Expository Preaching Blog #35 – “You Can’t Join My Church!”

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For those of you who read all these blogs you might recognize the “You Can’t” title. This is the 3rd one. Sorry I guess I am on a roll. This should probably be the last one but no promises.

A number of years ago we were attending a church in the DC area for a couple of months. Honesty the pastor was a pretty good expository preacher. But, he didn’t like anyone ever questioning him. I really didn’t have any issues with his preaching but I did have a couple of questions when his son preached when dad was away. My wife asked a question the first time he preached and that went OK. The second time I was the one who asked the question. I did not rebuke, argue with or correct him. I simply suggested that he go back in the passage that he had preached from that morning and take a second look at it to make sure he had it right and really preached what the passage said.

The next morning I got an email from dad the senior pastor. He asked me not to return to “his” church.” No discussion. No debate. Just a “please don’t come back.” This was a small church of about 40 people. I then understood why the church was that small in the midst of a population of about a 7 million metropolis area. You could only join his church if you fully agreed with him and didn’t disagree with him at all. Apparently he came first and God came second.

Just a few months ago we ran into a similar situation. My wife was asked to teach a ladies Bible study by some ladies of the church we were attending. They had no senior pastor at the time (and still don’t) and the only staff member was a young youth pastor. One of the ladies went to the youth pastor to “check with him first” before starting the Bible study. He told the lady that Tricia could not reach a Bible study in the church because she wasn’t a member of the church. Tricia and I talked it over and decided that if that was the only issue we would become church members so that she could teach the class.

When we sat down to talk to the youth pastor we found out that was not the only issue. We and he disagreed slightly on the wording of a minor statement on the family in their church constitution. It was not a major doctrinal issue. It was simple an opinion of what they thought the Bible taught. An issue that most churches do not ever address in their church constitution.

But because we disagreed with him (him not necessarily the church body) he said “because of this you cannot join my church.” That is an exact quote by the way.

I was floored. After a minute, and after I got my hearing checked, I told him he could let himself out the back door. I could not even bring myself to walk him to the door. I honestly was ready to throw him out the door. The ladies of the church had been asking for over a year for a Bible study. No one could be found to be the teacher. Now here is a very capable and experienced trained Bible teacher offering to teach and he said NO because of a minor unimportant issue.

Why are our churches dying, shrinking and struggling? Because too many preachers and pastors are so hung up on their own opinions and pet peeves that they absolutely refuse to obey the very commands of Jesus Christ that we call “The Great Commission.”

What does God say? Preach the Word, teach the Word and practice the Word. It is hard to do when pastors stand in the way and block people from obeying Jesus Christ in their church.

 

 

Rev. David Johnson

Former Pastor

First Baptist Church of Austin, MN

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