It is easier to preach encouragement than it is to live it. It is easier to exhort people to be strong in the Lord than it is to recover from a tempestuous board meeting. It is easier to confront a counselee about the sin of envy than it is to deal with personal feelings about the superchurch up the road.
The Tempter of ministers, being well experienced at his work, has learned over the millennia to keep his eye on his goal and not fixate on one technique over another. Adultery and embezzlement are fine tools, but a bit flashy, and if he can disable God's servant through subtle fumes of discouragement and self-pity, mixed with disgruntlement at the success of others, why not?
Who has not inhaled some of his vapors at the end of a long and draining Sunday while turning off the lights and locking the doors and driving home in the rain? Who has not felt inwardly irked as laymen burble about churches they visited on vacation and business trips, or the wonderful blessings across town (exciting youth program, rocketing attendance, great move of the Spirit, whatever)? Who has not struggled to make ends meet, straining to outfit his children for another year of school, while wondering how much the television preachers take home? At such times, one joins Martin Luther in his vendetta against the Book of James, which includes such seemingly outlandish lines as "The brother in humble circumstances ought to take pride in his high position" (1:9). How so?
To learn firsthand about the lure of discouragement and professional jealousy, and how ministers today are resisting it, LEADERSHlP editors singled out a particularly vulnerable group—pastors of small-to-medium churches in the shadow of very large and famous churches—and went to see them. We tried to match not only geography but theology, so that the essentials would be comparable. "What is it really like to labor in this place?" we asked. "How do you stay 'up' when their choir rehearsal is larger than your morning service? What do you do when you feel like a grasshopper before a son of Anak? How do you keep the sourness out of your spirit?"
As we talked, some pastors took longer than others to get down to their true feelings, but all were helpful. The crunch was best expressed by a pastor in La Habra, California, not more than two miles from First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton. "The truth is that Chuck Swindoll is simply outpreaching me," he said quietly. "He has a tremendous communication gift, and people are naturally drawn to that. I'd estimate that we've lost fifty families to First Free, including at one point the president of this congregation, a good personal friend. That hurts."
As they leave, people often profess their continuing love for this pastor. "But it still feels like rejection," he says. "They're leaving here and going with a winner, a place that has all the momentum." The La Habra church is not shrinking, but neither is it growing; it is simply holding steady.
Other interviews were able to probe more deeply the ways of coping, of maintaining personal momentum in spite of the externals, of not getting sucked under the cascade of another's fame. Here are five profiles.
By the time Charles Laughlin came to pastor Christian Fellowship Church in Hammond, Indiana, the philosophy of Jack Hyles had been the fuse for not only endless debates among the membership but two church splits as well. "CFC," as its people sometimes call it, was founded as an independent fundamental church in the 1930s and was the largest of its kind in the Calumet region by1959, with 1,200 in attendance. Then Hyles arrived from Texas to take the helm of First Baptist, two and a half miles north.
Some of the CFC elders still remember beating First Baptist in Sunday school contests. Those days are long past: Laughlin now preaches to 200, while First Baptist uses almost that many buses. They fan out to the far fringes of metro Chicago, swelling the crowd as high as 31,000 on special Sundays. Laughlin, thirty—two, who came from Florida five years ago, has thought much about his congregation's value in the present as well as the future.
People in the community will sometimes ask me, "Are you like First Baptist?" and I'll say, "In doctrine, yes; we believe the same things. But we do things differently." And from there I try to steer the conversation back to the gospel.
That's the real difference in the two churches: philosophy of ministry. We're committed to teaching and edifying, building up the believers to minister. Not that we avoid evangelism—we don't. I give a public invitation every Sunday morning and sometimes on Sunday night as well, but this isn't the major thrust. We're pushing evangelism in life, and it's happening as people share their faith in the world where they live.
When we go house to house throughout our part of town—south Hammond — we sometimes get doors slammed in our face because people have been offended by too much aggressiveness. But in many homes, we get a good response. The point of our calling is simply to let them know we're here and we want to help.
A church like First Baptist, of course, gives Christian people an interesting option. If the teaching of the Word in their own church is getting too close to home, they can always go downtown and hear an evangelistic sermon. Some people find that more comfortable than dealing with sinful attitudes inside.
Some of our older people are still struggling with bad memories of the splits. Once we did a joint concert with Suburban Bible Church, which had started back in 1962 out of CFC. A lady in our choir declined to participate, and when I asked her why, she said, "I promised myself I'd never set foot inside that church after what they did to us."
Sometime later I preached about bitterness, and she hinted that I'd been preaching at her. I said I hadn't meant it that way at all, but if God was speaking to her about an area of her life, she should listen. The old hurts, however, are hard to erase.
