{"id":21780,"date":"1997-07-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"1997-07-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/1997\/07\/01\/you-know-its-bad-meeting-when\/"},"modified":"1997-07-01T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"1997-07-01T00:00:00","slug":"you-know-its-bad-meeting-when","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/content\/you-know-its-bad-meeting-when\/","title":{"rendered":"You Know It’s a Bad Meeting When…"},"content":{"rendered":"
    \n
  1. The church loudmouth rises to his feet and announces dramatically, “I can no longer remain silent . … “<\/li>\n\n
  2. Mike Wallace and the 60 Minutes crew are there to film it.<\/li>\n\n
  3. Your picture ends up on a milk carton.<\/li>\n\n
  4. People arrive at the meeting, clutching copies of books about “spiritual abuse.”<\/li>\n\n
  5. The church constitution suddenly becomes revered as the most important legal document since the Magna Charta.<\/li>\n\n
  6. The little, blue-haired lady who’s in charge of the nursery pounds the lectern with her shoe and screams, “We will bury you!”<\/li>\n\n
  7. The next day your spouse books a one-way flight out of state and doesn’t invite you to come along.<\/li>\n\n
  8. Your neighbors hear about the meeting on their police scanner.<\/li>\n\n
  9. A loyal supporter presses a can of Mace into your hands.<\/li>\n\n
  10. Another loyal supporter presses a can of Coors into your hands.<\/li>\n\n
  11. Another loyal supporter presses Jack Kevorkian’s business card into your hands.<\/li>\n\n
  12. You’re asked to try on a pair of bloody gloves.<\/li>\n\n
  13. People begin referring to you as “our former pastor.”<\/li>\n\n<\/ol>\n

    —Jim Carpenter & Mike Wagner Des Moines, Iowa<\/p>\n

    1997 by the author or Christianity Today\/Leadership<\/em> Journal. For reprint information call 630-260-6200 or contact us<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    —Jim Carpenter & Mike Wagner Des Moines, Iowa 1997 by the author or Christianity Today\/Leadership Journal. For reprint information call 630-260-6200 or contact us<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_books":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[154],"tax_ctp_field_guide_subcategory":[],"tax_ctp_field_guides":[],"tax_ctp_format":[131],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[653,156,656],"tax_ctp_tags":[3605,3613,4193],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-21780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tax_publications-1997-leadership-journal","tax_publications-leadership-journal","tax_publications-summer_1997-leadership-journal","tax_ctp_tags-church-board","tax_ctp_tags-church-leadership","tax_ctp_tags-humor"],"acf":{"scripture_references":null},"yoast_head":"\nYou Know It's a Bad Meeting When... - CT 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