Thoughts on Pastoral Authority
A friend of mine and I were speaking in general terms about the authority of the pastor within the context of the local church. As I wrote in my post a few weeks ago, sometimes the authority of the church subverts itself, as in the case of stigmatics, by proclaiming them to be persons with a special revelation, but then have to backpedal when or if that revelation runs counter to the accepted and orthodox traditions.
On the other hand, as my friend and I were saying, the Protestant church itself is struggling with the issue of pastoral authority. Not because we have stigmatics running around proclaiming against us, but because we have congregations in which the pastor is not viewed as the theological authority.
Let me explain how that happens.
In many cases, the authority of the pastor is only granted so long as the pastor preaches or teaches that which is already accepted as 'true.' In other words, the pastor has authority if what they say matches with what the people already think. However, should the pastor deviate from those ideas (knowingly or unknowingly), then the pastor runs the risk of being called a false teacher - as has happened to me before. It isn't that the teaching is false so much as it is different.
For example, in a church I served early in my career, I made the observation that Genesis says that the rainbow is put in the sky not for us but for God so that if God ever had the urge to flood the earth again, God would see the bow and remember what God had promised (see Genesis 9:12-15). I had an individual who became quite irate and said, "So you are saying God would forget?"
Which of course I wasn't. What I was doing was simply reading the text and pointing out that sometimes our assumptions of what the text says aren't born out by the text itself.
The man never came back to Bible study - or church.
Suddenly because I seemed to proclaimed something different, I was the villain. At least in that man's eyes. That had to do with the fact that he saw me as saying something contrary to his belief as well as challenging his personal understanding of God - a challenge I do not believe I was offering.
But that is the issue at hand. For most Protestant pastors in mainline churches, we have been seminary trained, educated by great teachers and scholars. We have had our long dark nights of the soul and have wrestled with our own ideas, beliefs, and faith. From that, we have come out the other side (hopefully) with a deeper sense of connection to the faith than when we started. Then we come to bring that very transformation and depth to the congregation only to find that congregations don't always want what they haven't heard before - what they want is either reassurance that things will always and evermore remain the same or that what they believe is right.
For most pastors who have a passion about the Bible, it isn't about finding out if what you believe is right or wrong, it is more about delving deeper into the text, the traditions, the contexts, and drawing out more and more meaning. It is about making a deeper connection in your life with the Divine. Searching only to be right or wrong is to treat the Bible as only a legal code. While important, it isn't the only approach.
Of course, sometimes it isn't even Bible study. It is a sermon. You place an emphasis on a point and not on another and a member of the congregation heard you not saying something they think you should have said. Suddenly you find yourself accused of 'watering down' the Bible, or only picking the parts you liked. But as a preacher, I feel being sensitive to time is important, and you can't get every theological point in the Bible in every sermon. Not every sermon has to feature the Advent, Christmas, Lent, Holy Week, and Easter cycle to be good, thought provoking, or relevant.
And yet the other part of the vanishing authority of the pastor is that the congregation members will give authority to plenty of other persons - particular television evangelists, particular Bible study authors, particular studies from other denominations, or (the most common), particular past pastors. A pastor will find out quickly if they preach something that doesn't sound like or contradicts a beloved past pastor. Sometimes they find that they preach something that doesn't match a Bible study that a person attended at another church.
These are all potential theological crises, I suppose, but what is most perplexing is that the church is no longer a place to discuss these differences. The pastor of some worth would be willing to sit and discuss these issues with parishioners who would take time to ask. But this doesn't happen. People seem to go for 'being offended' instead of being in discussion. And instead of a place of learning, the church is increasingly where people seem to be becoming more entrenched and polarized.
And the 'nuclear option' is that the pastor can always be changed.
So, back to the beginning of the story, my friend and I came to the conclusion...well, we never really did. But we keep talking about it. And maybe that's the point.
On the other hand, as my friend and I were saying, the Protestant church itself is struggling with the issue of pastoral authority. Not because we have stigmatics running around proclaiming against us, but because we have congregations in which the pastor is not viewed as the theological authority.