Still, there are good things about pastoring in Hammond. One is the sheer number of Christian people in the community. I took my car into the garage the other day, and out of the blue, the service manager said, "I'll be praying for you, pastor." The students from Hyles-Anderson College are a good spark of life. I spoke at Pacific Garden Mission in Chicago recently, and a busload of students was there that night as well. They really inspired me to do the best I could.
Even though Jack Hyles and I don't have a direct relationship, his presence is good for me. His ministry makes me examine myself and my work, to keep asking, "Should I be doing this like he does it or not?"
For me, it all comes down to two questions:
- Am I where God wants me to be?
- Is my philosophy of ministry what God wants it to be?
Presently, I can say yes to both of those. So I'm at peace, and I can move ahead. The question of size is secondary.
Calvary United Presbyterian Church in Denver is a backyard knoll surrounded by three mountains and a major foothill. To the north is Montview Presbyterian with some 2,000 members, an established church with prestige and reputation, known for its excellent choir. To the east is Faith Presbyterian, where everything seems to happen with charisma and splash. To the south is Wellshire Presbyterian, very Reformed, very affluent, with a good sprinkling of political and business leaders among its members.
There's also South Evangelical Presbyterian Fellowship to the southeast, a bit smaller than the others—800 or so—but very influential.
When Stewart Congdon came to Calvary in 1977, the membership was down to 105 (from a high of250), and no more than seventy came his first few Sundays. He was the seventh pastor in the church's twenty-five years. The rooms and parking lot were as small as the church's vision and sense of self confidence. Today, about 150 attend worship services.
If I'd known in the beginning how few active members there were, I probably wouldn't have come. The honest truth, I confess, is that I was attracted to the location as much as anything. I wanted to leave Iowa, and when I heard about the opening in Colorado, I sent my dossier on a whim.
Others in the denomination told me the congregation was a dead end, but when I came out for the interview, the people were so warm and so eager to make the church work that I was attracted. "This is our last chance," they said. They knew the presbytery was thinking about closing the church if things didn't improve.
The situation fed my ego. Here was a place where I could pour myself, turn it around, build it up, and make it work.
A year and a half later, I was asking, "Shall I bail out?" None of my noble plans were working. My salary was so small my wife had to work. I was wishing certain people would find another church. I was tired of pettiness and distrust. I dreaded each day. My wheels were spinning—people sensed defeat and took it out on me. Some people choose weak churches because they can wield power in that situation. They enjoy mediocrity.
I was ready to quit my career in the ministry. Then I went on a spiritual renewal weekend and for the first time—as amazing as it sounds—had a real encounter with Jesus Christ. I saw him in a personal way. I repented of my own ego control. "God, this is your church, not mine," I prayed. After that retreat, I was a different man. God was more real somehow. Others in the congregation noticed the difference and began to seek the same experience.
At that point, I decided to stay at Calvary five more years before resurrecting the question of whether to leave. This freed me from continually debating what I should do. It also forced me to my knees.
Wellshire Presbyterian financed us until we got on our feet. But they did something else that meant just as much: they took me on as an adjunct staff pastor. I attended staff meetings and developed a warm relationship with the pastors there. I treasured that fellowship, because when you're the only pastor in a struggling church, you can feel isolated.
I soon learned that trying to match the ministry of the large churches is a sure route to depression. If you're just a poor copy of the larger model, you have no reason to exist.
Our turnaround came when we realized we had a distinct style, that God has us here for a purpose, that we can supplement the ministry of the other churches and do things they aren't doing.
Wellshire, for instance, is a great church, attractive to upper income levels, and offers a reserved, dignified, formal style. Our emphasis, on the other hand, is warmth and relationships. At Calvary we capitalize on our smallness. We're more informal; we share prayer requests in the service, use music from classic hymns to Gaither and Crouch, spend time making Communion personal. We'll spend five minutes during the Lord's Supper with a "passing of the peace," and a lot of hugging and affection will be shared. You can sense that Christ is present. People have said, felt like I was surrounded with love and care." You can't always do that in a larger church.
I'm working harder now than ever, but it's easier. Once I seriously gave my ambitions to God, I saw he was doing something significant here, even if it wasn't as spectacular as some of the bigger churches.
There's enormous hope now. People are looking for something with spiritual depth. We may not be able to provide the breadth of ministry other churches do, but we can provide just as much depth. And we've found that growth was not impossible after all. We've stopped thinking we are permanently a small church. God is still sovereign. He can do with this church whatever he wishes, if we cooperate.
I looked through the Yellow Pages and measured the ads of all the other Presbyterian churches. Then I ordered an ad half an inch larger! It's worked. People have come to church because "we saw your ad in the phone book."
Our church was also hard to find— lost between a sprawling lumber yard and a large Masonic Temple, and hidden behind two huge maple trees. We put a large, attractive sign in front of the maple trees to help people find us.
