Tuesday, January 19, 2010
A Note on the Massachusetts Senate Election
I, like most of you, am pleased with the gain of one vital seat in the Senate today. I'm taking a moment to consider God's timing and sense of humor. The road ahead to a Christ-friendly nation is long. This is only one step in that direction, but, thank Heavens, it is in that direction. Enjoy the ironic victory God has given us, but let's not slacken our grip. There is still much to do! Tomorrow is another -- slightly brighter -- day.
Monday, January 18, 2010
The chains that bind us: 501(c), false charity, and the modern church
It’s Sunday morning and you are in church. If you are like more and more Americans, your congregation is large -- at least 700 members -- with lots of programs for this and that social malady, age group, and concern. You probably have groups for recovering alcoholics, for recovering dopers, for single parents, for teens, for tweens, for college students, for empty-nesters, for fat folk, and for left-handed dyslexics. A growing number of congregations have basketball programs and softball and morning yoga (think about that one for a minute!) and Lamaze classes. One local church I know of even has classes in stuff like pottery and gluing things together with those ubiquitous hot glue guns.
In and of itself, none of this is bad. The church brochures tell us this is all intended to draw people to Christ, and perhaps that is the intent. But to finance all of this, the church needs a larger and larger congregation paying more and more tithes and offerings to cover larger and larger building projects and maintenance on buildings that already exist. Oh, and then there’s staff -- senior pastor, assistant pastor, youth pastor, elder pastor, children’s pastor, facilities pastor, bus drivers, bus captains, bus maintenance personnel, graphic designers, webmasters, media pastors, secretaries, music ministers, pianists, organists, and program directors for each of the many various programs. Whew! Most of these are at least part-time paid professionals. The pressure of all this forces the church to be less and less about Jesus and more and more about finances.
To make it all work, most of these modern churches model themselves on the modern American corporation. The senior pastor is more like a CEO managing the bottom line than a shepherd watching over a flock. Everything is scheduled and regulated and organized to the nth degree. Every Sunday school teacher is given rigid marching orders. Their lesson must tie in with the pastor’s sermon, which has to be prepped and tossed in cold storage far in advance because the media folks and graphic artists need weeks to prepare the presentation -- uh, sermon. Oh, and if some sick congregate calls for a pastor to come visit them in the hospital, the secretary will have to consult the calendar to see who’s on duty and what their schedule might be. Wouldn’t want to conflict with a budget meeting.
Churches have become veritable soul factories. Or at least so they hope. Everything is forged and focused on getting people in the door, down the aisle and dunked, membershipped up, and tithing as quickly as possible. (Gotta catch up the mortgage for the new gym!) They work harder and harder to herd more and more people in the front door, often never noticing that the same people are marching right out the back door, thoroughly injected with the mini-Gospel and now more dejected, rejected and immunized than ever to the calling of Christ. I know of one such church that fits this model which, much to the pastor’s dismay, ran an entire congregation in and out each year for nearly a decade. To my knowledge, he never discovered why so many people left. The church eventually folded when everyone in town had been there, done that, and didn't want any more.
How did the sacred church that Christ established come to this?
In our society, one major cause is the federal tax code. When you are sitting in church and the offering plate comes round, I expect that you throw in your share. After all, tithing and giving to the church is Biblical, right? But have you considered that by giving -- governmental strings attached and all -- you might be killing your congregation? The tax exemption the church “enjoys” comes with strings attached that are really more like weighty chains. Ask your pastor some time in private (if you can catch him when he’s not in meetings) what price he pays in the pulpit for tax exemption. He cannot speak honestly about any politician. He cannot comment plainly on the moral condition of our nation. He cannot advocate or denounce anything in Congress or your state legislature. Since the current administration has come to power, he is even in danger if he speaks frankly against perversions the Bible plainly calls sin. In short, he cannot boldly proclaim the Gospel. He could lose his tax exemption. For the sake of a tax shelter, he has become a servant of the State rather than a servant of Christ. Money pressures are such that he cannot afford to offend any tither from the pulpit, even though scripture informs us that the Gospel is apt to give offense. The end effect is watered-down sermons, loss of holy conviction, and a mingling of many goats with the sheep.
