I blog anonymously for a particular reason, and expect that reason to come to a close – at which time I will stop being anonymous.
The week before I began blogging, I had a run-in with the pastor and his wife… and it led to me leaving the church to attend a sister-congregation at the end of December (I stuck it out there for 2 months until after the holidays). I figured at the time that things would be settled by Easter, but they weren’t, and still aren’t. I’m settled, but the meeting we requested to sort out the relational issues which ensued has not yet been arranged. They did call one Friday and offer me a meeting a mid-afternoon the next day, but I declined it; after certain travel schedules were passed, they were supposed to arrange it; nothing. I followed up a month ago, and still nothing since.
To be fair, I haven’t really been attending for the past 6-8 weeks… but I don’t think it should be necessary for me to have regular attendance in order to get a meeting to settle an issue like this.
When I started blogging, I thought that I would end up writing a few posts about the whole thing, in a more direct way than I have… I thought I might talk more directly about my consideration of this local church, and I did not want to uncover them in the process until I had completed processing things in my mind. Sometimes during a process like that, the pendulum swings too far and you say things you later regret… so if people didn’t connect those particular posts with the actual church and individuals involved, that would be a good thing. As it turns out, there really aren’t many of these posts. Maybe there should be — I wrote a few and never published them, perhaps I should have. I’m doing so now with two of the most significant of these, for those who wish to read them.
As I kept blogging, I thought I might talk about how I’ve come to believe that this particular local church is controlling, engaged in spiritual abuse, wrongly understands the grace/works tension, and lacks the accountability they claim and espouse. It’s the same church who recently decided to charge extra for tithes contributed through debit and credit cards. The farther I get from this group, the worse it looks, and the more glaring the problems. Am I becoming more judgemental? Maybe. But when your pastor turns up on your doorstep 20 minutes after church ends one Sunday and yells at you in your driveway, you have to know something is a bit “off.”
Recently I was told that the group to whom these church leaders are accountable said that the congregation didn’t have faith for a particular course of action desired by the elders but resisted by the congregation, and they would have to wait to do it until the congregation had faith for it. Problem is, these leaders talk about consensus in decision-making, about hearing God as a people rather than autocratic rule. The people in this congregation are actually under the impression that they are hearing God on the issue and the elders are not. Turns out that perhaps the elders hear God ipso facto, and the process of taking major decisions to the congregation maybe has less to do with having them confirm the will of God (why the congregation thinks they are being asked) and more to do with testing the waters to see if they have enough faith for it.
I was in leadership of various types for a number of years with this group of people, and now that I’m leaving, I still grieve a bit about my participation in the whole thing… I grieve for what I personally said and did to other people; things I probably don’t even know has hurt them, or how badly. I know of one couple who left the church fairly directly because of me, and while I’m sorry for the pain I caused them, I’m glad for the pain I’ve inadvertently saved them had they stayed.
I expect to be providing a letter to the elders of this church in the coming week or so telling them formally and officially that we’re moving on elsewhere. Like the last letter I sent to them, we see this move as a moving toward and not a moving away; iow, we feel this is about engaging with God and where he wants us much moreso than simply running from where we were. Once this chapter is finally closed in our lives and the dust has settled, I expect I’ll stop blogging anonymously… but now you have some more insight into the reasons for it.
Anyone who wants to read the dirt posts The Last Straw and Giving it up for Lent, you’ll find them just below this one; the password is detox. These are the ones I did not want to publicly connect with the actual individuals, and am still not yet doing so. I post them because they provide some personal disclosure — they are negative (one in particular) toward the church we’ve left, and for this reason I’ve password-protected them so they don’t come up unless you really want to read them, and they won’t come out in the RSS feeds (at least they’re not supposed to).
The whole thing is made all the more complex by the heartfelt love we have for so many in the church we’ve left. These things exist on a personal, relational level, and have nothing to do with church or church function. In this particular church, abiding friendships between those who have left and those who have remained are a stark minority, but we continue to hope and pray these precious relationships that we have will continue.
I haven’t read your password-posts yet, although I will after writing this brief comment, but let me say that I’m really saddened on your behalf. I think you’ve shown admirable restraint in how you’ve been so careful to not publicly indict people or churches, and I agree with your decision to blog under Brother Maynard — although it’s kinda like having Clark Kent for a friend and not being able to tell people that you actually know the real Superman. :p
You’ve been a good friend for a long time (19 years already!), and while I grieve at what you and (insert spousal name here _________________) have gone through, I’m really impressed to see that you’ve handled things with such grace and humility. You’re a great example, and I’m sure that people who read your blog are learning invaluable things from your attitude alone.
Blessings, Bro!
You’re *way* too kind. Clark Kent indeed… I’m sure you know as well as I do that I have kryptonite feet!
;^)
Gratia vobis et pax,
I have always blogged publicly and, even though I never mentioned my ministry by name while I was there, my blog became a great source of contention. It is a tough journey for so many of us. May God bless you on your journey, bro.
Maynard,
Though I know you only from this blog and a few e-mails, I have to say that I agree with robbymac that you have been an admirable example in your public discussion of some very hard and hurtful issues. Don’t ever stop taking the “high road” my brother. I don’t think you will.
