Leader's Insight: The Church Health Self-Test

The dear Lord Jesus loves the church and has given himself for it, and he obviously wants the church to be healthy and vibrant. The devil hates the church and since its inception has been hurling all the weapons in his diabolical arsenal in an effort to cripple its witness and its effectiveness. Let me mention five of the things that weaken the church and minimize its effectiveness.

1. Scandalous Leadership

When immorality bred by lust or greed is found among the leadership of the church the results are devastating. That is precisely why pastors, church staff and lay leaders such as deacons must have lives marked by physical chastity, moral purity and spiritual integrity.

I have pastored a church that was marked by a staff member who was guilty of immorality of the worst sort and the results of his sin had a devastating impact, not only upon him, but also upon his family, friends, the church and even the community. In fact, the church may still bear the stigma of that heinous sin. Someone said that it might take the church a generation to overcome the humiliating and ignominious scars suffered from the grievous sins of one staff member.

2. A Discordant Member

I am not speaking of the person who registers an occasional disagreement. I am referring to the person who sows seeds of discord among the brethren. Such an individual can make life miserable for the pastor, sandbag decisions in a church business meeting, discourage other church members, repel the lost and summon an ominous cloud over the entire church.

3. Apathy

Vance Havner said, “We have anarchy in the world, apostasy in the professing church and apathy in the true church.” An indifferent, indolent, lukewarm church nauseates God and renders the church helpless and ineffective.

One pastor went down to the train station every day to see the one westbound passenger train that came through their small town each afternoon at 4:30.

One day the ticket agent, who saw the pastor watch the train pull out of the station each day, asked, “Preacher, why are you always here to see the 4:30 train pull out of the station?”

The weary pastor said, “I just like to see something moving forward that I don’t have to push.”

Did you hear about the company that makes blank bumper stickers? They’re for people who don’t want to get involved. Too many churches have too many people who just don’t want to get involved. Such apathy cripples the cause of Christ and paralyzes the effort to build healthy kingdom churches.

4. Inflexibility

Some churches do not grow because the members are so unwilling to change, so unyielding, so set in their ways. I have known Sunday School class members that were so married to their class that they would never agree to serve anywhere else or move to another class or help start another class.

Some classes have their own budget in order to purchase their own chairs, carpet their own classroom and purchase their own television in case they want to watch a certain television preacher instead of have their own teacher teach the lesson. The class is like a country club and for the most part visitors and new members are not welcome unless they are “approved.”

Gordon Venturella says, “Inflexibility leads to idolatry; and change is the only road out of self-centered control to servanthood.” Yet many churches are inflexible, unwilling to change.

5. Purposelessness

One church put a sign on their church door in 1963 that stated, “Gone out of business. Didn’t know what our business was.”

Thomas Carlyle said, “A man without purpose is like a ship without a rudder: a waif, a nothing, a no man. Have a purpose in life, and, having it, throw such strength of mind and muscle into your work as God has given you.” The same is true of a church. Proverbs 29:18 emphasizes: “Where there is no vision, the people perish …”

Is your church avoiding the problems that cripple the family of God?

Gerald Harris is editor of The Christian Index. This article is reprinted by permission.

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