There’s more. Another major intrusion of government into American churches is social welfare. Along with preaching salvation, the church is also commanded to attend to the needs of the widow and orphan -- the poor -- in the community. The modern church rarely does this or does it poorly and ineffectually. How can it be otherwise? The church competes with the mega money available to the federal government, and government funds come with no strings attached. Rather than try to compete, most churches just throw up their hands in surrender and go build a gym. In the days when the church managed feeding the poor and helping the helpless, that help was married to guidance and teaching that truly helped the poor get out of poverty. Most often, poverty is a result of sin -- either the sin of the poor or of the poor’s oppressors. Salvation and the principles of Christianity -- honesty, sobriety, chastity, thrift, and hard work -- do much to erase poverty. In the meantime, those who really were unable to provide for themselves had a safety net. The church attended to their needs rationally, with compassion and a spirit of service. Most of that is gone now. As a rule, poor folk don’t tithe much and are therefore not really a priority in corporate Christianity. The money that was once spent on them now feeds the never-ending, ever growing, race to have the coolest facilities in town. Meanwhile, those whom the church could help in a real way put their hand out at the welfare office and are sucked into a life of both fiscal and spiritual poverty and lethargy.
We have lost a powerful redemptive tool, seceding charity to a Humanist government.
I have a very simple question: is this how Jesus did it? Is this the approach the Apostles used to establish the Gospel all over their world in less than a generation? The simple question has a simple answer: No! Jesus said it very plainly, “And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me.” What 21st Century people need is the same thing that First Century people needed: Jesus. Not pottery classes. Not great basketball. Not weight-loss programs. Those things might come later, or not at all. First, they need Jesus. The first Century church was blessed because they pointed people to Jesus, not to the crafts wing. Furthermore, early Christians were unencumbered by at least three fetters that hinder most American churches today.
First, they had no facilities. Churches met in homes. We have drifted so far from that paradigm that the mental image most people have when they hear the word, “church” is a building. Real church is about relationships. It should happen on Tuesday morning and Friday afternoon as well as Sunday and Wednesday. A building ties us down. It makes us lose appropriate focus. It makes us schedule and manipulate and maintain. I’ve known of churches splitting over such trivial matters as the color of the carpet in the sanctuary. What kind of testimony of the love of Christ is that? If our world were stable and safe for believers right now, I still believe Christians should ditch the buildings in favor of the much closer and down-to-earth relationships fostered by being together and working closely in one another’s homes. With the coming troubles, it will be even more vital that we loosen the bonds that tie us to a building and work as our predecessor did.
Second, the early church was free of State control. As I mentioned before, we have enormous chains involved in our relationship with the State. The first Christians certainly didn’t ask Caesar’s permission to work or preach or seek his advice about what to say. InChina China
Third, the first Christians did not have paid professional staff. That’s right. No professional pastors. Yes, they certainly did support people like Paul and Silas with offerings and charity, but no one got a regular paycheck, nor expected one. Paul paid his own way at least part of the time by making tents with Priscilla andAquila . Jesus himself was not a professional preacher in the sense that he got or expected regular payment. In fact, on at least two occasions, it was he provided food for the masses who came to hear him. Jesus spoke of the difference between a shepherd and a hireling, “The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.” A wage worker obviously works for his wages. That is to be expected. I don’t mean that no paid pastor cares at all about his brothers and sisters. Only that the interloper of lucre muddies the waters and interferes more than it helps. A second negative effect of the hireling system we have now is that it establishes an ungodly hierarchy. There is an assumption -- more subtle in some denominations than others -- that the professional preacher is the “real” Christian and the rest of us are just passive followers. How deadening is that to the Spirit?
