Musings on Spiritual Matters

As congregations become larger, there is a need for a larger staff.  A large staff can be a blessing or a cursing.  When there is synergy, the congregation is deeply blessed, but when there is rivalry the congregation is deeply hurt.  Sometimes ministers begin to jockey for position.  The pulpit minister is insecure which causes the other ministers to be discouraged from practicing their gifts.  There are associate ministers and youth ministers doing everything possible to push the pulpit minister out of the way in order to have his job.  There are naive ministers that believe that the people who come up to them and state that “we wish your were the preacher” is a real rally cry.  I have heard of elders firing both ministers because of this jockeying for power.  Preacher friends of mine will mention that the youth guy or the associate guy is wanting to be a pulpit preacher, and they do not want to move.  This is going to cause conflict.  If you want to be a pulpit guy, go find another church, because trust me, you do not want the church after you cause all this controversy to get the other guy fired.

It is really sad when this type of conflict happens.  While at the first church I preached at, there were people who said, “we wish you were the preacher, Matthew.”  What a nice comment, the problem was the pulpit guy was ten times the preacher I was.  I could put together one good sermon every four or five months, but to preach two good sermons every week, this would be impossible.  In my role at this congregation, was to support the pulpit guy, and if members tried to polarize us, I was to stand with the pulpit man.  In this role, I was to an advocate for him, and not allow members to cause pride.  Preacher’s, know your place!

Fortunately, I have worked with great preachers in Castle Rock and Waynesboro.  A pulpit guy knows when the youth minister or the associate minister is pushing for his job.  It as always been a blessing to know that Mitchell and Steve have supported me in my work.  Instead of allowing the critics to create division, these men have allowed the spirit of Christ to reign.  I think about of churches have been hurt by youth ministers that did not have the maturity to handle these complaining members.  Instead of supporting the minister, the youth guy allowed the members to use them to hurt the church.  Preachers, never be a pawn in a members game!

In the situation in Corinthians, you see this modern day problem in the ancient context.  Nothing has really changed.  Members wanting certain people.  In this text, you see that Paul and Apollos are on the same page.  There is no rivalry, no jealousy, no jockeying for top preacher.  In fact, 1 Corinthians 16:12, Apollos will not even come back to the congregation to preach.  He wants no part of this division.  And Paul states clearly, it is not a one or the other, it is a both/and.  There is watering and planting that takes place.  Shockingly, preachers who think they can do a better job soon learn that what they wanted is not all the great.  Instead of running to you to complain about the bad preaching, now they are complaining about you.

So what can elders do and congregation do to help this to not happen?

1. Hire people with different skill sets.  If you have a high energy guy, do not hire a high energy youth minister, etc.

2. If you have a type A, or a type D, I, S,C type of minister, do not hire another one.  Blend the staff as much as possible.  This might be harder to deal with each other, but the staff will respect each others gifts more.

3. Define roles well.  When Waynesboro hired Mitchell, I was clear to Mitchell and the elders, we are not hiring a mini pulpit guy.  We were wanting someone to work with young families.  Mitchell developed a super successful over school program called CSI.  This was his baby, and mostly I went visiting on Wednesday afternoons.  He did his thing, and I did my thing.  I helped him, and he helped me, but we knew each others roles.

4. Ask them to leave.  If someone on the staff cannot support the pulpit guy or the direction of the eldership, ask them to leave.  Do not wait around, do not allow the problem to get bigger, just ask them to leave.  Of course, be good about it.  Give them time, and give them money, do it right, let them look.  But if the person cannot support the leadership in the congregation, they need to go.  One of the things I love about Steve is my desire to be preaching at 10:30, I like our services to be on time and end on time.  When Steve leads singing, I never doubt that he will do what I asked.  In fact, it means the world to me, I can relax and focus on the lesson instead of the time.  Yea, yea, maybe that is shallow, but hey this is what I like and he respects this.

Hope this was helpful.  I was reading 1 Corinthians and realized how relevant this book is to church life.  Also, I want to say thank you to Burnice Wesbrooks, who taught me to be humble to the pulpit guy.  I like to thank Mitchell Skelton and Steven Curo for always being a blessing to work with.  I have been blessed, but know too many guys who have not.

Related posts:

1. Elder-Preacher Retreats
2. Preacher Killers
3. How To be Preacher Friend
4. The Role of the Preacher in Decline
5. When The New Preacher Comes

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This entry was posted by Matthew on Friday, April 30th, 2010 at 1:32 pm and is filed under Church News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.