Reasons Pastors Are Not Trusted

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, ministry.

Mike Abendroth here. My name's not Tony Miano, but I'm here with Pastor Steve. What?

Wait, I can't be on the air with anybody but Tony.

I know, it's like 14 weeks in a row.

I was missing my spot. Well, I told him, I said, you know, he was now officially staff at No Compromise Radio, and I gave him all the salary and benefits requisite thereunto.

That 4 raise helped me out a lot this year, the No Compromise section. Woohoo!

Yeah, I told him, I said, you know, you can get as much money for No Compromise as I do, Tony, so.

See? But you don't get the notoriety. Yeah. Steve, what we could probably do is we could send Tony one of these coffee pun mugs. Nice. Those are three words. Coffee. Pun. Pun. Mugs. And CBD does say you can espresso yourself with a mug shot of faith.

Oh, those are some nice puns, huh? But see, if you say it too fast, it sounds like coffee pun.

Yeah, yeah, this is right, coffee pun, yes. And the one that we would send Tony, of course, is he brews. Yeah. I saw that somewhere else, though. I just, come on. Truth be told, I am drinking a Keurig Pete's coffee out of a Do Not Be Surprised mug.

Wow.

I don't know. There's so many things going on there. That's kind of de-mazing.

Pastor Steve, I saw from Tom Rayner, who is a Southern Baptist lifeway guy, he has a lot of analysis. Would you say he understands real evangelicalism better than Barna? Yes, I would.

And Tom Rayner is a very smart man. He is very smart.

And he's got a little blog here, a little article, Christian Post, February 3rd, 2014.

So it's relatively new. Yes.

Why Pastors Are Trusted Less Today

11 Reasons Pastors Are Less Trusted Today.

Okay, first I would just note that 11 is not a biblical number. It is a prime number. Ooh, well, that might make it worthwhile right there. It's a prime. I like prime numbers. Prime numbers are fun. How do you factor a polynomial?

Well, I'm glad you asked me that. I love factoring. It's interesting because when the kids are little, as you know, fourth, fifth grade, I can figure out the math. Yeah. But math is so cumulative that when it's 11th grade or college level math, I'm smoked.

Yeah, I miss those days. I miss those days. Now what we're going to do is we're not going to go through every one of these, but we're going to talk about why pastors are trusted less today. We will use Rayner's main points, and then we will wax no compromisingly.

I thought you were going to say, well, Rayner on his parade. You know, it's the whole pun thing.

Back to Steve again being a wannabe comedian.

I'm just going with your thing, you know, the coffee pun. The Hebrews.

Number one, the moral failures of a minority of pastors received widespread coverage.

Well, it's true. I mean, when we think about what was that guy's name in Colorado, the guy who, you know, we found out he had a... Yeah. Ted Haggard. Yeah. That guy. I mean, that was a major story. I mean, it made it to the national news.

And, you know, if it's Jimmy Swaggart or someone like that. But yeah, I mean, even other pastors who have less widespread ministry, sure, it becomes a big deal and we find out about it. Yeah.

I would say it's even more traumatic when a pastor fails because to those that are given much, much is required and you do affect not only yourself when you fall as a pastor, but you're a leader and so other people are affected.

But Steve, there is the pile on by the secular press because people love to write about how other people fall, whether that's Justin Bieber or Christian pastors. See, this doesn't really work. Look at this as a knock on Christianity.

Yeah. How much more so when it's, you know, Christians because they're hypocrites and what a delight to put that forth. Of course, I can't wait to go to Scandalbook, I mean, Facebook and, you know, post stories like that.

Steve, I do think it's fair to say that in the old days, if you ask the question, who's respected in the community? The clergy. Clergy were, right? Doctors. And you would have clergy come in and they would be character witnesses in court.

And now you don't see many clergy folk at court. You see the psychiatrist instead, psychologists. They're the ones offering the insight.

Well, and it really is because, well, I think part of it is just because we communicate so much more these days. I mean, there's so many ways of kind of gossiping, spreading the news and everything like that.