The time is coming when we will need to know our brothers and sisters thoroughly and with spiritual intimacy. The time is coming when public worship will be profoundly hindered and possibly even perilous. We may find that we certainly cannot operate confidently in the open. When we find ourselves in this situation, it will be concurrent with a hugely hurting and hopeless world, a world that will need the comfort of Christ more than ever. We need to be ready to help. We must be able to work and to work well together when that time comes. The modern corporate church has not equipped us for the situations we may soon face. It cannot. We must begin to rethink church. I believe the best approach is what worked before. We need to begin to meet with our brothers and sisters outside of the usual sanctuary and pews. We must learn to work for the cause of Christ beyond the traditional brick and mortar. We must begin to think of church as family, a place where we all work together as equals, dedicated both to the common good and to a cause greater than ourselves. Our time is short. We must begin these changes soon.
Please understand me: I respect and honor the brothers and sisters who dedicate their lives to working for the good of the Church on a daily basis. But they -- and we along with them -- have become ensnared in a trap of the Enemy’s making that we must now recognize and, with God’s help, escape. Nothing less than our own spiritual liberty and the preaching of the one Hope in a rapidly darkening world are at stake.
In and of itself, none of this is bad. The church brochures tell us this is all intended to draw people to Christ, and perhaps that is the intent. But to finance all of this, the church needs a larger and larger congregation paying more and more tithes and offerings to cover larger and larger building projects and maintenance on buildings that already exist. Oh, and then there’s staff -- senior pastor, assistant pastor, youth pastor, elder pastor, children’s pastor, facilities pastor, bus drivers, bus captains, bus maintenance personnel, graphic designers, webmasters, media pastors, secretaries, music ministers, pianists, organists, and program directors for each of the many various programs. Whew! Most of these are at least part-time paid professionals. The pressure of all this forces the church to be less and less about Jesus and more and more about finances.
To make it all work, most of these modern churches model themselves on the modern American corporation. The senior pastor is more like a CEO managing the bottom line than a shepherd watching over a flock. Everything is scheduled and regulated and organized to the nth degree. Every Sunday school teacher is given rigid marching orders. Their lesson must tie in with the pastor’s sermon, which has to be prepped and tossed in cold storage far in advance because the media folks and graphic artists need weeks to prepare the presentation -- uh, sermon. Oh, and if some sick congregate calls for a pastor to come visit them in the hospital, the secretary will have to consult the calendar to see who’s on duty and what their schedule might be. Wouldn’t want to conflict with a budget meeting.
Churches have become veritable soul factories. Or at least so they hope. Everything is forged and focused on getting people in the door, down the aisle and dunked, membershipped up, and tithing as quickly as possible. (Gotta catch up the mortgage for the new gym!) They work harder and harder to herd more and more people in the front door, often never noticing that the same people are marching right out the back door, thoroughly injected with the mini-Gospel and now more dejected, rejected and immunized than ever to the calling of Christ. I know of one such church that fits this model which, much to the pastor’s dismay, ran an entire congregation in and out each year for nearly a decade. To my knowledge, he never discovered why so many people left. The church eventually folded when everyone in town had been there, done that, and didn't want any more.
How did the sacred church that Christ established come to this?
In our society, one major cause is the federal tax code. When you are sitting in church and the offering plate comes round, I expect that you throw in your share. After all, tithing and giving to the church is Biblical, right? But have you considered that by giving -- governmental strings attached and all -- you might be killing your congregation? The tax exemption the church “enjoys” comes with strings attached that are really more like weighty chains. Ask your pastor some time in private (if you can catch him when he’s not in meetings) what price he pays in the pulpit for tax exemption. He cannot speak honestly about any politician. He cannot comment plainly on the moral condition of our nation. He cannot advocate or denounce anything in Congress or your state legislature. Since the current administration has come to power, he is even in danger if he speaks frankly against perversions the Bible plainly calls sin. In short, he cannot boldly proclaim the Gospel. He could lose his tax exemption. For the sake of a tax shelter, he has become a servant of the State rather than a servant of Christ. Money pressures are such that he cannot afford to offend any tither from the pulpit, even though scripture informs us that the Gospel is apt to give offense. The end effect is watered-down sermons, loss of holy conviction, and a mingling of many goats with the sheep.