Basically, we've recognized our smallness, tried to take advantage of it in our personal worship and warmth, but we've also been aggressive in trying to grow. We've acquainted our members with church growth principles. We've planned for growth, enlarging our parking area, classroom space, programs, and adding part—time staff—even though we're still under 200 in attendance. We've stopped thinking of ourselves as a small church. We're a growing church.
Never was L. Crane more minded of his precarious state than last year, when the Fort Worth, Texas, congregation he had built from scratch almost lost its modest building. A cluster of bonds came due all at once, and the Truevine Missionary Baptist Church treasury had nowhere near the $54,000 needed to redeem them. Crane, a gentle father of nine children in his late fifties who walks with a cane, knew that his flock of 200-300 would not be able to amass that much cash, no matter what kind of campaign he tried.
Such problems could have been taken almost in stride by the group just one mile up Miller Avenue. Rising Star Missionary Baptist is a mountain of a church pastored by a mountain of a man, T. H. Davis. Well over six feet three and 240 pounds, Davis leads a vibrant congregation of three to four thousand and is known throughout the city for his preaching and administrative talent.
In the end, Crane and the people of Truevine managed to get a bank loan that replaced the bonds, and so the church goes on. But how does it feel to persevere in the hot glow of a Rising Star?
When I organized the church back in 1967 with only ten members—six of them from my own family—I did it because of a special leading in my heart. I knew it was what God wanted me to do. Others have organized churches around here since I did, and that's all right. I don't see it as competition.
Those God chooses, he qualifies. He gives me what I can handle. I may not be ready to handle as many folk as Rev. Davis! But whenever I seem to forget that and start feeling jealous, the Spirit speaks to me: "Be thou faithful over a few things… ."
The fact is, there are other preachers in this city—good preachers, too—who are still in storefronts. So I say to myself, "Be content. Somebody else has fewer than you do. The Lord will elevate in his time."
Not everyone can relax in this way, though, it seems. A while back I tried to rent a bus from another church in the city so our choir could take a trip of about 100 miles. "Sure, we'll help you," the pastor said. "We always like to help a small church." He didn't need to say that. And the price he quoted was hardly a bargain. We ended up saying no thanks and finding different transportation.
When pastors get their eyes on size, the people do too. In the black community, the well-educated sometimes think that a little church makes them little. So a church like Rising Star tends to attract doctors and teachers. But they don't always work hard once they get there—things like paying their tithes or serving in the organizations of the church.
So I tell people: If you're a Christian, you can do well anywhere. And it's a word I have to tell myself from time to time, too.
First Church of the Nazarene is one of five prominent evangelical churches in the Oregon capital of Salem. But H. B. London, its pastor, has not forgotten South Whittier, California, where he started fresh out of seminary in a struggling, problem-plagued church. The Whittier Nazarene church, by contrast, was a stronghold in the early sixties with over 500 people. "We were at a disadvantage in every way—program, building, and my own abilities as a pastor," says London. "I looked around several times and said, 'Why would anyone come here to church?'
He is forever grateful to the Whittier pastor, Ross Hayslip, who encouraged him and tutored him. "I remember he helped me with my first funeral," says London. "He was a true brother; in fact, he made the difference in keeping me in the ministry when I was ready to quit."
Now, twenty years later, H. B. London has tasted success and growth, but he worries about the isolation that most ministers suffer.
Interpersonal relationships are where the ministry is weakest. Each of us struggles alone with competitive feelings. We don't call it competition, of course, but who can escape the fact that people in Salem commonly look at my church, the Baptist church, the Alliance church, and the two charismatic churches from a view of "Where's the best show in town?" And all five of us know that success or failure depends in large part on people coming through the door.
I'm a sensitive guy, and it still tears my guts apart when someone leaves First Nazarene, especially if I've failed them in some way. This is the most difficult part of the ministry. The Devil can get me centered on the two or three people who've left, and I'm totally despondent until I say, "Lord, help me to see the positive again. Help me appreciate the growth you've given."
I was in Korea not long ago and preached on Sunday morning at a mission church we had helped establish in Seoul. It's a good work; about a hundred people were there that morning. That night I preached at the final worship service—number six—of Full Gospel Central Church, to 15,000 people. What an incredible experience. I sat there thinking, What are we doing wrong?
The Lord had to steer me back to asking, What are we doing right? Sure, there are things I can learn from Yonggi Cho and the great church he has built. But I must not despise the individual lives being changed in the little church across town, and in my own church back home, and in every place where ministry is happening. I must not be comforted when others do badly, nor dismayed when others excel. I am not their opponent, even if thoughtless people sometimes view me in that light. We are Christ's laborers together.
Dennis Hester is right now where H. B. London used to be: his first church. Only he is a Southern Baptist trying to make it thirty-five miles from Lynchburg, Virginia.
