Every once in a while someone comes up with a new wrinkle on church headaches.

A young pastor friend wrote to say the church he now serves went through a split a year or so before he arrived, and the smaller congregation struggles to keep up with the financial needs. Presently, they are running a deficit of perhaps $10 thousand a year, forcing them to draw on reserves.

The church has a number of fixed expenses, he says, such as utilities and insurance, that cannot be cut. Even if they eliminated all literature and supplies, the deficit would still not be covered. His suggestion is that they cut his salary by $10,000 a year.

The leadership refuses.

How awful of them, wanting to keep the pastor’s salary at a high level.

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You’re on vacation or just traveling through, and you stop for church somewhere. As a minister of the gospel, you are so looking forward to being ministered unto.

You are beyond disappointed.

Question: Do you say something to the minister or not?

No. Almost always, the answer is “Absolutely not! There may be a hundred reasons why the preacher did not deliver today or the sermon bombed, and you don’t know any of them. Leave him to the Lord.”

When it comes to one preacher rebuking another for something, I fall back on Paul’s statement, “Who are you to judge the servant of another? To his own master he stands or falls….” (Romans 14:4).

However, that doesn’t stop us from wanting to.

I had spent several days ministering in an East Tennessee setting, and on Sunday morning asked my hosts to go to church with me.  Since we were old friends and they were new in that area and had not found a church home yet, I figured we’d be safe worshiping at the First Baptist Church there.

You would think.

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Something inside us pastors tends to love impressive offices with nice furnishings.

We have to constantly work against this lust for the trappings of the ministry while neglecting the ministry itself.

The front page of Monday, August 26, 2013’s The New Orleans Advocate tells of LSU’s new president Dr. King Alexander’s way of introducing himself to students.  He’s helping them move into the dorms.

In the photo on the front page he’s wearing a t-shirt and ball cap and loaded down with boxes and bags.  Looking anything but presidential.  (Don’t you know he had fun with that!  “No, really, I am the president of the university.  Really! My name? It’s King.”)

Okie dokie.

I will say that in my quarter-century in Louisiana, this guy is unlike any chief executive LSU has ever had.

What makes this special is a conversation I had later in the day with a minister friend concerning a church he once served as a staff member.

“The pastor talked a great game,” he said. “He sounds a lot like (a well known radio preacher) who is his mentor.  Just listening to him preach, you would think this is one great pastor, someone I can really relate to.”

You would be wrong, he said.

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A friend passed along something that Dr. Robert Jeffress, pastor of Dallas’ First Baptist Church, tells on himself. In an earlier pastorate, a little deacon group who found they could not control the pastor decided to fire him, and called a church conference for that purpose. Pastor Jeffress and his wife gave the matter to the Lord in prayer, asking Him to show one way or the other whether they were to leave or remain at this assignment.

In the meeting, after the deacons leveled their charges against the pastor–it was penny-ante stuff, Dr. Jeffress says–the moderator invited the congregation to speak. A small elderly woman stood to her feet and walked toward the front. Asked if she wanted to say anything, she said, “No. I’m just going to stand by my pastor.”

At that, another person rose and silently walked to the front and took his place on the other side of the pastor.

One by one, across the sanctuary, people got up and walked to their pastor. Many went to the microphones and testified of the blessed ministry Brother Jeffress had had in their lives. For a full 45 minutes, the congregation overwhelmingly affirmed his ministry.

The ringleader of the movement to oust the pastor finally said to the congregation, “I never realized how out of touch I was with the sentiment of this congregation. You will never hear another word from me.”

Within a few weeks, every one of those deacons and their families had left the church.

And–do we need to say this?–after they departed, the church grew and the ministry flourished.

Stand by your pastor.

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