The article in yesterday's newspaper about the decline in salvations, baptisms, attendance, and financial support within the Southern Baptist denomination is just a reminder of how many people are looking at the church as an outdated institution. The article went on to say that there must be an attitude adjustment internally and spiritually if the current trends are going to be broken within their denomination.
Literally, because of all of the worldly pressures put upon the church as a whole to survive in these troubled time some bad attitudes have developed within the church. Almost every church, independent or denominational, during this recession period of the past 3 years has gone through some kind of crisis that has created this spirit of negativism that is infecting us with bad attitudes.
When a church has a group within it that develops a bad attitude it can cause great pain. To them the church has become their personal institution where they must have their way or nobody will be happy. And to be honest with you that is what is killing so many good churches today.
We enjoyed 13 years of ministry in Union, but our last two there were the hardest. During that time I had to deal with situations both spiritually and financially within the church that literally broke my heart. During our time there we remodeled the church, built a family life center, remodeled the day care, and left the church with less debt than it had when we went there. Becky and I had worked so hard during that time period to rebuild the church image in the community during our pastorate there.
Yet after leaving Union because we felt God was through with us there we had some disgruntled folk that literally tried to destroy our reputation in the community and within the church with lies and false tales. Even before we left their influence over leadership caused them to not acknowledge our 13 years of work in their midst. We had buried their loved ones, dedicated their babies and watched many of them grow up, spent thousands of hours at the hospital, worked countless days on structures and properties, and did hundreds of others things. Because of a few bad attitudes and threats to leadership we didn't even get a plaque thanking us for our service to the church. I don't think Becky will ever fully recover from some of the stuff that was said about her outreach ministries that were nothing but lies after we had moved.
Needless to say, we were hurt by a church that we loved and gave everything to. Were we perfect and did we do everything right? No, but we did the best we could. But even giving our best effort wasn't good enough to please everybody within the church. And just a few folk, who we thought were our friends and supporters, let their bad attitudes mark our entire ministry there at least in our hearts and minds.
The church I am currently pastoring is no different. I have had to deal with more stuff in the past 15 months that I had to deal with in 13 years at Union. Sometimes I just want to say to God, "Why are you doing this to me?" I know that God called us to our current church and I believe God is going to help us turn it around, but I'm dealing with 8 years of hurt that they have gone through that has created some very bad attitudes. I have grown to love many of these people, but some never have given me a chance to love them or even get to know them because they are holding on to the things of the past that have caused them pain and hurt.
After awhile you become so bonded with a bad attitude that only God has the power to break it, but someone has to be willing to let Him do so. You may say, "Pastor, why are you writing all this? I thought this was supposed to be a blog to encourage us not discourage us!"
Well I hope to do so by reminding you of this one fact-even Jesus could not please everybody. He had to deal with bad attitudes for most if not all of His ministry. He had to handle things that nobody else wanted to handle and deal with junk that nobody else wanted to deal with. Yet He did so with integrity and confidence knowing that God would vindicate Him in the end and that His Father's will would be accomplished through Him.
Just remember this:
-The church is not perfect. For as long as any of us are in it, it will have some imperfection. We are all subject to having a bad attitude on any given day. The solution for a believer is the church is the place where these things can be dealt with.
-The church is the only place where people feel they can vent their daily or weekly frustrations at one individual such as a pastor and make themselves feel better. Rather than going to God and getting the help they need, they allow their bad attitudes to become gossip, trash, critical spirits, and destructive forces that can and do hinder the spiritual growth of the congregation.
-The church is the one place where people want their way more often than they do God's way and will many times do what they can to achieve it, even if it means hurting others. Bad attitudes create lies out of personal opinion, unsubstantiated facts, and just plain old meanness in one's spirit.
But there is a solution to surviving bad attitudes and I hope daily this week to share with you how according to God's Word. Starting tomorrow I am going to take you on a road of progress that I hope will help you learn how to survive bad attitudes. Prayerfully you will take this journey with me.
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