The Next Cultural Threat to Your Church’s Health

Want to gauge one key, overlooked aspect of your church’s health? Check your congregation’s attitude toward civil authority.

The Bible offers Christians only two ways of relating to civil authorities. When authorities require us to deny Christ or compromise His standards of righteousness, the Bible calls us to a costly disobedience (Mk. 6:17-29; Acts 4:19; Heb. 10:34). The Bible’s other path, under all other, more friendly circumstances, requires a cooperative and supportive spirit toward secular rulers (Ro. 13:1; 1 Tim. 2:1-2; Titus 3:1).

Our current national climate tests both these approaches. Like a Tesla experiment gone wrong, the highly charged negativity and polarization of public discourse threatens to zap anyone who speaks against unrighteousness or specific politicians. Reactive pundits strike out like coiled rattlers at anyone with a differing political opinion.  It’s no wonder that the Church has lost its voice in our culture; it’s also heart-breakingly sad.

Current divisions bear an uncanny resemblance to the ugly discontent that motivated our nation’s founding. You might think breaking with England would have put dissent to rest, but, in the post war years, George Washington and John Adams faced heated attacks in the press, so much so that it led to the Alien and Sedition Act of 1798. This Act criminalized anyone making false statements about the government and allowed for the deportation of dangerous illegals. Talk about history repeating itself!

How do negative attitudes toward authorities impact a local church? One ministry I know of actually made it their mission to reach disaffected people. Guess what happened when they succeeded? Though the church was unified in their distrust of authority, they fell prey to their own suspicions and rebelled against the church’s leadership. Distrust of authority, if fostered on any level will jump up and bite churches. It creates the exact opposite spiritual environment that God says is essential for church leadership to work!

In our disaffected culture, distrust is rising like a tide and shows no signs of receding. Unless your leaders form a break wall, your church will likely be swamped by unhealthy attitudes toward authority.

If you feel the waves of distrust and resistance lapping at your ministry right now, what should you do?

• Check your church’s history. Unhealed congregational wounds will leave your church predisposed to distrust leaders, even new ones, and resist their initiatives. It might be time to look under the rug and clear away those old piles of dirt. It’s not easy, but it can be done. Visit our website for resources on how to heal your congregation.
• Upgrade your definition of discipleship. Discipleship is a core value of evangelical churches, but any definition of spiritual development that does not include addressing the whole person—including their attitude toward authority—leaves churches vulnerable. Societal and familial wounds in the lives of church members, especially as it relates to authority figures, must be tended to so that reactivity in churches can be minimized.
• Search your own heart. Don’t leave yourself out of this assessment. Distrust of authority permeates our culture, including the people in charge. Are you overly resistant when given direction by authorities? How willing are you to submit to an authority figure when you don’t agree with him or her? Perhaps it’s time to do a little soul-searching.

Protect your church from our culture’s highly reactive, anxious, increasingly rebellious spirit. If you don’t, sharing the Gospel will become a shouting match and rancor will infect your church. Rather, may God enable us to engage culture from a position of peace, even if we have to pay a price for doing so. Let’s put our full trust in the only One who has the power to heal hearts and minds and churches . . . including our own!

Rev. Mark Barnard serves as President of Blessing Point Ministries which helps healthier churches to bear more fruit and facilitates healing in ministries that have been wounded by painful crises. Mark authored The Path of Revival: Restoring Our Nation One Church at a Time among other works. For more information visit blessingpoint.org or contact mark@blessingpoint.org.