There’s more. Another major intrusion of government into American churches is social welfare. Along with preaching salvation, the church is also commanded to attend to the needs of the widow and orphan -- the poor -- in the community. The modern church rarely does this or does it poorly and ineffectually. How can it be otherwise? The church competes with the mega money available to the federal government, and government funds come with no strings attached. Rather than try to compete, most churches just throw up their hands in surrender and go build a gym. In the days when the church managed feeding the poor and helping the helpless, that help was married to guidance and teaching that truly helped the poor get out of poverty. Most often, poverty is a result of sin -- either the sin of the poor or of the poor’s oppressors. Salvation and the principles of Christianity -- honesty, sobriety, chastity, thrift, and hard work -- do much to erase poverty. In the meantime, those who really were unable to provide for themselves had a safety net. The church attended to their needs rationally, with compassion and a spirit of service. Most of that is gone now. As a rule, poor folk don’t tithe much and are therefore not really a priority in corporate Christianity. The money that was once spent on them now feeds the never-ending, ever growing, race to have the coolest facilities in town. Meanwhile, those whom the church could help in a real way put their hand out at the welfare office and are sucked into a life of both fiscal and spiritual poverty and lethargy.
We have lost a powerful redemptive tool, seceding charity to a Humanist government.
I have a very simple question: is this how Jesus did it? Is this the approach the Apostles used to establish the Gospel all over their world in less than a generation? The simple question has a simple answer: No! Jesus said it very plainly, “And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me.” What 21st Century people need is the same thing that First Century people needed: Jesus. Not pottery classes. Not great basketball. Not weight-loss programs. Those things might come later, or not at all. First, they need Jesus. The first Century church was blessed because they pointed people to Jesus, not to the crafts wing. Furthermore, early Christians were unencumbered by at least three fetters that hinder most American churches today.
First, they had no facilities. Churches met in homes. We have drifted so far from that paradigm that the mental image most people have when they hear the word, “church” is a building. Real church is about relationships. It should happen on Tuesday morning and Friday afternoon as well as Sunday and Wednesday. A building ties us down. It makes us lose appropriate focus. It makes us schedule and manipulate and maintain. I’ve known of churches splitting over such trivial matters as the color of the carpet in the sanctuary. What kind of testimony of the love of Christ is that? If our world were stable and safe for believers right now, I still believe Christians should ditch the buildings in favor of the much closer and down-to-earth relationships fostered by being together and working closely in one another’s homes. With the coming troubles, it will be even more vital that we loosen the bonds that tie us to a building and work as our predecessor did.
Second, the early church was free of State control. As I mentioned before, we have enormous chains involved in our relationship with the State. The first Christians certainly didn’t ask Caesar’s permission to work or preach or seek his advice about what to say. In
Third, the first Christians did not have paid professional staff. That’s right. No professional pastors. Yes, they certainly did support people like Paul and Silas with offerings and charity, but no one got a regular paycheck, nor expected one. Paul paid his own way at least part of the time by making tents with Priscilla and
The time is coming when we will need to know our brothers and sisters thoroughly and with spiritual intimacy. The time is coming when public worship will be profoundly hindered and possibly even perilous. We may find that we certainly cannot operate confidently in the open. When we find ourselves in this situation, it will be concurrent with a hugely hurting and hopeless world, a world that will need the comfort of Christ more than ever. We need to be ready to help. We must be able to work and to work well together when that time comes. The modern corporate church has not equipped us for the situations we may soon face. It cannot. We must begin to rethink church. I believe the best approach is what worked before. We need to begin to meet with our brothers and sisters outside of the usual sanctuary and pews. We must learn to work for the cause of Christ beyond the traditional brick and mortar. We must begin to think of church as family, a place where we all work together as equals, dedicated both to the common good and to a cause greater than ourselves. Our time is short. We must begin these changes soon.
Please understand me: I respect and honor the brothers and sisters who dedicate their lives to working for the good of the Church on a daily basis. But they -- and we along with them -- have become ensnared in a trap of the Enemy’s making that we must now recognize and, with God’s help, escape. Nothing less than our own spiritual liberty and the preaching of the one Hope in a rapidly darkening world are at stake.
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