My first appointment in ministry was a three-point charge in rural Idaho. Idaho, if you don’t know, is a beautiful place. I lived in the southern part of the state, called the “Magic Valley,” where modern irrigation drains a huge aquifer to grow large swathes of land. Sagebrush, mountains, and volcanic residue are to be found all over the area. It was a blessed place to be. Every day I looked to the North and saw the foothills of the Sawtooth Mountains. As I drove between my cooperative churches, I would trace the mountains to the north as sagebrush whizzed by.
Each of the three churches I served had their own assets and their own liabilities. All of them were moored to a dysfunctional denomination that is out of touch with the needs of people and the requirements of our Lord. A United Methodist pastor to the south of my appointment actively spied on me and interfered in my ministry. My superintendent, of course, did nothing to remedy the situation. It was hostile territory for a conservative pastor. Efforts on the ground were often complicated by the fact that, culturally in that area, it was expected that the only high-demand religion was Mormonism. All other forms of church were expected to be more lukewarm, less intense.
Moreover, in each local church, there are established patterns. Sometimes, rarely but sometimes, there are cultures of faithfulness that make a pastor’s job much harder. Other times, much more often, there are patterns of unbiblical ego: ministries that have lost their connection to Christ, associated more with the personalities involved than the personality of Christ, done for monetary or emotional reasons. There are also often unhealthy understandings of how it is that Christian fellowship is to work. Too often, a congregation identifies as beggars, obligated to take and retain any and all unregenerate comers. This regularly tears churches apart. Churches that cannot distinguish between sheep and goats, or even wolves, will lose their identity in Christ and jeopardize the faith of the sheep.
This is often most clearly seen in a church’s tolerance of a fractious person. Each church I have served has had fractious people. While there are many ways to cause division within a church, many intolerable behaviors are quite common within churches. People who easily take offense, who complain, who speak privately with sympathetic parties rather than going to the source, who respond to personalities rather than points, who draw vindication from their own subjective feelings. Undergirding people like this is a deep-seated conviction that they are right with God, so anyone who upsets them is working against God. People like this start turf wars in churches. Families will feud with one another. Individuals will speak against the preacher, even while hatefully sitting week after week in a pew. I once had a lady who would sit on the second pew from the front and mean-mug me the entire time. For years.
This article was begun with another lady in mind. I’ll call her Esmerelda in this piece. That obviously isn’t her name.
On my first Sunday leading worship at my new church, Esmerelda approached me, holding the hand of a man. They were both in their seventies. She informed me very directly that their spouses had both died and that they were dating. I smiled and acknowledged what she had said. I thought she was just sharing a detail of her life that she thoughts was cute. I didn’t realize that she was challenging me to maintain biblical righteousness on my first day: The two were intimate, with no intention of getting married. This maintained for the full five years I was there. I wasn’t attuned at that point to be concerned for the sexual sin of older people. I just didn’t even see older folks as sexual creatures. I was much more concerned about teaching young folks to govern themselves and to flee from sexual immorality. I did not consider than older folks would similarly fail to observe clear biblical instruction. I am still a bit appalled, but I have since met several other older people who feel like such biblical warnings against porneia are quaint, or even backwards.
People like this, of any age, are an affront to God and will not be found in his Kingdom if they fail to repent. If that describes you, I hope you will repent and to conduct yourself righteously in the future. This is no small issue.
Why I’m Picking On An Old Lady
Let me take a timeout for a minute and explain why it is that I am going to tell you the story of Esmerelda here. It is not because I carry bitterness in my heart and want to passive-aggressively attack sweet little old ladies who had the temerity to disagree with me about the finer points of Christian doctrine or church administration. It isn’t that I have such a fragile ego that I cannot deal with any sort of challenge or opposition in the church. I am a classical liberal, believing in the importance of robust dialogue and challenging authority. Also, I am not regularly revisiting these things in my head, stoking resentment and anger towards Esmerelda. Rather, I rarely think of her. Even so, I regularly remember the lessons she taught me in ministry, which is why I offer them here to you.
