One day after the church service, when we were all standing around talking, our little two-year-old suddenly dashed up to the platform, laboriously lugged a big chair over to the pulpit, climbed onto the chair, stood up on it and began "preaching"! As we laughed, someone remarked that this little boy would become either a minister or a politician! That was one of the few light moments we had in a deteriorating atmosphere.
Things started going downhill with the pastor. (I'll call him DD.) It seemed harder to get things done, as at times he tried to stifle us. His interests didn't always seem appropriate for a church that wants to "get things done". For example, our small congregation had $500 earmarked for outreach ministry...and he wanted to take money from that account to buy a big, industrial-sized coffee machine for our after-church gathering in the fellowship hall. His duties as a pastor in more than one area were being neglected to some degree, and it showed.
We (the larger part of the congregation) felt the atmosphere of the services getting more and more tense. DD had always been rather formal. (Once I asked him quickly before the service if the choir could sing at some point, and he said No, because it wasn't in the bulletin!) Emotions ran high. We couldn't continue this way. I remember once I stayed home on a communion Sunday, because the Lord's Supper is supposed to be something that is done in a spirit of unity, and "united" we weren't!
It is NOT my wish to make DD look terrible. In fact, there were good things about him. Before things got really bad, we once had a new young man come to the service, an unbeliever. I was sitting at the back of the church at the organ (I could see everyone), and it was communion Sunday. Now, DD had his patterns, and one was that he never gave an "invitation" on communion Sunday. NEVER. But I suddenly was absolutely positive that if he gave an invitation, the new young man would respond and open his heart to Jesus. So I prayed hard, asking God to give DD a big nudge and have him alter his pattern and do what he never did. At the close of the sermon, DD stepped down to the communion table and...gave an invitation! And the young man DID respond. I was SOOO amazed! God had heard me, and DD had heard and obeyed God.
It IS my wish to have you see why we proceeded the way we did. Some of our group wanted to oust the pastor and get a new one. Germán wisely cautioned them, using the example of David and Saul. (Even when David had a fabulous chance of killing Saul and taking the kingship that God had already promised him, he refused. God had put Saul there, God would be the one to remove him.) We prayed and talked and dialogued and tried so hard to work things out with DD, but it all failed. He wouldn't budge. It was painful for us all. I'd never been snubbed in the supermarket by a friend (ex-friend!) before! It really shook us up.
We (tellingly, our group was made up of just about all of the people that actually did things in the church - like musicians, deacons, Sunday School teachers, etc.) were determined to depend on God to move us in the right direction. This poem captures God's answer to us.
Let Me Be Your Guide
Don't let your doubts push Me off to the side.
Now, more than ever, let Me be your guide
to Love overwhelming; I need you to see
that, knowing all that you are, you're still precious to Me;
to increasing Peace, as my mercies toward you
again and again prove my promises true;
to Joy, spilling free from my Smile to your heart,
drowning the pain that would pull you apart;
to Faith that can steady your unsettled soul,
refocus your vision, re-anchor your goal.
My passionate Grace drew you in from the wild.
Since then I have held you and called you my child.
I'm your Strength! and I do what no other god does.
Remember, my Name is "I AM'...not "I WAS".
-Becky Rhon
So we followed I AM into His future...and found all that He promised!
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(Note: the poem wasn't written at the time this occurred, but it "fits", doesn't it?)
(If it also "fits" your situation or that of someone you know, please feel free to use this poem, BUT PLEASE let me know! Thanks.)
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