May 16, 2011
Confronting Ministry, Money, and Power
I’m not really sure I can write the following post without offending some people. However, this issue comes up often enough, that I think it’s worth addressing head on. I’ll do my best to speak of my personal experiences, and I want to make it clear that I’m not trying to judge or condemn anyone’s calling.
About ten years ago, I thought I would enter into full time ministry on staff at a church. I never thought I would end up writing full time, though I had hoped to one day write a book. The more I thought about the dynamics of ministering on staff at a church in a salaried position, the more I became personally convinced I should not go down that road.
I hope that every church handles money, power, and ministry well, and therefore I think we need to talk about it. There’s a huge elephant in the room, and we don’t always address it: Churches hire pastors to do a job for them. If a pastor lets his people down, the congregation can fire the pastor.
Perhaps a little context is in order.
I heard horror stories in seminary about the way churches handled their pastors. I ate lunch with pastors who lived under the threat of losing their jobs because their eschatology wasn’t quite right, they didn’t succeed as counselors, or their congregations didn’t like the new praise songs.
In a rather extreme case, a pastor who lived in a parsonage was fired and told to vacate immediately—leaving him and his family in a terrible position.
I know that there are plenty of good stories about happy pastors and churches. I’m not out to drag anyone through the mud or to question anyone’s calling. What I do want to talk about is money, ministry, and how the two work together in the power dynamics of the church.
I’m not out to justify myself or to criticize anyone specifically. My beef is with our system, which may work in some circumstances, but has clearly proven less than satisfactory often enough. We stand to gain quite a lot if we can talk about these dynamics openly.
I’ll lay my cards on the table up front by saying that I support a particular ministry financially. That ministry relies on freewill offerings. In addition, there are some folks who send me free will gifts to support my writing ministry. I have no problem with financially supporting someone who is in the ministry.
However, we could run into problems when a Christian minister counts on a group he or she serves to provide a set amount of money as a salary. There is an unspoken power dynamic that may come into play when a minister is relying on specific people to provide a set amount of money. I’ve seen churches handle it well, and I’ve seen churches handle it poorly.
I’ve felt compelled that I personally, at this point in my life at least, can’t take an officially salaried ministry position. I have good friends who minister quite well as salaried pastors, and for that reason, I want to ask, “What makes a salaried ministry position work?” and “What do we need to watch out for when we have a salaried minister?”
Tuesday’s Post: What’s at Stake for Pastors
Wednesday’s Post: What’s at Stake for Congregations
Now this should be fun.
I am interested to see where you go with this one. I served on staffs for quite a while and I decided early on that when I started making decisions based on whether I would keep my paycheck or not was precisely the time I had to leave.
That thought sounds good, but it gets infinitely tougher to follow through on the older you get.
I think part of the problem is that our definition of ministry success is based on success in the business world. Success is more people in the pews. We need to redefine ministry “success.”
On the other side we do need hold our pastors and ministry leaders accountable for the jobs that they do. I’m interested to see where you weigh in over the next few posts.
The problem is democracy. That’s right: you heard me.
Take a look at Acts 1: 23-26. I would rather choose a pastor by rolling the dice than by congregational vote. Looking forward to this series, Ed.
You’re definitely brave to tackle this (and yes, it’s important)!
What Joel pointed out really resonates with me–that dichotomy.
And I get what Ray is saying, too. At my current church we have drawn lots for leadership team members (from a pool of people who have been nominated and agreed to serve)rather than cast votes. I have also (twice now) chosen to be a part of churches that are in between pastors (in other words, I decided on the church without knowing who the pastor would be).
I’ll look forward to seeing what alternate models you suggest.
(Btw, I used the “in a mirror dimly” verse in my post today–suddenly I had a better understanding of who you are.
Looking forward to reading the rest of your thoughts on this topic this week.
I’m very double-minded when it comes to this topic. I know for me getting paid for full time ministry didn’t end up to be the best thing. I compromised on many things through the years in order to keep my paycheck. Once the power of the paycheck was gone I related to leadership, topics, and the people differently (at least more honestly).
But I’m equally appalled at the slave-labor mentality that many boards take with their pastoral staffs, paying them far less what they are worth, far less than what they need to provide for their families, and then having the audacity to chalk it up to sacrificing for the Kingdom of God.
Now look what you’ve started…
Thanks everyone for your thoughts on this issue. Comments like these keep me writing and thinking–or thinking and writing… This really is a tough topic. I’m certainly not under any kind of delusion that I’ll be able to solve this, but I do hope we can come away with some fresh ideas and some fodder for more open conversation with our pastors and congregations.