My old blog was found by some people from a past church, who had some rather unkind things to say to me. Maybe I’m a chicken–but I just didn’t want to deal with it. My somewhat drastic solution was to completely delete my first blog and start another–notifying only my regular and beloved readers of the new URL–and stop using my first name in comments and on my blog in hopes that I wouldn’t be googled and found again. So far so good I guess.
So I’m a “heretic’, just so you know. ;)
Peace my brother. I hope that someday I can call you by another name than Maynard, though I admit I’ll kinda miss that one when it goes.
I appreciate you sharing this with us. I am new to your blog and glad you gave us the condensed version. Sorry you are going
thru such an ordeal with this church and the leadership…..something surely is not right. In my prayers brother, keep doing
what you are doing……
My story sounds eerily similar to yours. 2+yrs ago my wife and I with our kids left a fairly prominent charismatic church after having been very involved for a dozen + years. Controversy surrounded the issue for about a year and in the end the elders remained unmoved/unchanged/unrepentant, sadly the abuse continues. And I am convinced it is abuse. I am ambivalent about keeping the churches and leaders anonymous. It feels increasingly sick to keep the “family secret” to someone else from getting mad at me for telling my story. I don’t feel a need for revenge and attempt to discredit the church/elders but I know the line of wounded continues to grow while I keep quiet. So, I share your struggle in this regard,
grant
I am incredibly lucky in these matters. I’ve gone to church all my life, I’m 47 years old, and I have never experienced a major split or conflict in any of the three churches I have attended. I’ve heard so many horror stories from friends in other churches that it’s scary.
I really do think the conflict resolution is the most undervalued and underestimated skill in human life. It’s something the church could take the lead in teaching, and the benefits would accrue to society at large as well. Of course, half of it is checking your pride at the door and sacrificing yourself for a higher goal. Whether the will is there to do that is another question that all the teaching in the world won’t resolve.
The blogging software I use lets people enter an email address but not display it, and tracks the IP address of poster. Nobody sees this stuff but me; the IP can be useful for dealing with spammers or flames and the like, and it will tell you who the ISP is for the user (stuff you probably don’t get with a Blogger account).
Grant, the point of that is to say that I believe you and I are actually talking about the same church… so small wonder if the experiences are parallel. Welcome to the blog. In one of the password-protected posts, I said we “came face-to-face with a knee-jerk reaction from the church leadership, one which was deeply rooted in and motivated by their pain from an earlier issue with a church faction from a couple of years back.” The incident referred to was 6 months ago, which causes it to align precisely with the timeline you mention in your comment. I hope you don’t take offence at the word “faction” — what actually happened was a group of people attempted to bring some correction and introduce change with the church elders; although I was not involved with these folks at the time, I know many of them and their issues in most cases were ones I’d spoken about to the leaders privately over several years… so while “faction” is usually a negative thing, these folks were on the right track. If we’re talking about the same incident, that bit will be personally applicable. Anyway, hit me offline if you’d like to follow up and compare notes – we’ll name the names offline. ;^)
For me, I won’t keep it anonymous forever, and people will be able to connect the dots to the church if they want to (Arlen, I’ll probably keep the Brother Maynard name going anyway but I’ll post my name on the About Me page). Until I had sufficient detox time though, I didn’t want to name names… just giving it enough time to fully process and ensure that if I was going to say things, they wouldn’t be strictly reactionary or pain-based. I don’t do this to keep the family secret, but because I don’t feel called to go heresy-hunting, and without a bit of time and distance, that’s what it could too easily become.
Just a note if you’re reading the password-protected posts, remember that those were composed a few months ago, so any confusion, indecision, or unresolved issues that seemed to appear at the time are for the most part no longer are there. I appreciate all of your comments and prayers here, but in that context I do want to let you know we’ve largely moved past the pain stage to a place where we’re personally disappointed with some of the individuals, which is a much different thing.
Grant, you’re right about the abuse. “Abuse” is quite a word, and it can’t be used without conjuring up all kinds of baggage. Spiritual abuse can be different than other common forms, I think. Most often, as is the case in this church, the abuser simply can’t see it. If they could, I still believe most of them would be grieved about it and could repent — but they just can’t see it. Or maybe I just want to believe that.
Hey,
Thanks for the insights.
I don’t mind telling you that I experienced quite a bit of “spiritual abuse” in a previous ministry position myself. I know what it’s like to have a spiritual leader go off on you. I know what it feels like to know that your whole ability to trust those in spiritual leadership has been shot to pieces.
Some men are simply incapatible with church leadership–and yet they are quite often the very ones in those leadership positions. They are more concerned with power and control and less concerned about love and nurture.
Again, thanks. And know that I’m your brother in this as well as in Christ!
I’ve been wanting to comment on this post for a few days but haven’t been quite sure of what to say. I’ve been through a similar situation twice, the most recent being about nine months ago. I’m glad to hear that you’ve been able to maintain perspective and are moving beyond the hurt. Peace for your continued journey – I’ll be praying for you. Blessings!