The reason I chose to write about this exceptional person is because I think the common approach to dealing with unregenerate personalities within local churches is killing the American church. I believe that a counterfeit version of Christianity has taken over our churches, one that seeks inclusion/inclusivity more than righteousness, one that cannot bear an exclusive God nor an exclusive culture that he requires. This counterfeit faith has largely replaced authentic Christianity, which is by nature exclusive. The fact that practicing church discipline and pushing out the goats is so offensive and unthinkable to so many is evidence of how far this co-opting of the Christian faith has become.
I believe that, while our churches continue in the delusion that we can and should make room for all, repentant and unrepentant, regenerate and unregenerate, we are quite literally killing ourselves and destroying the foundation that was built by generations of faithful believers before us.
*Insert obligatory statement about how there is nothing exceptionally evil about little old ladies in particular, that I generally like and love old ladies, and that all people are equally born in sin and need to repent*
Scriptural Basis
The primary scriptures I lean upon in dealing with personalities like Esmerelda’s are 1) the Exodus narrative, and 2) Paul’s letters to the churches. Also, here is a classic:
“A quarrelsome wife is like the dripping
of a leaky roof in a rainstorm;
restraining her is like restraining the wind
or grasping oil with the hand.”
-Proverbs 27:15-16
True, this woman was not my wife. Even so, the point of that passage isn’t primarily marital. It has to do with sharing space with a person who is prone to complain. It is terrible. In the household of God, there is no room for complainers.
The story of the Israelites’ time in the wilderness begins in Exodus and ends in Deuteronomy. Several thematic elements persist throughout. One of those elements is that, despite God’s continued proof of love and care, provision through the wilderness, the people continue to complain against him. There are many different accounts of them complaining or grumbling over those years. The Lord is always upset by this, and often punishes them. My favorite account of him doing so is when he sent poisonous serpents among them to just start killing them painfully (Numbers 21:4-8). In the end of this episode, God saves them from the death, but not from the pain that was the result of their complaining.
Paul’s letters to the early churches are regularly concerned with the kind of speech found within Christian communities. “Let no evil speech come out of your mouths” (Eph. 4:29) was just one of many clear phrases to warn against what we say. He regularly warned against “vain jangling” and unwholesome talk. The best warning against speech is actually not written by Paul, but by James:
“Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.”
-James 3:5-8
It is a dangerous thing to provide a rationale for biblical instruction when it is not explicitly offered by the text. How wonderful, then, that Jesus himself provides the only rationale we should ever need for controlling our tongues:
“But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile a person…”
-Matthew 15:18-20
We live in a culture in which people have this consistent problem of conflating what they can legally do with what is morally acceptable. The two are not the same. Yes, we live in a land with free speech. No, that freedom does not keep us morally blameless when we choose to say whatever we want. Rather, as Jesus said, “everyone will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken.” (Matt. 12:36). We should control our speech because, if we fail to do so, we can quite easily condemn ourselves. It is a salvation issue.
Disregarding the Scriptures
Even so, people within the church have a way of justifying themselves and others when they misbehave in this way. Despite all of the biblical correction offered here (and there was a lot more than what I was able to succinctly offer here), Christians have proven exceptionally bent on sin:
“Oh, he has always been like that. He loves the Lord and has a heart of gold. You just gotta know how to eat the good fruit and spit out the seeds.”
“I’m only saying what everyone else is thinking. Are you going to target me for just being honest?”
“Listen, I’m just asking questions. I don’t know why you’re being so defensive.” Ben Shapiro just did a decent little segment on why this is so toxic.
“I am entitled to an opinion. This is America, after all!”
“Pastor, some people are saying __________.” Oh man, this one drives me nuts. If it doesn’t have a name attached to it, nobody should be passing it along. Even if it does have a name, often it still should not be passed along. Have discernment!
