his heart is tender toward God and he is very humble and also optimistically displosed; basically, a joy to work with and to learn from.  But he would be fired if he had my job (I started to specify the 3 major areas of violation, but did not to forget the lessons of Weiner).  I am not saying that pastors don't sacrifice, especially as pastors get paid like public school teachers without the pension and healthcare benefits.  But don't cry me a river.  the average or median person in China lives on less than one-tenth the average or median pastor in America.

[James Nored]

Timothy, do I think that most churches are skewed towards "pastoral" roles? If by this you mean nurturing of believers and "feeding the flock," then yes. Hirsch has said that the pastor and teacher roles are almost exclusively upheld in most churches, which leads churches towards an inward focus and never doing anything that might upset anyone. Meanwhile, the gifts of apostle (or missional leadership), prophet, and evangelist are virtually ignored. I totally agree with this. The latter three gifts upset the status quo, and therefore are marginalized.

 That does not mean that it is wrong to recognize someone with a pastoral role, or to pay someone who preaches and teaches as Paul says is legitimate. By the way, in our fellowship, my role is referred to as a minister or evangelist, and we have elders/shepherd/pastors/overseers. We try to distinguish between these gifts, while recognizing that they at times overlap.

You say, "I think you are subrogating scripture to your personal comfort as it pertains to current polity.  Just because your seminary professors and mentors accept the pastor construct as it is structured today does not mean that they have read, interpreted, understood and applied NT theology when it comes to biblical church governance." How can you possibly make this assessment? I dropped out of medical school to go into full time ministry. I was tithing towards the church and supporting those who were paid in ministry and doing mission work when I was working and in medical school because I wanted to and believed that it was biblical. It had nothing to do with my comfort, and I was not getting any pay at this time. If comfort were my primary concern, I would have stayed in medical school and made a whole lot more money than I ever would as a minister. How can you assume people's motives and make these kind of judgments?

And our fellowship has studied NT theology and leadership issues extensively. We are not perfect, certainly, but the goal of our fellowship has been to restore New Testament Christianity. We are part of the "Restoration Movement."

[Timothy Tien]

Terry, I would be careful to explain the distinctions between gifts, roles, and responsibilties.  For instance, 1 Tim 5 talks about honoring any and all elders who lead well, but then makes a special shout out for preaching and teaching.  Did Paul preach and teach?  Was Paul an apostle, prophet, and evangelist?  If anything, Paul was everything but a poimen (shepherd or pastor), given his issues with John Mark and Barnabas.  Now, I can't say I know anyone today who is remotely like Paul.  But I am unsure that we can cleanly decompose what his precise gifts, roles, and responsibilities over his ministry life were.  In fact, probably the greatest pronouncement of gifting Paul ever made was in 1 Cor 14:18, and in context, that was the least of all gifts.  We all need to be careful in our exegesis.

[Timothy Tien]

James:  I don't think Terry has an issue with 'pastor' in the context of Eph 4.  I certainly don't.  I have a problem with 'pastor' in the context of the seminary-church complex today.  Wouldn't you say that, practically and realistically speaking, that we are skewing towards pastor and ignoring the other roles?  I'd bet my 3 kids' college savings that pastors in this country receive more church payroll money than apostles, prophets, evangelists, and teachers combined.  I'm not saying that money is the best yardstick.  But it does reflect the values of today's church culture.  I am willing to go on other yardsticks, too, but ultimately, I believe that Terry is calling you to use the Bible as a yardstick ahead of culture.  In this area, I think you are subrogating scripture to your personal comfort as it pertains to current polity.  Just because your seminary professors and mentors accept the pastor construct as it is structured today does not mean that they have read, interpreted, understood and applied NT theology when it comes to biblical church governance.  To me, they accept the construct because to do otherwise would make it hard to feed their families.

[James Nored]

Terry, please read that article more closely. This is not something that I wrote. This is a reposting of an article by Eugene Cho. These are Cho's words.

But this is beside the point. Jesus was dealing with a heart issue, and it is not our job to look into people's hearts. I don't think Cho is saying that he loves the honor and accolades of being a pastor, but the ministry which he does.

The NT does describe people in various ways. Paul talks about Timothy as a minister. Philip is called an evangelist. Peter refers to other shepherds as fellow shepherds. Eph. 4:11 lists apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. Describing people by their role is found in the NT.

[James Nored]

Terry, where are you talking about? Which blog post?