Photo by Alejandro Tocornal on Unsplash
Have you ever felt like this guy in the picture? Now, you could interpret this picture a lot of different ways, but if you have ever climbed a mountain, you know that sitting on the summit is a dangerous place to be when a storm is brewing.
Over 5 months ago, me and my family were sitting on the mountain and we got struck by lightning (in a figurative sense of course, otherwise I probably wouldn't be typing this right now). The fall has been long and hard. So now we are sitting at the bottom of the mountain trying to assess all of the damage.
Okay, so enough of the figurative language. Many of you know that I have been in ministry for the last 14 years. My latest position was in North Texas.
Back in 2016, the elders and I had some theological disagreements. We were on different sides of two specific issues. No, it doesn't matter what they were. I was saddened and disappointed by the fact that we were in such different places. It actually sent me into a bit of a crisis. So I started 2017 by fasting and seeking God on Fridays (yes, Fasting on Friday has a ring to it, or maybe I'm just a nerd). I did it for the first 3 months of that year. After that time, it seemed that God was leading me to be content in my system. I wanted to do this for many reasons. First, it is a good church. Lots of great people are there. Second, we had great friendships and relationships. Third, the staff was really good to work with. And finally, financially speaking, this church takes great care of its ministers.
Unfortunately, I had a hard time being content. In fact, I wasn't content. I suppose part of my nature is to push the bar. My motivation was that I was seeking to lead a church to reach lost people and I saw lots of reasons why we weren't doing that. So I started pushing and messing with things to try and align us as a church to become more focused on those who do not know Jesus.
What I realize now is that I pushed too hard. I brought too many new ideas, and challenged too many old ideas in a short amount of time. Richard Rohr in his book, Falling Upward, points out that on a good day, a person is only willing to question about 5% of what they know. I don't know how scientific that is, but my experience tells me that this is probably very close to the truth. The problem was that I was asking people in our church and our elders to question a lot more than that.
As a result, there was a steady stream of people who were coming to the elders complaining about my teaching and preaching. Unfortunately, because the elders were trying to protect me, they didn't tell me about these complaints. Just FYI, if you are an elder, you aren't protecting your minister by not telling him about complaints when they actually mean something to you. In other words, if you agree with the criticism or you think it is well-founded, you do your minister a disservice by not telling him about it.
It all came to a head in January of 2018. I preached a sermon that was pushing against some long-held beliefs by people in churches of Christ. Then all the criticisms came pouring in. People came to me about that sermon. The elders also approached me about that sermon and a few other criticisms. And 6 weeks after that sermon, I was asked to resign. To their credit, the elders took good care of me. They gave me a great, five-month severance package. But a severance package does almost nothing for your shattered confidence, your friends that are taken from you, your kids school and friends they have to leave, your wife's special Bible study group that she has to leave, and the emotional and Spiritual turmoil that sets in immediately.
You see, ministry is not like other jobs. You have to leave everything when you get forced to resign or get fired. At the time when you need your friends and spiritual family the most, you have to leave them. It is terrible. This must be a last resort in our churches friends and it shouldn't be done without telling your minister the problem and then giving them the opportunity to try and come up with some solutions together.
I tried to interview with churches, but my heart wasn't in it. I have been turned down several times. Two good job offers came up, but they both required a leap of faith. As a family, we were not ready for a leap of faith. We were broken. So we turned them down.
So here I am, over 5 months later sitting here jobless and floundering, living with family. I'm not pointing fingers. There's a lot of blame to go around, including my own. But over the coming weeks, I am going to try and write several blog posts in which I will try to illuminate what I have learned through this experience. I hope that it will be helpful to people in ministry and people wondering if God is calling them to a life of ministry. I also hope that it will be helpful for those going through a bad church experience right now. Finally, if you are an elder/board member in a church, I hope that you will consider this as you interact with your ministers. So join me, as I wrestle with what the next step is going to look like for me and my family.
Blessings,
Josh