Anyway, there are a lot more like this. These sayings, and the behaviors that match them, create church rot. If they are allowed without challenge, you have no right to expect for your church to do well.
Another Reason
Something also quite explicit in scripture is the reality that we are all connected. While we are all individuals, no man is an island. The behavior of those around us impacts us very much. Beliefs and behaviors are contagious. Humans are like sponges, absorbing and internalizing the phenomena around us. This is why the Old Testament is so concerned with purity law. Jews were given an appreciation, by God, for the invasive nature of sin, the corrupting and degrading influence it has, and the need for purification.
While Christianity did away with repeated blood sacrifice, and though it practices a much more open posture towards a sinful world, it is not right to see it as being unconcerned with sin or purity. Rather, Jesus himself came to save us from sin (Matt. 1:21). And if Ephesians 5:27 isn’t as explicit as it gets about the need for purity in the church, I don’t know what to tell you. Read it again. Purity is not optional. That is why Paul warns against being “unequally yoked” with unbelievers in 2 Corinthians 6:14-17.
Christians are called to be pure. Churches are called to be blameless. When churches make room for bad behavior and speech in the church, they cease to be a biblical church. It is right to ask if they are really even offering salvation.
Back to Esmerelda
Esmerelda embodied the uncharitable spirit of a worldly unbeliever. I worried that I wouldn’t be able to remember many anecdotes, but they are coming to me freely now…
Music & Worship
I remember she cared a lot about the music and was quite unhappy with it often. We once did a new hymn in the 1989 United Methodist Hymnal that had a Japanese origin: “Send Your Word, O God.” It is simple and sweet. It is not hard to pick up. It was just new and unfamiliar. After worship, in the receiving line, she had nothing to say to me except, “I did not like that hymn.” She said it like a customer who wasn’t satisfied for a service she had paid for.
I stole a line from Francis Chan: “That’s okay. We weren’t worshiping you today.” The lady was incensed. There was venom in my response, making clear that I could not care less about the satisfaction of her personal tastes. She made a complaint to the Staff-Parish Relations Committee (SPRC).
This began a larger fight about the amount of time spent singing, praying, and preaching in worship. Esmerelda insisted that we were spending an inordinate time in worship, that things should not be going on so long. She made this complaint to everyone who would listen. Eventually, the SPRC members started timing out how long each of the elements in worship would take. From time to time I would hear about an SPRC member correcting Esmerelda when she was complaining to people after worship, “Well, Esmerelda, Pastor Jeffrey actually only preached for 15 minutes today. Here is my timer right here.” To their great surprise, she did not change her mind based on an objective measure. She knew that her feelings were more legitimate than these pawns of the pastor in the SPRC.
Communion
Out of concern for including people with digestive issues, Sara Beth started experimenting with gluten free bread recipes. She had been a vegan since seminary, so she knew how frustrating it was to want to participate in a group setting but to have the ingredients be a problem.
One Sunday, for the sacrament Sara Beth submitted a loaf of gluten free bread for consecration. It didn’t taste great, though it was far from the worst breadlike product ever made. I and everyone else in the flock dutifully ate it and meditated on our Lord’s crucifixion and death, his atoning blood for our sakes. Everyone except for Esmerelda. Esmerelda knelt at the altar and spat out the sacrament on the floor. It sat there for the rest of worship. I did not hear about it until afterwards.
Again, this analysis of the worth of an element of worship by elevating her subjective tastes was toxic to the assembly. Her lack of discernment was galling. It is amazing how many people can sit and listen to the pure Word proclaimed week after week while simultaneously failing to gain basic discernment about how God’s glory is not subjectively determined. Not everything in worship is to be saccharine and simple. Her hateful rejection of the bitter, the meaty and hearty, the meditative…well, it could have been overlooked had it not been so visible and vocal. It was behavior that required a response.
