Before all you saints come in extra heavy and ready to send me to hell, I need you to take your opinion all the way to Bethlehem and worry about your own salvation. I grew up in a very religious household and most of my life’s memories involve church. If they were handing out 401k for church attendance, I should have been set to retire by the age of 16 because one gift my mother gave me and my siblings was the love of the Lord. I spent a lot of time in church and I have seen a whole lot of foolishness.
Church is the only place that folks feel comfortable and dare I say confident to show up with mediocre skill sets and not expect to be challenged. What we really need to start doing is booing preachers who get on the pulpit without doing the due diligence of studying the word and showing up prepared. It is baffling to me that we take the house of God as a place where we can show up as leaders without studying and showing ourselves approved of whatever title we hold. I cannot count the amount of times I’ve sat through sermons where a preacher slapped together a bunch of motivational speeches, mixed with out of context bible verses, to help carry their own opinions. I recently saw a reel where a preacher told women, on the pulpit, that their “p*ssy’ will perish with them in hell. The fact that he was comfortable enough to say that, shows me that we’ve normalized not holding preachers accountable. As the body of Christ, we cannot keep saying "Amen" and shouting in order to caress or preserve these preachers' egos. I am not at all advocating for division within the church but I am asking for church leaders to care enough about the congregation and truly study the word before getting up there.
Anointing alone is not enough to support people who are struggling with depression, anxiety, and the everyday stressors of life. We need church leaders to study and accurately interpret the word of God (within proper context) in order to best serve its people. Far too frequently, preachers are getting complacent and are not adjusting to the times and being more prepared to serve their people. This does not mean that preachers should conform to the patterns of this world, but it certainly means that they need to be aware of the culture in which they (and their members) exist in and teach in a way that helps people navigate life. Anything outside of that is just laziness that we’ve over spiritualized and I’m sick of it. And while we’re here, if you know that you cannot hold a note, please go ahead and join the children’s ministry or something. I am trying to get into worship and you have no idea where the note is. We are playing in the key of G and you are all the way in Yemen, causing confusion and turmoil to my ears; Please stop it! I will not be sitting there encouraging you talking about “take your time baby” No ma'am. Get off the worship team and find a ministry that is more suited for your skillset and quit making us sit through horrible harmonies.
In conclusion: there are so many times I am unclear or wavy with my thought process but this is not one of them. I love the church and I want us as a body to be better equipped to influence different sectors of society (educational, judicial, political etc.) and we can’t do that if our preachers are on the pulpit misquoting scriptures and talking about female genitalia.
Reflection: What has your church experience been? Do you feel like we hold our church leaders accountable enough?
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