MY STORY

During my twenty plus years of pastoral ministry I experienced my share of happiness and heartache just as you have. One skirmish with a particular family, however, is forever embedded in the depths of my being where it will haunt me until I die.

It began a year and one half after I accepted the call to the church and it lasted almost two full years. Whenever I preached, I felt the icy chill of frozen eyes penetrating my soul like a cold steel shank. It was becoming more obvious to me, the “owners” of the church were mad at me and were planning my departure.

Actually this wasn’t the first time they had done this. My predecessor tried to warn me, but I refused his pleading fearing his experience would taint my opinion of "the family."

I should have listened to him.

Rumors of clandestine dinners were becoming more frequent and so was hostile opposition at business meetings to previously supported ideas and programs. Surprise visits with petty lists of “concerns”, were marked by frequency, intolerance and rage. I was in for it, but I didn’t know why! Removal not reconciliation seemed to be the goal which made it increasingly more difficult to side step. Although I reached out in love, my acts of kindness were jeered at and rejected. I met with my Association Director who turned a deaf ear to me telling me after I'm gone, he still had to "live with these people." The State office didn't help either. But my biggest blunder, I believe, was that I trusted a man who claimed to be my friend only later to conspire with them against me. Once their army was poised for attack, they dropped a bomb in the center of my world I'll never forget.

It happened at a packed out Wednesday night “business meeting” most of them never attended. What hurt most was that my children, my wife, and my parents were all there to watch what they did. I’ll never forget the look of horror in their eyes as phantom allegations were fired at me with reckless machine gun rapidity. While I helplessly searched for compassion in the eyes of those I had often assisted, I received only anger in return. I now know what a lynch mob looks like. Although no specifics were ever cited and nothing ever proved, the viciousness with which they labeled me a liar and a cheat both impugned my integrity, and undermined my effectiveness as a pastor. I can’t fully explain to you how this period of my life made me feel, but only that it heaped fuel on a growing heart problem I didn’t know until later that I had.

I filed the memory of that night as one of the worst I have ever spent. After 40 months of what many observers viewed as successful ministry- with hundreds of souls coming to Christ, leading the state in baptisms, quadrupled attendance and income, exploding youth ministry, a new building, property paid for and cash in the bank, I submitted my resignation and silently limped away, only later to learn that the family that lead the attack was spreading disgust that I left. 

THE NEW CHURCH SCANDAL

My story is not an isolated one. It has actually replaced televangelist greed as the new scandal in the church.

"Termination can happen to any minister no matter how good he is," says Ross Campbell, a retired psychiatrist in Chattanooga, Tenn., who has worked with many terminated ministers. "The more ministers are compassionate or are servant pastors, the more vulnerable they are. If you get a mean, sociopathic board member, it's easy to manipulate a pastor. This is happening to our best, most wonderful pastors."

A 20-year study of US pastors fired or forced to resign revealed that most cited ongoing conflict with just one or two people as the determining factor. Sadly, two thirds of these churches discovered all too late that the charges brought against the pastors they fired had been falsified by the devilish instigators.

The question is simple: How can this happen? One of the problems is that pastors-- who are in reality God's gift to the church (Eph. 4:11-12), are often set up as the enemy. In well concerted "us against him" campaigns they are removed from their calling by one or two votes as easily as an unpopular city councilman. G. Lloyd Rediger, author of Clergy Killers sees this trend as a horrible commentary on our whole society. He writes: “When churches start to function like rotten politicians, we're in trouble."

So where are we? At the crossroads of a wonderful opportunity to help some of our beaten and berated colleagues. “One of the tests of leadership," writes Andrew Glasow, "is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.”

You were led here-- we believe-- by the Lord Jesus, perhaps to lend your experiences like balm and bandages in a new book addressing this growing ministry malady.

My writing partner Kent Crockett and I now have our manuscript in the hands of 3 publishers. Your story-- which could prevent just one desperate soul from a final desperate act-- could be included in it. Pray about this, please. 

You can email an overview to me at ---> Mike