Backstory
“Walk another mile in a man’s shoes” goes the saying (it isn’t scripture). The notion is that, if one uses enough empathy, one will lose his ability to speak against the behavior of another. This is a sort of propaganda aiming to deprive people of discernment. Everyone who has lived has had both blessing and suffering, victimhood and sin, each in different measure. Many persevere under great adversity, while many others crumble for no good reason. No matter how much one attempts to walk in another’s shoes, we are all judged according to the same standard. We can say that isn’t fair. It won’t work out for us on the last day.
I did take the time and energy to learn about Esmerelda. I asked others about her. At church events, I would ask her about herself. Few people knew a whole lot. She had always been a prickly person. She was actually a widow, having been married to a man who died many years before I came to serve the church. She and her husband were known for being particularly involved in a ministry, maybe they were the leaders, aimed at marriage enrichment. I was told by more than one person that they hosted a party for that group at their house, at which many people saw pornographic art on the walls. This was a woman of the flesh.
Times of Kindness
I do not mean to convey that Esmerelda was only ever bitter and evil. That is rarely how people are. Almost everyone has redeeming qualities. She had a lovely cackling laugh. I genuinely enjoyed her often. Her boyfriend, a trustee of the church whom I liked, was a fan of cowboy poetry. Once the two of them took my wife and me to a cowboy poetry competition, with lots of booths and special food around. I don’t particularly care for that sort of stuff, but I went with them, and they were kind hosts.
I also remember a Good Friday service one year, after which she approached me with tears in her eyes. She grabbed my arms and looked in my eyes, saying “I felt like I was actually there.” I don’t remember what I said. I remember I was incredulous. I hadn’t felt like it was nearly as moving as some productions. To this day I am mystified. I have honestly wondered if the woman was dependent on pharmaceuticals that affected her hormones and/or moods. Or maybe the Holy Spirit touched her. That is entirely possible.
The Real Nature of Evil
Evil is sometimes overt, dark, disgusting. More often, it seems quite benign. Usually, evil is coupled with many things that are pleasant, or even seem to be good. This is how people stay in abusive relationships: sure, there is the bad, but there is also the good. And that good can be pretty great sometimes.
Evil often feels good; that is why people do it. Evil often makes sense. It often seems like the only reasonable or sane option. To be concerned with evil can seem silly, immature, unnecessary, dramatic. Folks love to tell the story of Jesus saving the woman caught in adultery. Those same folks rarely remember to tell his instructions after her persecutors left: “Go forth and sin no more” (John 8:11).
The movies we watch condition us to see sin, not in the way the bible does, but the way the world does. We talk about “good guys” and “bad guys” as though that is a category that corresponds with reality. We get portraits of thoroughly wicked people, depraved and nasty. Those are the folks who deserve eternal punishment. We love the movies in which they suffer and are punished for their wickedness.
The evil that God hates and punishes is the evil found in every human heart. It isn’t found only in bond villains, murderers, child molesters, and the environmental destroyers in Captain Planet. Rather, the evil God hates and punishes is also found in little old ladies, handsome young men, responsible voters, people who stand and salute the flag, people who pay their taxes, people who obey traffic laws, people who tuck in their shirts and mow their lawns, children, rich and poor, black and white—everyone. Literally everyone. Nobody can be saved without a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit because of the invasive and corrupting nature of sin.
A church that is lackadaisical about this topic has no right to expect to be right with God. God jealously loves his people. A relative indifference on our part to sin, whether it be in ourselves or our pew mates, is an affront to God.
What Ever Happened to Esmerelda?
The constant complaining eventually became untenable. Her boyfriend grew more vocal and hostile towards me. More people began to approach me or SPRC members to report things that she was saying. She began to speak, not just against me, but against my wife.
The spirit of discontent grew. Different personalities along the way chose to start interpreting me uncharitably. People who had been friends, who had sat at my dinner table with me, eventually came to hate me. Not everyone. There were many dear friends that maintained until the end. Yet they had to learn to keep their heads down.
