Thoughts on growing up in the church…and then leaving it.
My father grew up in the Catholic church, but he never heard the gospel. In addition, his parents were alcoholics, and his upbringing was less than stable. I don’t know much about my father’s early life other than that he walked away from a soccer scholarship and dropped out of college to be a free spirit. It was the early 1970s, and America was still living through the chaos of the sixties’ countercultural revolution. My father was making his best attempt at being a hippie, living for the moment, trying to be happy in the absence of God. It was not going well.
He soon discovered that even if you try to live without God, that doesn’t mean God is satisfied to live without you. At least, that’s what my father learned after he slipped out of the rain and into the car. God confronted my father while hitchhiking. Little did Dad know that he was just picked up by an evangelist, who asked him the now-famous Evangelism Explosions questions: “Do you know for sure that if you died today, you would go to heaven?” And “If God were to ask you, ‘Why should I let you into My Heaven? ‘ what would you say?” My father responded by saying, “You can let me out at the next corner.”
He got out of the car, but the questions logged themselves in his mind. They followed him wherever he went. He became increasingly dissatisfied with the life he was leading, and he wanted something else, something more. The wisdom of St. Augustine was proving itself true in the life of my father. St. Augustine famously said, “You have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee.” Those questions created curiosity, and eventually my father sought answers. The pastor of a little local church in Long Island, New York, shared the gospel with my father. He received Christ. He later got married to his girlfriend (my mother) and they moved to Pittsburgh. Not long after, my twin brother and I were born, and my parents started attending a local charismatic church that was growing in the wake of the Charismatic renewal of the 1970s.
I have many fond memories of that church, but there was a fly in the ointment. Though the church was loving and strong in many ways, it failed to address sin, and when sin entered the pulpit, the congregation failed. It was discovered that the pastor had an extramarital affair. When confronted, he admitted to the failure and confessed his sin, however, he informed the leadership that he did not want to vacate the pulpit. Many of the leaders objected, but some supported the pastor’s desire to stay. The church had been growing under the pastor’s leadership; a congregation of 600 before the mega-church era was impressive. The church decided that the pastor could stay, but the congregation split over the decision. Leadership tried to salvage the situation, but the damage was done. The ministry shrank, and the church eventually had to close its doors. The property was sold, and years later, the building was razed to the ground. If you go to the location today, you would never know that a church once stood in that place.
Paul says,
“Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:25–27 ESV).
I was taught that God’s church is called to holiness. The church is the bride of Christ, and her dress is supposed to be pure white, without spot or wrinkle. Unfortunately, my childhood experience in the church seemed to prove the exact opposite. We were no longer attending the church I grew up in, and a season of desert wandering ensued.
Eventually, we started attending a large, urban, African-American charismatic church in the city. The pastor was well known and his popularity was growing, locally and nationally. (He eventually became a speaker in the Promise Keepers circuit.) There was a lot of excitement in that church. The music was outstanding, the preaching riveting, the culture electric. Every Sunday was an event, and we didn’t want to miss out. Maybe the exile was over? Perhaps this church would be our new home. At least that’s what I thought until we attended an evening service, where I was prayed over to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
It all seemed very exciting. Worshippers at the church were lining up in droves to come forward and have the leaders of the church lay hands on them so that they could receive this special gift from God. Speaking in tongues, I was told, was evidence that you received the Spirit and entered into the second baptism. I remember being in line to receive prayer from the pastor’s wife. She was unofficially second in command of the ministry; I felt like I was granted an audience with the Queen of England. She prayed for me to receive the Holy Spirit and for the Spirit to guide me and speak through me. Nothing happened. She prayed again, looked at me, looked at my father (who was behind me), and encouraged me once more to pray by the Spirit. Again, nothing happened.
One more attempt was made, but as before, there was nothing, no ecstatic utterance of the Holy Spirit through me. I remember the pastor’s wife telling me that sometimes these things happen and that perhaps I wasn’t ready. That’s all the consolation I received. The line was long, and others were waiting behind me to receive this blessing. I walked back to my seat, confused, feeling rejected. This “failure” initiated in my mind a series of questions. Why didn’t God give me this gift? I was told that God loved me and I loved God, so why would God withhold this gift from me? Perhaps I was not worthy of the gift, perhaps there was something deficient in me? Perhaps I had the spots and wrinkles, and God was withholding this gift until I got things ironed out. The whole experience left me shaken. I now had doubts about myself, about God, and about the church.