The buses of Thomas Road Baptist Church reach out toward the Shenandoah foothills as far as Hester's church at Roseland and even beyond. But Jerry Falwell is not the only old pro on people's minds; Hester's predecessor had served the church for twenty—seven years. He, by contrast, is a rookie preacher—and single.
In the past three years, however, he has carved his own niche, doing things greater luminaries would never have time to do: He serves as an auctioneer in the community, and he also takes his guitar to the front porches or inside benches Of country grocery stores for pickin' and grinnin' when business is slow. "It's amazing how many people you meet that way," he says. He's bringing new life to his rural congregation as well.
I didn't think about Jerry Falwell all that much when I came up here from North Carolina. I just knew I wanted to commit myself to these 150 people and the community where they live.
Since then I've found mixed feelings about him among the congregation. Some don't like the way he handles money, but I've given him credit in some of my sermons for making us all aware of the problems and sins in our society.
Meanwhile, I've been emphasizing that what we do affects Nelson County, but it also affects the world. Obviously we can't do radio or television like Thomas Road does, but we can still have a meaningful outreach. I guess I don't have to see people coming down the aisle every Sunday. The Holy Spirit is doing his work regardless, and I know things are going on behind the scenes.
How do I see myself and my ministry? I'm not a Solomon, building a magnificent temple with thousands and thousands of workers. I'm more like Noah building God's boat with just a few beside me. It's going to take us a while, and the job is often lonely, but God did tell us to do it, and so we keep sawing and nailing. One of these days, the value of our project will shine clear to everyone.
From these and other reflections by those who have fought the downdrafts of discouragement and pessimism in the ministry, the following convictions emerge:
1. Not all God's servants are equally gifted. In one way, we are like pipelines of various diameters. Some of us were made to carry a six-inch flow of petroleum while others measure forty-eight. There is no use bemoaning the fact that our output is less and that our assigned tank fills up more slowly. As Max Ehrmann's well-known credo "Desiderata" puts it, "If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself."
Or, in Paul's words, "God has arranged the parts of the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be." Paul also noted, as a special comfort to many of us, that "those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable" (1 Cor. 12:18, 22).
2. The standouts are good for observing but not for mimicking. The successes of others challenge us to greater vision. We only hurt ourselves and our congregations when we refuse to be stretched by what others are doing. But such models must not be picked up intact; we must put them through the testing of prayer, matching them with our own orders from the Lord of the harvest. Does each idea fit with what God has directed me to do? Otherwise, we stand to repeat the embarrassment of the seven sons of Sceva, who thought techniques were interchangeable.
3. Envy is a sin, even for preachers. God's law about not coveting another man's wife or ox applies also to his new sanctuary and his offerings. Throughout the Scripture, the examples of Cain, Joseph's brothers, Haman, and the Pharisees resound with the warning that wrong attitudes about the success of others will not go unpunished.
4. A spirit of rivalry can be diffused by praying for even greater things at the other church. Praying in one's closet is useful; praying with others is even better. When Sherman Williams started Fremont Community Church in Fremont, California, back in 1973, an Evangelical Free church was only a mile away and was running 300. "They were the most similar to us in doctrine and flavor," says Williams. "The trouble was, I tend to be fairly competitive, and in spite of all my creative efforts in the new work, they continued to be the fastest growing church in town.
"One of the ways I dealt with my problem was to start a local chapter of the NAE" (National Association of Evangelicals). "We began working at getting to know one another as a group of brothers and praying for each other's needs. In our church, every prayer service and every listing of requests included something specific about a sister church in the area."
When Williams left Fremont this past spring, his congregation numbered 500 while the Evangelical Free church was at 800, "but we probably had the closest fellowship with them of any," he says. "It's hard to keep your competitive spirit when you're praying."
5. It's OK to relish your own successes, modest though they be. Several pastors mentioned taking time to notice what went well, not being so self-deprecating as to reject their role in it. Another "Desiderata" passage says, "Enjoy your achievements as well as your p1ans." Many of us are consumed with planning to the exclusion of celebrating after a plan actually works.
6. The Master has enough work to go around. Charles Laughlin in Hammond, Indiana, says, "Too often those of us in smaller churches are a bit like Peter in John 21, asking, 'Lord, what about the other fellow?' Jesus' reply is still appropriate: 'What is that to thee? Follow thou me'" (v. 22).
It is instructive to note that during the reign of King Ahab, the Lord used three other spokesmen besides the legendary Elijah to carry his messages. Two of them (1 Kings 20:13-28 and 35-42) are unnamed, while the third (see chapter 22) was the lowly Micaiah, who at first crumbled to group pressure and only later declared a highly unpopular word from the Lord. He was no giant among the ministerium. He was only a willing servant.
We can be the same.
