I would like to say first of, I have no research to back up my “opinion.” They are simply my experience being raised in a pastors home, working with a pastor as youth leader for 10 years, 1 year of Assistant Pastor, and 3 years of Pastoring. My goal is not to focus on Pastor and Members, but Pastor and other Pastors. I truly believe we will not see a great revival in America until we have a great revival of ETHICS amongst Pastors.
What are “ethics?” In this context they simply mean “doing the right thing even if the wrong thing grows your church.” It is easy to plant a church and/or revive a church if your goal is simply “more” people. The goal of a church should be “transformed” people.
Topic 1 PEOPLE CHANGE CHURCHES
I heard a preacher sing “Thats Life” at Because of the Times (which you should attend in 2012, see the POA) and its appropriate for this post. People change churches….thats life! Ethics comes in to play in how you handle this situation. As a pastor and leader at our church I have been on both sides of this issue. We’ve had people leave, not sure why though, and had people come. I asked a mentor about this and he said, when you have a great church people will want to come. People changing churches is a part of life, how you handle it determines if you have ethics or not. This is how we handle it at New Life: We have a process for connecting with first time guest, if we notice they are from another church we will monitor their consistency in coming (b/c their home church may have taken a night service off or some other reason they were just “visiting”), if they come constantly and begin to support the church in offerings, we will schedule a meeting with them and request they return to their home church and have a one on one with their pastor to resolve any issues so they can stay at their home church. After they have had that meeting and still persist to come to our church we then contact their home church pastor. I will admit this is a very awkward conversation, but it is the right thing to do. After these two steps have been made, we then wait to use the new people for a few months to make sure they are really settled in, with the hope they might return home. After a few months and it is apparent they are now part of the New Life family, we use them like anyone else.
I truly believe if I follow those 3 steps; have them contact their pastor, me contact their pastor, wait to make sure this is permeant before “selling” them on our church, I have kept my integrity and ethics in the situation. This is important b/c our goal is not “grow” numbers but “grow” people. The disciples were told to go out and cast their nets and God brought great harvest of fish. The key to great harvest is to “have your nets.” God will not send a harvest to an unprepared church and a pastor without ethics is no prepared! My wife told me last night, “a church built on saint stealing will not have the favor of God.” I agree! Reminds me of an old book “tale of three kings” Motives matter and so our motives are revealed by our ethics!