Eventually, my parents left that church, partly because the drive into the city was so long, but also because they heard about a new church closer to home that seemed promising. This church was much smaller than our previous church; it felt more like a church family. There were lots of young families with children, so our family acclimated quickly. We made friends and developed relationships. The pastor would even come to our house for lunch. I was growing in my faith again, and so around the age of thirteen, I was baptized by the pastor in a backyard pool of one of the other congregants. Things seemed to be going well, even if the ministry was a little quirky. The quirkiness seemed to be part of the charm and came from the pastor’s charismatic identity.
The pastor was a charismatic personality. He was handsome and well-spoken, and he played the guitar. He was a rockstar during worship. He was also a dynamic preacher, but more than that, he seemed to be a miracle worker. The church was very charismatic, and the pastor regularly prayed for healing, miracles, and that worshippers would be delivered from demonic possession. Frank Peretti’s This Present Darkness was mandatory reading and revered almost as much as the Bible. I was just a young teenager when I was invited to participate in my first exorcism. I’ll never forget the experience. It was pure adrenaline as I stood in the background praying for this woman, who didn’t even know that she might be delivered from her demon.
There were screams and shrieks as this poor woman shook in her chair. The pastor and the elders confronted the demon, and the name of Jesus was invoked more times than could be counted as they commanded the demon out of her. Eventually, the whole ordeal came to an end. The woman seemed to be more at peace, or maybe she was just physically exhausted, I’m not sure. I, on the other hand, left the experience far more shaken than encouraged. “How did this poor woman get demon-possessed in the first place?” I wondered. “Could it happen to me?” “Am I strong enough to keep the devil away from my soul?” These questions began to plague my mind, especially at night, when things were quiet and the house was dark.
Over time, the family atmosphere of the church was slowly displaced by a growing sense of conflict. Confrontation emerged as the dominant characteristic of the ministry. Not only were demons confronted, but leaders started confronting each other about deficiencies they perceived in each other or in the church, especially when it came to the budget, the building, or the size of the congregation. Divisions sprang up between families, and lines were constantly being drawn. There was a crisis of authority in the church as everyone appealed to special insight or a prophetic word they received directly from the Holy Spirit. The pastor was at the center of it all, and his behavior grew more and more erratic.
At some point, we stopped attending the church, and I wasn’t quite sure why. My parents looked depressed, and I was confused. “Why did we stop attending the church?” I’d ask. “Why doesn’t the pastor and his family come over for lunch anymore?” I never asked the question again after seeing my pastor on the evening news. He was arrested by police after his wife was brutally attacked and found near death on the side of the road. Police suspected her husband was the assailant, though my former pastor claimed it was his doppelgänger who attacked his wife. Prosecutors eventually charged him with attempted murder. The trial ended in a hung jury, but before retrial, this pastor who baptized me pleaded no contest to a count of second-degree aggravated assault while maintaining his innocence. He served 96 days in jail. We never went back to that church.
A quick aside on Donatism: I’ve often reflected on my baptism in light of the Donatist controversy. Donatists argued that the efficacy of the sacrament was contingent upon the holiness of the officiant and that clergy must be faultless for their ministry to be effective and their sacraments to be valid. They refused to accept the sacraments of priests and bishops who recanted the faith during Roman persecution. Augustine opposed the Donatists, arguing that the sacrament originated with God and not the priest, and therefore the efficacy of the sacrament was secured by God and not the officiant. Donatism was later condemned as heresy. For me, this issue was no longer an academic question, having been baptized by an alleged attempted murderer. As a young man, I was ashamed of this fact, but as I studied church history and came to a greater understanding of the Reformed doctrines of grace, I was encouraged to look to Christ in my baptism and not the pastor. It is God who makes baptisms effective, not the minister. I am comforted by this fact, not only for my own baptism but also as a minister who is ordained to baptize others.
Our family spent the better part of a year roaming around as spiritual nomads. Many Sundays we skipped church altogether. Eventually, we were invited to join a church plant. This church plant was part of the rising Vineyard Christian Fellowship. John Wimber made a name for the Vineyard through his ministry in California and by his philosophy of ministry which he called “Power Evangelism.”
Power evangelism was predicated on Wimber’s belief that the church should evangelize the way Jesus did. Wimber taught that according to the Gospels, Jesus had a very intentional strategy. Jesus approached unbelievers who were sick, broken, or demon-possessed, and he would heal them with his power. This “power encounter” was not only a demonstration of God’s power for the unbeliever but a sign of God’s love. Once the person was healed, or delivered from their demon, then they would be favorably disposed to hear the claims of the gospel and give their life to Christ. Wimber became a celebrity through this ministry, gaining national and even global recognition, though several criticized his ministry.
