Who Stole My Church?: What to Do When the Church You Love Tries to Enter the 21st Century
248
Who Stole My Church?: What to Do When the Church You Love Tries to Enter the 21st Century
248Paperback
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Overview
Has your church been stolen out from under you?
A storm hits a small New England town late one evening, but the pelting rain can’t keep a small group of church members from gathering to discuss issues that lately have been brewing beneath the surface of their congregation. They could see their church was changing. The choir had been replaced by a fl ashy “praise band.” The youth no longer dressed in their “Sunday best.” The beautiful pipe organ sat unused. How will this group overcome a deepening rift in their fellowship and nourish the relationship between the young and old? Can their church survive or even thrive?
Who Stole My Church? is a fictional story that tells the all too real tale of many church communities today. In this book you can walk alongside an imaginary community, led by real life pastor Gordon MacDonald and his wife, Gail, and discover how to meet the needs of all believers without abandoning the dreams and desires of any.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780785230496 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Nelson, Thomas, Inc. |
| Publication date: | 01/11/2010 |
| Pages: | 248 |
| Sales rank: | 884,580 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.40(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.70(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Who Stole My Church?
What to Do When the Church You Love Tries to Enter the Twenty-First CenturyBy Gordon MacDonald
Thomas Nelson
Copyright © 2007 Gordon MacDonaldAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-7852-2601-7
Chapter One
From my pastoral notes:Yvonne Padula: widow, Wheaton College grad. Husband, Paul (doctor), died of coronary disease in 1997. Long-time Sunday school teacher. Loves traveling, cruises. Grew up in the church. Serious about photography. Will shoot pictures anytime you want. Speaks bluntly and takes no prisoners.
I began our meeting with words I'd rehearsed several times during my drive through the rain to the church: "I feel as if I've failed you." It was a good way to start because it clearly grabbed everyone's attention. And I wasn't trying to manipulate anyone-I meant what I said. I felt I had something to make right with them. The comment created an instant intensity around the table.
"I should have sat down with you long before the last business meeting we just had, and I should have sought out more diligently your feelings about some issues here in the church. I also should have been more candid with you about what the leadership and the elders were trying to do on an evening like that. It really bothers me that apparently you didn't feel consulted when this decision came up for a vote.
"Perhaps we could talk candidly this evening about your feelings and attitudes. Maybe you could explain to me why you said some of the things you said in that meeting."
The group didn't need much encouragement. Once they knew I wasn't going to be defensive, they told me everything that was on their minds and, perhaps, a little bit more than I was ready to hear. Beyond my initial description of the group, I'm not going to overload you with a list of names of those who were at the table. I'll let you pick up the names and something about each of them as we go along. In fact, why don't I let you thumb through the pastoral notes I've taken on each person I've come to know in the church? These are incidentals I've jotted down in a little black notebook I keep on my desk. I'll place one of these at the opening to each chapter.
Connie Peterson, not surprisingly, was the first to speak when I opened things for discussion. "Honestly, Pastor, I don't see why these new people feel that they have to change everything we have done for so many years. I never know anymore what to expect when I come to church. And, I'll be frank, if you want to know the truth, I can't get used to you not wearing a suit and tie. We were taught that you honor God by the way you dress in church."
We were only about six minutes into the evening, and I'd already learned lesson one about meetings like this: don't invite candor if you're a thin-skinned pastor, especially in New England. And I relearned lesson one several more times as the rest of the group seemed to take courage from Connie's boldness. I suppose the fact that I didn't flinch or respond to her comment about my Sunday morning attire signaled to everyone else that they could let fly.
"If it ain't broke, don't fix it. That's what I always say," John Sanders, the onetime building committee chairman, said. "These guys around here want to fix stuff that isn't broke as far as I'm concerned."
"They're worried about loudspeakers when what we really need," said Ted Patton, once an elder in the church, "is to get Wednesday night prayer service started again. Prayer meetings are the true test of how much a church loves the Lord. Why, we used to fill the whole sanctuary with people on Wednesday nights."
"Now really, Ted," Lillian Seamands retorted. "How many times did that happen? The sanctuary get filled for a prayer service, I mean. I can only remember the one time ... when Cliff McGinnis was dying."
Turning to me, Lillian said, "Truthfully though, there used to be a lot more people come to midweek services on Wednesday night than come now."
Lillian, I had come to appreciate during my time at the church, was all logic, and she wouldn't let anyone-even me-exaggerate. Ted chose wisely not to debate with her.
I could see that the conversation was only warming up. But, I wondered, was it warming up in a way that fit my objectives for the evening?
"Someone else?" I asked.
"What bothers me is that we don't have Sunday school anymore," said Yvonne Padula. "We used to have a wonderful Sunday school class. Called it the Home Builders. Connie, you and Lars were in Home Builders, weren't you?"
Connie nodded her head and said, "Now that room was packed every Sunday. I remember that Lars would always take up the offering for missionaries. We loved Elliot's teaching." Several agreed and told a few Elliot Coffin stories.
