I have come to a realization about my church. They refuse to take a public stand on many cultural issues, but sometimes take a stand behind the scenes. For example, a new ministers first sermon is about it being a Christian duty to go green and shrink one's carbon footprint. He disappears in less than a month. One story is that he missed his home state too much. But the other is that many people were alarmed at his sermon and he was given the opportunity to go back home. Let's just say that the second reason is correct for the sake of this post.
The leadership refuses to take a stand on "issues" (I guess the green movement/creation stewardship is one of these) because it will "detract from our mission". But the minister ends up gone. And I feel wary of the leadership. The level of transparency is rather disheartening. Even the city government has more transparency.
On a separate, but related topic. . .
We recently ordained 15 more elders. One of the comments made during the ceremony was that we should honor our leaders because we have no idea what they do (in reference to helping people). But the comment really struck me. A shepherd parable in the Bible says the shepherd knows each sheep by name and the sheep knew the sound of the shepherd's voice. How can 40 or so men (including the new 15) know 5000+ people? And obviously they don't expect us to really know them if it is accepted that we don't know what they do.
Our church motto is Building followers of Christ through worship, community, and service. But this just doesn't seem like a community to me.