Vineyard churches were also well-known for their music. In the late 90s, Vineyard Christian Music was growing into a sizable industry, with new CDs released regularly for purchase at your local Family Christian Bookstore. Their songs were popular and sung in many churches outside of VCF. The music helped reinforce the popularity of Wimber, and Wimber drew attention to Vineyard’s music. This reciprocity created upward momentum, and soon VCF became a recognizable and accepted Christian movement in the U.S. and in England and was a powerhouse in the 90s within the larger evangelical world. If a Vineyard church was coming to our town, then that was somewhere my parents wanted us to be.
Our Vineyard church was planted by the former music leader of my childhood church. He was an associate pastor of sorts whose main responsibility was music leadership on the guitar. He was a talented musician who spent some time in Nashville pursuing a music career. The church planter objected to my childhood pastor remaining in the pulpit following his extramarital affair. That decision offered some moral authority to the project and lent credibility to his leadership, something we were desperately looking for after the scandals of our previous churches. And he was still a talented musician, more than capable of playing and singing the Vineyard songs that were becoming so popular in the 1990s. My parents were sold, and we started attending regularly.
At this point, however, I was a teenager who was growing skeptical of the church. The ecclesial rug was pulled out from under me too many times. We were displaced, spiritual nomads who hopped around. I felt like a church gypsy. We never really put down roots. When we did, those roots were painfully pulled up through leadership failures. I had my reservations about this church plant, but I also had a longing to be in community. There was something inside me that actually wanted to belong to a people. I desired fellowship, worship, and most of all, stability. So I kept my guard up, but as the weeks passed into months, I began to fall in love again with the church, particularly this church. I started growing in my admiration for the pastor planting the church. I felt like I was growing in my faith again, and the church was starting to grow too.
But the man planting the church was not a pastor, not really. Yes, he had been a leader in his previous church, and yes, he was a talented musician who led the congregation in song. Yes, he stood before the people, read the Bible, and offered what could only be described as sermons, but he was still not a pastor. I didn’t know this at the beginning; I only discovered it at the end. An important detail to understand is that this church planter was also an insurance salesman with a growing and successful insurance business in town. He sold insurance Monday through Friday and led worship on Sundays. The problem was that the church was growing, which required more time away from his lucrative business. It was clear that Matthew 6:24 was becoming a pressing reality in the life of this church planter.
““No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” (Matthew 6:24 ESV)
A decision had to be made, either lay down the business and pursue ministry full-time or step down from leadership. He opted to step down from leadership. I still remember hearing the news and trying to understand what was happening. Our pastor would no longer be our pastor. He was handing leadership of the ministry off to an unknown man. Sure, he was a Vineyard-approved man, but I didn’t know who he was. And what about the planter? What happened to him? I was told he’d still be around to help, but he was stepping down to focus on his business. I felt betrayed.
In 2013, I had the privilege of studying with Eugene Peterson. I was finishing my doctoral work in Christian formation, and Peterson agreed to oversee an independent study I was doing, working through his pastoral books and his then-yet-completed spiritual theology series.1 During that study, Peterson said something remarkable that I’ll never forget. We were talking about the church, pastoral ministry, and how some pastors see their position in corporate rather than vocational terms (i.e., a calling).
These pastors are always looking for the next bigger and better church, and when they find one, they leave. That’s when he said, “When a pastor leaves his church, all churches suffer.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It sounded so audacious, even scandalous. Sure, several other local churches proximate to the church in question might suffer, but do all churches really suffer? Peterson said yes. Peterson had a high view of the church and a high view of the pastorate. The actions of a church and its pastor are consequential, even universal. Leaving a church is not a morally neutral decision.
I do not believe Peterson would ever forbid a pastor from leaving his church, but he did want pastors to understand the consequences of their decisions. And he wanted churches to appreciate how interconnected they are in God’s economy. Leading a church is no small thing, and neither is leaving one.
Peterson was a Melville fan, and he loved Moby Dick.2 He would have agreed with Melville that “the pulpit is ever this earth’s foremost part and leads the world.” When a pastor steps out of his pulpit, the ship suffers. I was watching yet another pastor vacate the ministry, and I was feeling the nauseating sickness of a church on the high seas, lost in the storm. It was disorienting, and I wanted to get off. I longed for stability, and the church seemed to offer none. So, at the age of seventeen, I decided to leave the church.
- Unfortunately, Eugene Peterson said some things near the end of his life that were confusing and, in my view, regrettable. However, I still affirm that Peterson was a deeply insightful pastor who took the vocation of pastor very seriously. His four-volume pastoral and five-volume spiritual theology series are both outstanding. ↩︎
- In The Pastor, Peterson has some wonderful insights about the harpooner from Moby Dick and how the orientation of the harpooner helps to inform the work of the pastor. ↩︎
Photo by Vinícius Müller on Unsplash
The Parrhesians 