Number Eight, Casual Holiness - Christianity Today

The Eighth Deadly Sin Casual Holiness

I know of no minister who ever set out to become a casual, hypocritical, professional Christian—doing all the right spiritual things but for all the wrong reasons. Yet Jesus warns us about this.It happens.One day we wake up and realize we are just going through the motions.We are those who, by our occupation, are expected to speak easily and naturally of spiritual realities. We are called to practice our faith in public. Under the never-ending demands of ministry, our holy calling to worship, love, and serve God can gradually become corroded until our ministry becomes a career like any other profession, except that public religious performance is part of the job requirements.When we deal repeatedly with spiritual things, we risk losing our sense of mystery and awe, of true worship, of inward as well as outward holiness.We can too easily become careless in our words and actions, presuming on the grace of God. We can become cynical in the things of God, including the way we think and behave toward fellow Christians.It is possible to lead a worship service but neglect to worship; to sing hymns and songs of praise vigorously without directing our thoughts to God; to pray and speak of holy things without engaging our inmost being; to seek human approval rather than the approval of God.I know. I’ve done it.Sometimes the sheer busyness and unrelenting schedule of church life require us to perform public acts of devotion more often than our soul can fully engage. Other times conflict and stress in ministry hollow us out until we feel like empty shells, hiding the reality of our own poverty and need.But even more sinister is when I see outward acts of devotion as good for my career.About a year into my ministry in a new congregation, I realized that I was in real danger of becoming trapped by the desire to impress people rather than depend on God. I began worrying more about “success” than about glorifying God.Sometimes our ambitions ambush us and we make choices to advance our success.One pastor friend confessed that for a period of years, he did not pray at all except when it was his responsibility to pray the pastoral prayer before the congregation on Sunday. Yet he wanted to be known as a man of prayer.Another refused to purge the rolls of absent members because of the desire to be known as the leader of a large successful church.A third shared the way her emotions went up and down depending on attendance and offerings, her real scorecard in ministry.The underlying tension has to do with not only what we do but with why we do it; it involves the inner springs of motivation and desire, the condition of our heart before God. The psalmist cries out: “Search me, O God, and know my heart.”God does and God knows. But do we know our own hearts?

His commands vs. their expectations

Again and again, in straightforward teaching and in parables that prick the conscience, Jesus calls us to be careful about play-acting our public spirituality or showing off acts of visible piety for the wrong reasons. God wants to bless us and to reward us for faithful service. Yet we cheat ourselves out of God’s reward when we seek human applause or personal gratification rather than the approval of God.Jesus warns us in the Sermon on the Mount against displaying two kinds of religiosity: impressive piety (Matt. 6) and impressive power (Matt. 7).Performance-oriented piety cares more about what things look like than what is true. We use religious words to win success and approval from people rather than from God. The false spirituality of power is exposed in the judgment of Jesus on those who claim many mighty works in the Lord’s name: “Depart from me; I never knew you.”Our motivation, character, and actions need to line up with integrity to our intimate relationship with Christ.There is inevitably tension between the words of Jesus and the expectations of those we serve in our public leadership. Still, secret prayer is the prayer of the heart toward God without any thought to impressing other audiences.Jesus tells us that when we give, we are to do it in secret so that our Father who sees the secrets of the heart will reward us. Fundraising consultants tell us that it is very important to open a building campaign by announcing the amount of our own pledge. “This is the way to set an example,” the consultant said to me. “This is real leadership; your people need to see you leading the way.”How do we hold the tensions together with integrity?

The pedestal problem

I have struggled in four major areas:1. Handling the pedestal, or unrealistic expectations;2. Using sacred speech honestly;3. Avoiding cynicism or despair in relationships with difficult people;4. Relying on power or control in order to “succeed.”On the pedestal it is easy to pretend to be what we are not, more spiritual on the outside than on the inside. In our speaking, even the holiest of words become empty when used carelessly or too glibly. In our relationships, disappointment or failure can lead us to lose hope in God’s power to change people and situations. Even as we speak of “servanthood,” we may be seeking ways to control the actions of others.The problem of the pedestal occurs when the leader is treated as someone “above” or “more spiritual” than others by virtue of office or position. For several years I had a woman who asked me to pray because she said my prayers got closer to the ear of God than hers did. This becomes pernicious if the leader is seduced into believing or pretending this.Pedestals can become a mutual conspiracy between pastor and people. Search committees write “messiah-like” job descriptions and both pastor and people agree this is impossible, while actually expecting perfection of each other.Eventually evidence clearly proves that neither pastor nor people can meet the standards. Then both have a decision to make. Do we walk together the way of humility, repentance, forgiveness, and holiness, or not? Can leadership be exercised in humility without the need for the pedestal? Can we trust God with our reputation and any results?Some are so eager to dethrone the vulnerable leader that they start searching for someone more worthy to occupy the perch before the leader is even gone (see Num. 14:1-4). Leaders may choose to cover up problems or intensify their public religiosity to hide the reality that both salvation and sanctification really do come only from the grace and power of God.Like the disciples of old, we have very little with which to feed the multitudes of hungry people or even our own hungry souls. Only God can take what little we have and multiply it to his glory. True Christian community is not nourished by pretense but is rooted in reality—the reality of acknowledging our human weakness and the reality of the power of God to restore, strengthen, and transform us into His glorious image, one stage at a time. I’ve seen God prove his grace and power again and again. He can be trusted.