Let me explain how that happens.
In many cases, the authority of the pastor is only granted so long as the pastor preaches or teaches that which is already accepted as 'true.' In other words, the pastor has authority if what they say matches with what the people already think. However, should the pastor deviate from those ideas (knowingly or unknowingly), then the pastor runs the risk of being called a false teacher - as has happened to me before. It isn't that the teaching is false so much as it is different.
For example, in a church I served early in my career, I made the observation that Genesis says that the rainbow is put in the sky not for us but for God so that if God ever had the urge to flood the earth again, God would see the bow and remember what God had promised (see Genesis 9:12-15). I had an individual who became quite irate and said, "So you are saying God would forget?"
Which of course I wasn't. What I was doing was simply reading the text and pointing out that sometimes our assumptions of what the text says aren't born out by the text itself.
The man never came back to Bible study - or church.
Suddenly because I seemed to proclaimed something different, I was the villain. At least in that man's eyes. That had to do with the fact that he saw me as saying something contrary to his belief as well as challenging his personal understanding of God - a challenge I do not believe I was offering.
But that is the issue at hand. For most Protestant pastors in mainline churches, we have been seminary trained, educated by great teachers and scholars. We have had our long dark nights of the soul and have wrestled with our own ideas, beliefs, and faith. From that, we have come out the other side (hopefully) with a deeper sense of connection to the faith than when we started. Then we come to bring that very transformation and depth to the congregation only to find that congregations don't always want what they haven't heard before - what they want is either reassurance that things will always and evermore remain the same or that what they believe is right.
For most pastors who have a passion about the Bible, it isn't about finding out if what you believe is right or wrong, it is more about delving deeper into the text, the traditions, the contexts, and drawing out more and more meaning. It is about making a deeper connection in your life with the Divine. Searching only to be right or wrong is to treat the Bible as only a legal code. While important, it isn't the only approach.
Of course, sometimes it isn't even Bible study. It is a sermon. You place an emphasis on a point and not on another and a member of the congregation heard you not saying something they think you should have said. Suddenly you find yourself accused of 'watering down' the Bible, or only picking the parts you liked. But as a preacher, I feel being sensitive to time is important, and you can't get every theological point in the Bible in every sermon. Not every sermon has to feature the Advent, Christmas, Lent, Holy Week, and Easter cycle to be good, thought provoking, or relevant.
And yet the other part of the vanishing authority of the pastor is that the congregation members will give authority to plenty of other persons - particular television evangelists, particular Bible study authors, particular studies from other denominations, or (the most common), particular past pastors. A pastor will find out quickly if they preach something that doesn't sound like or contradicts a beloved past pastor. Sometimes they find that they preach something that doesn't match a Bible study that a person attended at another church.
These are all potential theological crises, I suppose, but what is most perplexing is that the church is no longer a place to discuss these differences. The pastor of some worth would be willing to sit and discuss these issues with parishioners who would take time to ask. But this doesn't happen. People seem to go for 'being offended' instead of being in discussion. And instead of a place of learning, the church is increasingly where people seem to be becoming more entrenched and polarized.
And the 'nuclear option' is that the pastor can always be changed.
So, back to the beginning of the story, my friend and I came to the conclusion...well, we never really did. But we keep talking about it. And maybe that's the point.
Most people are uneasy with change. For many who feel as though their beliefs (as opposed to their faiths) rest in their cores, something that challenges that belief (and not the faith) seems empirically threatening and intolerable. We have become worshippers who have forgotten that your faith is always growing, and the only way to grow is to explore, consider, reflect. Looking back, I find that my greatest unrest as a parishioner has been when my minister has not challenged me in my beliefs. Great post by you, Pastor Charles.
ReplyDeleteChange is the dreaded word in most churches - and in most of our lives, if we are honest about it. We don't want to think that what we have thought is out of date, only partly right, or completely wrong. One of the great problems is that we start worshipping how we worship and what we think rather than allowing ourselves to hear new ideas, encounter the faith in a different way, and grow.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment!