Yesterday at the blog Church Marketing Sucks Brad Abare said he sees "a growing trend in the number of church leaders who work and serve in their primary church, and then attend a different church for their personal spiritual journey." Why do church leaders look outside their own church? Abare suggests at least three reasons:

1. Place of service is too small. Maybe it's a church plant or just really small, but for these leaders their primary church just can't meet all their spiritual and relational needs.
2. Place of service is too big. These leaders feel bound by their particular role to the point where they can't step outside it and freely participate in the church community.
3. Place of service is primarily a job. These leaders can't help but see the church as an employer rather than his or her family.

At first blush, this phenomenon bothers me. To these reasons above, I would ask questions like:

• If the church can't meet all of your spiritual and relational needs, are you expecting it to meet the needs of the others who are coming?