Three things to do in secret

I have found three simple “habits of the heart” that help strengthen my desire and ability to maintain inner integrity while engaged in public ministry.The first is to commit myself to a small covenant group that practices prayer and accountability. I have been in one such group with fellow pastors for more than 20 years. It has made an enormous difference in my Christian life. We all need a place to rejoice and weep, to confess and experience God’s forgiveness, to share the stories of the hard and joyous journey of discipleship, to pray and be prayed for.A small covenant group can provide this. To be truly known and loved in one circle can help us be transparent, holy, and loving in other places. Telling the truth with those who love you can help you live the truth with others.Second is to practice a discipline of secret service and secret giving. So much of what we do inside our congregations is visible to someone. I believe God honors quiet service, performed invisibly, unnoticed and unremarked, where we give ourselves to someone in need, especially to the poor and lost. It is very important not to talk about it. If everything we give shows up on our income tax return, every good deed as a sermon illustration, then perhaps, as Jesus suggests, we already have all the reward we are ever going to get!A third habit of the heart is to memorize 1 Corinthians 13 and pray it into mind, heart, and life regularly, along with the Lord’s Prayer, as part of a regular prayer discipline. I have found it especially helpful to pray this love chapter, verse by verse, or phrase by phrase, in my marriage and family, in prayer for my enemies and those whom I have trouble loving or who may have trouble loving me. It is a long journey to truly learn how to love others as God loves us. God is faithful and sustains us on the journey.It is no accident, I believe, that the temptation stories of Jesus follow his baptism and entrance into public ministry. Led by the Spirit into the wilderness, he struggled with issues of identity, kingdoms, power, and glory. So do we. He met these temptations through Scripture and reliance on the power of God. So must we.I find these spiritual disciplines to be helpful antidotes to the poisons that can seep into professional Christian service. Jesus summed it up very simply: “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.” Then everything else will fall into its rightful place.

Roberta Hestenes is minister-at-large for World Vision. rhestene@worldvision.org

Diminished Horizons Syndrome

We judge worship by the visible, rather than by the infinite.

I’d left church after a good morning performance. The worship leader was on top of his game. The preacher’s perfectly constructed sermon had left my ears tingling. Even the congregation seemed more engaged than usual.

The only problem? I didn’t feel as though I’d met God. On the church steps I realized I had fallen victim once again to Diminished Horizons Syndrome.

It’s easy to assume church is okay when everything functions properly and people leave feeling upbeat. The trouble is that church isn’t supposed to be about running a smooth service; it’s about meeting God and hearing what He has to say.

Diminished Horizons Syndrome afflicts us when we are satisfied with giving our people a warm glow. It encourages leaders to focus on getting the atmosphere and incidentals just right at the cost of giving God room to work. Our eyes are focused on the limits of human praise, without looking beyond the horizon, to the one we worship.

Simon Jones is the London Area Coordinator for BMS World Mission, a Baptist mission agency based in the United Kingdom. peckhamboy@cwcom.net

Nominations

Hypocrisy

I submit a quote from Tolstoy:

Not without good reason was Christ’s only harsh and threatening reproof directed against hypocrites and hypocrisy. It is not theft nor robbery nor murder nor fornication, but falsehood, the special falsehood of hypocrisy, which corrupts men, brutalizes them and makes them vindictive, destroys all distinction between right and wrong in their conscience, deprives them of what is the true meaning of all real human life, and debars them from all progress toward perfection.

Bob Douglas, St. Paul, Minnesota

Know It Already

Sometimes my attitude about Scripture is “read that, understood it, next verse”—I get out of a passage only what I got the last time I taught it or studied it. It takes real effort to read afresh and allow God to speak to me through that text for today, not just as he spoke to me the last time. It’s too easy to fall back on education or hermeneutical skill and to miss God’s still, small, living voice.

Kevin McQuay, Kitchener, Ontario

The Mask

We are called to be maskless children of God, but at times we are more concerned that we impress people with our “holiness” than with being a wounded healer. How much more impact would a pastor have by exhibiting faithfulness in adversity and brokenness, rather than being a “teflon person” whose feigned holiness makes us difficult to relate to? I do believe we can grow in holiness, but for that to happen, the masks must come off.

Tom Snode, Bucyrus, Ohio