"Let's talk missions. I've wanted to say this for a long time," Ernie Yost interrupted the brief trip down the Sunday school nostalgia lane. His daughter, Amy, and her husband were missionaries in Colombia. "Missions is really going downhill in this church. The missions budget has been flat for years now. We used to have a missionary conference every year, and there would be several missionaries here from all sorts of places. There'd be pictures and stories and the young people would dedicate their lives to become missionaries.... We haven't had a missionary conference for ... um, at least twenty years. I bet we haven't had a missionary speaker preach one Sunday morning for all those years either. This church just doesn't care any longer about getting the gospel overseas."
I knew that Ernie was having trouble coming to grips with the changing scene of missions in the larger world. But that, too, is another story. And I chose to let his words stand for the moment. I was there, I reminded myself, to listen.
"Well, if we're getting things off our chests-" Russ Milner spoke up, took a breath, and continued, "I wish there was more doctrinal preaching. How are these young people going to grow in the Word if they don't get some good solid teaching? I can remember when Pastor Collier preached through Romans verse by verse. Took almost three years before he got to the end-"
"That was the most mind-deadening collection of sermons I ever heard," Lillian interrupted, just as she'd done with Ted on the prayer service comment.
There was a lot of laughter when Lillian said that, and I got the feeling that more than a few were relieved that someone had said what they were thinking.
When the laughter subsided, Lillian continued. "Sorry ... that just slipped out. But I agree with you, Russ. We need to teach these young people more Bible truth. I don't think they know their Bibles at all. They don't bring their Bibles to church anymore. They don't memorize God's Word like we used to. And I don't think they know any of the Bible stories." Now everyone-even Russ-murmured in agreement.
Then, for a moment, there was silence. It was almost as if everyone had run out of breath; they had to stop and think whether there was anything else that wasn't happening like it used to years ago. And in that moment I made a mistake. I asked a question-I guess I asked it just to fill the silent space: "What do you think have been the better moments you have had in this church? What are your very best memories? When did they happen?"
Want me to be honest? I really thought a few might talk about something that had happened in the last year or two-you know, during the years I had been there. I'm amazed, looking back at the evening, that I would have assumed this, but I actually thought they might forget about all that yesterday stuff and recall something that had happened during the past year or two. A sermon I'd preached, for example. Or last Christmas when we had such a beautiful Christmas eve service, and everyone said it was the best ever. Perhaps they'd remember the day the congregation took up an enormous spontaneous offering for hurricane victims in the South. Or maybe someone would express delight in the housing project we'd undertaken with the Habitat for Humanity people.
I wasn't looking for compliments (well, maybe I was), but I was searching for any hint that the last few years had brought some gladness or satisfaction to them. I was hoping that they could revel in the fact that the church was going forward even though they were no longer in control. But I was wrong.
Their best moments? Let's just say that it went back to things that happened thirty years ago. Such as the weekend in 1972 when the president of Moody Bible Institute had come all the way from Chicago and preached a weekend Bible conference. Several remembered it well. Someone even remembered his Scripture text. One or two others described a citywide evangelistic campaign in the early eighties, and John talked about how the church had summoned all of its faith and energies to build our gymnasium in 1993.
Then this from Ted: "You know, it wasn't any one best moment. It was the singing we used to do ... on Sunday nights. Anyone remember when Joe Lund was our song leader?" Everyone remembered. "The thing I miss most is the hymns. We don't sing them anymore. I miss 'The Old Rugged Cross' and 'I Come to the Garden Alone.'" Then, looking at me, Ted asked, "Couldn't we just sing some hymns again?"
Several weighed in with other favorites: "When We All Get to Heaven," "Since Jesus Came into My Heart," "When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder," "It Is Well with My Soul."
I made another mental note (but said nothing) that they had picked song titles that all came out of one particular musical era more than a hundred years ago. That era of gospel singing was reaching its end when they (we) were kids. None had mentioned the earlier hymns of Charles Wesley or one like "Crown Him with Many Crowns"-writers and songs from an even earlier time. They'd been nursed on a form of gospel music that had been around for, relatively speaking, only a short time and thought it was the only hymnody in the Christian movement.
Winn Rilkey, who is a floor manager at Home Depot, was sitting to my right, and he spoke up for the first time. "Yep, you're right. The old hymns had doctrine in them. These new songs the young people sing don't have any doctrine. As far as I can see, it's all about 'me.' And they sing the same lines over and over and over again. Sometimes I just want to explode. How are they going to learn the truth if they don't learn it in the hymns?"
Russ said "amen" to Winn's comments, and it was clear that both Winn and he were convinced that there was a serious dearth of theological content in contemporary church life.
"Couldn't you just make sure we sing at least one hymn each week?" Evelyn Moody asked.