The SPRC did eventually try to get involved. They went through all the unfortunate developments and behaviors. They eventually drafted a covenant for her to sign in which she would commit to not speaking evil of me. She refused to sign it. SPRC members started signing up to accompany her everywhere she went in the church in order to correct her or intervene when she started complaining. This, of course, didn’t last. In the end, their efforts to reform Esmerelda was fruitless. Even so, asking her to leave was never an option. They were entirely defeated.
I was, too. We had a rebellious music leader who refused to work with me. We had a praise band member who was discovered to have collaborated with a neighboring clergy to interfere with my ministry. The SPRC made clear to me that none of these were to be shown the door. In the end, it was their understanding that it was my job to bear the abuse and internalize the harm.
I refused. When it became clear that the local church leadership would not defend me, nor would my superintendent protect me from outside interference from the neighboring clergy, I moved. It was a great decision. When we got to Nowata, we somewhat immediately had a crisis in which the church could have turned against me. I instantly anticipated the waves of hatred I had felt before. But Nowata dismissed the words of the complainer and stood beside me. When it became clear that this church would not abuse us the way we had experienced, we decided it was finally time to start having children. Eight years later, things are pretty great.
When I moved away, I stopped corresponding with folks in that church, with a couple rare exceptions over the years. I have not heard anything from any of them for some time. The last time I checked, they were led by a gender confused woman who preaches a gospel quite foreign to me. It is actually quite amazing that the church is even alive after being pretty much closed down for a couple of years during Covid.
But had I stayed, I’m not sure the church would be much healthier. The truth is that a heckler’s veto has more power than the most capable leadership. Nastiness has more power than purity. That is why it is so important to protect the church. That is why shepherds have to be able to beat back the wolves and expect the sheep to fall in line. When the sheep refuse to acknowledge the difference between themselves and the wolves, then a bloodbath is all that can be expected. That is how I remember my ministry there: a series of bloodbaths.
Lessons Learned
When I sat down with my Board of Ordained Ministry in Oklahoma, after moving away from Idaho, one of my interviewers took great offense to me. I told the story of the harm that bad behavior among laity did to my family while growing up the child of preachers, continuing on to the dysfunction of my last appointment. I said that I would not be tolerating or internalizing abusive behavior anymore, and that it would be my intention to show someone to the door if they made clear their intentions to continue in unrepentant grumbling.
“What?! You mean there are certain churches we can’t send you to because they are too toxic?!” she said incredulously.
“Well, you can send me to them, but odds are I will destroy the churches. Sometimes that needs to happen though, so if you need me for such a purpose, then yes, send me.” She didn’t like my answer.
Wrapping Up
Early Methodism was known for requiring a high standard of righteousness among its people. Those who refused to conduct themselves accordingly were shown the door without much pity.
Today, many like to act as though such an approach is somehow unChristian or unrealistic. I would submit that it is necessary and essential for a true revival of the church.
I do not mean to convey that I have been so quick to push people out of the door. In my current appointments, there have indeed continued to be personalities who grumble and complain, who speak evil of me, and even my wife. Yet these people have all but fallen away. When I have had to speak with them after a prolonged time of unpleasantness, they have left, and the people have stood beside me as the complainers portrayed themselves as victims to the public. I have continued to be afraid of the hatred of men and the disapproval of the world.
But I fear God more. And I love his church more than I love to be admired by men. I am still learning, but after a dozen years of ministry, I’m pretty sure I’m right on this one. Church, folks like Esmerelda don’t belong in the church. Give them over to their sins and put them out of the church. When they repent, take them back. This is the way.
Wow, so many different people came to mind, I feel for Pastors. Amazing how Jesus spoke to the woman at the well with concern and how he reminded us all to go and sin no more . True worshipers also remember the second half of that story.
Many modern Pastors want to be inclusive and grow their membership rather than grow the faith