SoulWork
So, You Want Some Respect?
I believe this is a special temptation in many churches, where pastors often have an extraordinary amount of formal and informal authority. Pastors can pull rank in almost every area of church life, and they often do. They'll do this in the name of efficiency, or church growth, or the parish mission, or faithfulness to the Bible, or defending truth, or whatever. And every time they exercise this authority, even though they may have won a particular political struggle in their church, they will have lost something as well. But no matter our calling, the less we play this card, the better.
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Another temptation will be to ground your authority in expertise. You have taken two classes in church growth, and so naturally your evangelism committee should submit to you! You have a degree in accounting or a Ph.D. in political science or lots of experience as a father, so of course people should listen to you!
This does not mean that we do not have or should not exercise our expertise in our callings. Of course we should. But our expertise—whether it comes from education or experience—is not where our authority is ultimately grounded. Our efficiency, our ability to solve problems or gain insight may be grounded there. But not our authority.
And psychological manipulation will be a constant companion, always whispering in our ears. We'll be tempted time and again to threaten that we'll be hurt or angry if we don't get our way. This is so common I hardly need to illustrate here.
So, the temptations to ground our authority in anything but love will be with us always. But sooner or later, God's good grace will knock us up the side of the head. We'll discover that disconcerting but liberating news that we have no power to ground our authority in the first place. It is something grounded in us, and grounded by another. And that other grounds it in love—more particularly, his love for us. In the same way that we are called to listen to Jesus because the Father loves him, so people in our charge are called to listen to us only because the Father loves us.
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It's just at this point that we feel the ground shifting under our feet. This doesn't feel like a very secure foundation for authority. We are tempted to say, "What type of authority is that? If I don't start using my gifts [note the appeal to expertise!] or throwing my weight around [my office!], nothing's going to get done! Who cares if I'm loved? What does that have to do with anything?"
Well, it has a great deal to do with authority.
In the movie Unforgiven, the character played by Clint Eastwood shoots a man who then crawls out of rifle range. As he bleeds to death, the victim calls out to one of his companions hiding within earshot, "I'm thirsty, Slim, Jesus, I'm thirsty. Bring me a drink won't you, Slim? One drink, Slim … I'm dyin', Slim."
That's the situation for all of us when it comes to love—we're desperately thirsty for love, dying for love, the blood draining from our lives while we desperately yearn for love. And when we're in the presence of love, why, we'll do anything asked of us. We listen for love more than we listen for anything.
SoulWork
In "SoulWork," Mark Galli brings news, Christian theology, and spiritual direction together to explore what it means to be formed spiritually in the image of Jesus Christ.
Mark Galli
Galli is editor of Christianity Today and author of God Wins, Chaos and Grace, A Great and Terrible Love, Jesus Mean and Wild, Francis of Assisi and His World, and other books.
- Christian Athletes Are Not Role Models
- On the Death—and Life—of Innocent Children
- Closer than Ever to the Breath of God
- Making Non-Sense of the Colorado Shootings
- Mastering the Golf Swing of Life
Grieving with the Good Friday God
La complejidad hispana: Todo cambió en el 2012
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Comments
Maurice Smith
Mark, I think you handled Stanley in exactly the correct way. What I hear you saying is that not everyone is a Stanley. I agree. An old mentor of mine, Harold O.J. Brown, once told a class of 300 eager Campus Crusade students (I was Joe's teaching assistant that summer), "Authority is the ability to command voluntary obedience". After all these years I've never fogotten Joe's words. A genuinely Christ-like example gives leaders the "authority" to "command" the voluntary obedience of those around us. And for the Stanley's of the Church, there's still the direct approach.
Caleb Fitting
Insightful stuff.
Pax Paws
Mark, pls hear my gentle voice: Are you basically saying that a lot of Pastors out there who feel unloved, & thus are fearful of confronting their people & are feeling bullied by their Boards? In all honesty, I saw your straight-forward dialogue with Stanley as effective, loving, and instructive. You said that the discussion was fear-based, but perhaps it was just normal nerves when one addresses another about a perceived wrong. Stanley certainly respected your directness, it appears. But this really isn't about you, or Stanley. If church families that have poor ways of handling disputes or disagreements... if we have church families where a leader feels disrespected, or ANY MEMBER feels disrespected... we have serious need of changing the way we do things. If we are indeed listening to HIM, there will be no power plays by any, at any cost. Perhaps we need to re-examine the authority we were ALL purposed to have to build mature disciples... and stop feeding Churchianity.