"And couldn't we sing some of those songs without having to stand all the time? I don't think anyone knows how painful it is for a person my age to stand for a half hour-especially in the sanctuary where the floor is slanted," said Arlene Lewis.
Stan Baker began speaking the minute Arlene appeared to be finished: "I'm going to say it before someone else does. I miss the choir." (There were several umms of apparent agreement.) "We had the best choir in town (more umms). And we had some great singers-Barbara O'Neil, for example. Ted Steele played the organ. They're gone now." (The supporting umms seemed deafening.) "Now," Stan said, "all we get is five people up in front with microphones stuck in their mouths ... as if they're eating ice cream cones."
I thought the last comment unkind, but it was instructive to see things I'd never considered from someone else's point of view.
Moments passed as people around the table recalled various musicians from the past: soloists, trumpet players, someone back then who was extraordinary on the marimba, and a man who played the musical saw. (They had to explain this to me, and take my word for it, you don't want to know.)
Then Stan spoke up again: "What I really want to say is something about giving. These young folks don't give faithfully. They're driving all these nice cars and buying cabins up north ... all this stuff. I'm on the counting team, and I've got to be careful about what I say. But I'm telling you"-and he almost whispered the next words as if he was afraid of eavesdroppers-"they're not giving; they don't tithe. When there are large offerings from them, it's almost always designated to a project or a program. But their giving to the general fund is pretty bad. I'm telling you, this church is going to be in trouble in a few years if it has to depend on the giving I'm seeing from the younger members."
For a moment I felt as if an undercover FBI agent was briefing us.
There was a heavy silence again as people processed what had been said. Outside the wind was blowing even harder and the rain was beating more violently on the windows.
The silence was broken when one of the women-Yvonne, who, I must admit, is a favorite of mine-looked at me and said with great sadness, "All I know is that someone stole my church and I'd like to get it back."
Yvonne said this with a severe determination in her voice. It was as if a precious thing had been taken from her life during a burglary. As if something of great sentimental value had been snatched away, never to be seen again. I sensed that she felt violated.
I was aware that almost everyone nodded when Yvonne spoke. And for another moment we lapsed back into silence. I was hard-pressed to know how to respond. My instinct was to feel totally repudiated. I felt as if she was saying that I was part of the band of thieves or at least the driver of the get-away car. For just an instant I had a terrible feeling that the group was telling me that I'd lost their confidence and that the sooner I resigned from being their pastor, the better.
I decided to break the tension by suggesting that we take a break. Some of us needed a glass of water. Some of us, given our ages, needed to go to the bathroom. And I knew I could use both-plus a few minutes to think. That last comment of Yvonne's had blown me out of the water.
During the break several found ways to approach me and affirm their affection. They feared that some of the things they'd said hurt me, and they wanted to reassure me that their comments were not personal. But despite their protestations, I couldn't help but take what had been said very personally. And I must tell you candidly, I was falling into deep self-doubt. This meeting wasn't supposed to be about me-but then again, maybe it was. This mess of feelings and divisiveness in our church was reaching a crescendo on my watch.
When we reconvened around the tables, I told the group how much I liked being with them. And I was being truthful. In spite of my bewilderment at their barrage of criticisms, I really did like them. They were good people. But how could I get my arms around this conversation? I was at a loss.
"You're not sorry you got us together?" Arlene asked. "I was thinking that you'd probably want to kick us out of the church now."
"No, Arlene," I said, "I needed to be reminded of the things you miss so much. But I do worry for you, because some of these programs are never going to come back. They were things our generation made happen in our best days. But now another generation wants to make other things happen. And we have to figure out how we can accept this and rejoice in their vision. In a sense they're just doing what we did to our parents. You don't think for a moment that our mothers and fathers liked all the stuff we changed, do you?"
That comment froze everyone for a moment.
"You know, Gordon's right," someone (I'm not sure who) finally said. "I can remember my father complaining that we were going to kill off the church when Pastor Fredrickson brought a TV camera into the church and started putting our worship service on cable. 'God never intended for a television camera to be in a church,' he'd say. He actually walked out one day!"
"Lots of people walked out from time to time," said Ernie. "Remember the first time Barbara O'Neil sang along with a recorded orchestra on the sound system? Whoo-ee! I thought old Cameron Coulter was going to have a heart attack. He was up the aisle and out the door in a flash. I was sure that he was never coming back."
Evelyn laughed. "Cameron was even more frosted when Pastor Kelso told him that he'd been the one to encourage Barbara to do it. But he finally cooled off and came back after a few weeks."
Stan said, "When you're the treasurer as I've been, you worry less about people walking out and more about people who show their unhappiness by withholding their giving. And we've had a lot of those in the past. They let you know real fast how they feel about things. They just stop giving, or they designate their money to a missionary and away from the church."
"I've done that," Arlene said. "I probably would have done it again if we'd voted to do that sanctuary thing last week."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Who Stole My Church? by Gordon MacDonald Copyright © 2007 by Gordon MacDonald. Excerpted by permission.
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