In a recent post, Thom Rainer describes what he calls \u201cnine traits of mean churches.\u201d Here are the first seven:<\/p>\n
\u2022 Too many decisions are made in the cloak of darkness.<\/strong> Only a select few members really know what\u2019s going on. The attitude of those elitists is that the typical member doesn\u2019t really need to know.<\/p>\n \u2022 The pastor and\/or staff are treated poorly. <\/strong>Decisions are made about them without a fair process. Complaints are often numerous and veiled. Many of these churches are known for firing pastors and\/or staff with little apparent cause.<\/p>\n \u2022 Power groups tenaciously hold on to their power.<\/strong> The power group may be a formal group such as a committee, elders, or deacons. The group also can be informal\u2014no official role but great informal authority. Power groups avoid and detest accountability, which leads to the next point.<\/p>\n \u2022 There is lack of clear accountability for major decisions and\/or expenditures.<\/strong> The church has no clear system in place to make certain that a few outlier members cannot accumulate great power and authority.<\/p>\n \u2022 Leaders of the power groups have an acrimonious spirit.<\/strong> Though they may make first impressions of kindness and gentleness, the mean streak emerges if you try to cross them.<\/p>\n \u2022 A number of the members see those outside of the church as them or those people. <\/strong>Thus, the church is at odds with many in the community instead of embracing them with the love of Christ.<\/p>\n \u2022 Many members have an inward focus; they view the church as a place to get their own preferences and wants fulfilled.<\/strong> They are the opposite of the description of church members in 1 Corinthians 12, where Paul describes them as functioning members for the greater good of the body of Christ. (Click to read the full article.)<\/p>\n Does this describe any churches you know? What can we do to help churches move from mean <\/em>to mission-focused<\/em>?<\/p>\n In a recent post, Thom Rainer describes what he calls \u201cnine traits of mean churches.\u201d Here are the first seven: \u2022 Too many decisions are made in the cloak of darkness. Only a select few members really know what\u2019s going on. The attitude of those elitists is that the typical member doesn\u2019t really need to … Continue reading “Have You Ever Served in a Mean Church?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33704","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33704"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33704\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}