One thing I realized about people is that when you’ve had conflict and you’ve had to go through a Matthew 18 process or some kind of church discipline process in the church, most people really do think -whether or not they can express it- if you had gone about it the right way, if you had prayed, if you had searched your own heart, if you had the right attitude and were humble and kind, and you were well mannered, you didn’t get too angry, you didn’t get too bitter and accusatory, and all the things, if you went about it the right way, you would have been successful.
Was the conflict succesful?
Now you can define “success” in a few different ways. There was reconciliation, however you define that. You were heard; people heard you out and they did something, they acted. People in charge acted and things were resolved, right? That’s one definition of success.
There could be others, right? It’s you’re still in the church. You’re still an active member. Everybody loves each other. You sing together every Sunday. It’s all good, right? That could be another measure of success.
But we can all agree that if you are either kicked out or you are vilified in some way, that’s not success.
Now we know, we absolutely know, those of us who’ve been in ministry for a long time and have watched things happen around us or have been part of things and issues that have come up. We absolutely know that there’s so many factors and, you can look at the final, let’s say, verdict and go, “Well, this sounds right.” And most people are just going to believe that everybody did their best, right? We just want to believe that. We’re going to believe that about the people in charge. We’re going to believe that about the people who made the decisions and regardless of whether they did everything perfectly.
I mean, let’s be clear. None of us, well most of us, are not looking for perfection. It may seem that way. It may seem like we’re just going tit for tat or we’re just trying to pull out every little bit of discrepancy that there is. I would say most people I know personally are not doing that. People who are pushing back on abusive leadership are not doing that. That’s not what we’re doing.
What we are doing is trying to assess what’s actually important to the process, what’s actually important to our hearts, to our SOULS and relationship to each other and relationship to God, because we still believe in “love God, love neighbor.” We do. Absolutely do.
And so when you start to hear people say things like “You would have gotten what you wanted” (or at least what we say you wanted) “if you had done it the right way or if your spirit, your attitude was right”. And if ultimately you didn’t get your way, you must have been wrong.
Now that is one of many ways that the prosperity gospel continues to have its hold on the evangelical mind because in my mind and in my experience, it’s very similar to the idea that health will always go well for those who love God the most. We really do.
Holding all forms of Prosperity Gospel to the mirror
Maybe it’s American. I don’t know. I haven’t studied this in other countries. American exceptionalism is the thing. I have seen in many American churches this concept that if we are doing God’s will, we will see. blessings and we will see fruit and we will see prosperity and success, however you define success. I’ve long been concerned about that language because what does that mean? Are we defining that?
Because some of us who’ve been doing church planting, for example, have said amongst ourselves what if this church never gets bigger than 30 people? Like who’s asking that question? Who’s planting a church and telling their church planting funders, “The reality is we may never get very big?” What does that mean? What does it mean if we never get above 30 people on a Sunday morning? What does it mean if we don’t ever find a location. We never build a building. We never have enough funding to do something like that. What does that mean? Does it mean that God is not for us?
Absolutely not. And we’re solidly at a time in church history where this is about churches of every stripe and every creed -like it’s across the board and it’s discouraging- but it also points again to the question of do we really believe? That God only blesses what’s right and good? Or are the things that we look to as blessings and success those very same things undermining the vision and the mission of the church today.
We look at these churches that have thousands of people showing up every Sunday. And, it could be on multiple sides. It could be churches that are heavily now in cases of church abuse, sexual abuse, all things. And they’re horrific. The stories that are coming out are horrific.
I mean, I still… Ravi Zacharias is probably still one story for me that still shakes me to my core for multiple reasons. And nobody wants to talk about RZIM anymore.
I remember even years ago when most people were finding out, they did not want to talk about it. I think about all the money that… well anyway, the point.
So “success” is not the metric. It’s never been the metric with God.
As far back as examples in the Bible, one that popped out for me was the spies, when they went to Canaan and they looked to Canaan. Only two of the 12 spies said, we absolutely believe God is with us and we can conquer this land. And the other 10 said, “Yeah, looks scary.” This kind of majority vote works against the purposes of The Church, if we always go with a majority vote, which lends itself easily to Prosperity Gospel. Then God absolutely said to them, “Well, you 10 people are not going. You and your families are not going to enter the promised land because of doubting me.” (Numbers 13)
And I’ve thought about Solomon the wise. I thought about how God blessed him and his reign was somewhat prosperous. There’s certainly precedent in scripture where God sends a rain to the just and the unjust alike. There are many examples of a metric of worldly success and health and what looks like comfort and contentment.
Which circles back to my original point.
The argument that if you were right, you would have won your case is absolutely bonkers for Christians. It’s bonkers in the way that the church courts end up pitching it. They say, “Well, you have recourse. You can, you can appeal, you can go to this, you can go to that.”
In some denominations, like my former Presbyterian circles, they talk a lot about when do church courts need to act? Things I won’t go into it. But it begs the question again, that if one church court gets it wrong, will the next church court get it right? And then the court after that which is the SJC and they have to get it right because there’s no recourse for them getting it wrong. It is inherent to the system that once the decision is made by the SJC -by those 22-24 men- those men HAVE to get it right. Whatever they say has to be right full stop in the PCA. There is no recourse much like the Supreme Court of the United States. And we know that the Supreme Court of the USA is never wrong.
So when most wise, the most godly, the most learned and educated, the most Spirit-led, Spirit-filled men tell you you’re wrong. Where can you go from there? Seeking the blessings of the kingdom of God feels all the more daunting after that. But where else can we go?
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Asking For Me 
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