And the people that are used to be up on a pedestal, so to speak, have been brought down low because who are the first people you take shots at? You know, the people that are respected. So it's the policemen, it's the, you know, pastors.

But nowadays, you know, this is funny. I mean, I was talking to somebody the other day about a politician, you know, who was lying. And they go, well, what do you expect? It's a politician. And we kind of get that same thing these days out of cops.

What do you expect? He's a police officer. What do you expect? He's a pastor. All the things that used to be held up in some kind of esteem, now we just think, well, of course they did that.

That's what they do. Steve, this one isn't on his list, but I'm just going to add one. Uh-oh. Can I do that?

Well, that'll make it 12. Of course, that takes it out of prime territory, but it will make it a biblical number.

Reasons pastors are trusted less today, not from Tom Rainer, but from Mike Ebendroth. It's okay. Okay. Number 1A. 1A. 1Ebendroth. It's hard to trust a flat screen.

Err, it's hard. So if your pastor is on the television, then it's really hard to trust him. Well, I think that's true too, right? I hate all that. Where do you go to church? I go on the internet, you know, or I watch TBN.

Well, I'm on the campus that we get the video, but we do have the live rock band. It's all bad. All right. Number 2. Our nation has marginalized the Christian faith. That's the second reason pastors are less trusted today.

So Christianity is less trusted, therefore the leaders of said religion.

Well, I think that's true from two perspectives. One is, you know, atheism, secularism, those things are on the rise, but I think even those people who call themselves Christians are Christians in name only.

What would that be? Sino? You know, Sino? Hmm. Whatever it is.

I sort of like that. I just coined that on the fly here. That would be a nice Bible Institute class. By the way, you should get online. You can hear Pastor Steve's IBS class talk about Tim Keller. You can talk about engaging culture.

Yeah.

Troubling trends in evangelicalism, but yeah, engaging the culture. Yeah. And I think as we see Christians, so-called Christians, denying the faith or minimizing the faith or trying to minimize the differences between them and the world, I mean, really, why should anybody be offended by Christianity today?

No pun intended. But Christianity, because we're just like the world in so many ways, we meaning generically. Right. And you know what, Steve?

It's so true with a real evangelical church, but you also have people who say they're Christians and they're modalists, they're Oneness Pentecostal, they're Mormons, there's all kinds of folks and they have no constraining power.

There's no restraining element by the Spirit of God and they don't live Christian lives because they're not Christians. And so when I see 48 Hours Special and here's this pastor that shot his wife, could a Christian man shoot his wife?

I guess he probably could, maybe just in some rage, but what's the definition of a Christian is what I would ask the media. They don't even know that. As long as you say you go to, you know, you read your Bible half as much as you do Facebook, you're okay.

Is that the definition of a modern Christian?

I think so. Number three, pastoral tenure has dropped significantly over the past few decades.

You know, I was watching, I saw some SportsCenter the other night, or maybe, no, it was a basketball game. I flipped on, I watched probably about five minutes of the Clippers and Heat and they were talking about a player who played for 17 different coaches.

And you know, they asked him to name them. He named 16 of the 17 coaches, which I thought was pretty impressive. But it's the same thing. Pastors kind of tend to move a lot. What's the average tenure?

Is it two to three years or something like that? And so when you think about that, well, you know, people don't have, like, if you're at our church, you know, you're going to hear some Pastor Mike stories.

I remember when, you know, Pastor Mike did this or when he started his series and he had hair. Yeah. Whatever the story is. I remember when we used to have bonfires at his house and then I remember when we burned down his house.

Whatever the story is there, you know, because he's been around for 16, 16 years.

Coming into my 18th year. 18.

Wow. I lost track. But, but, you know, if somebody is there for 18 months, how many memories did they, you know, and so how much respect has grown or whatever. And so, yeah, it's a big difference.

Tom says, I think correctly, tenure is up slightly the past few years, but the longer trend is down. Trust is built over several years, not two or three years. Fewer pastors have made it to the point of several years.

And while we wouldn't say on No Compromise Radio that if you don't stay more than three years, you're dopey. I guess there are reasons and people could even have a ministry of, of going to help a struggling church, get it in on their feet, getting it on their feet again, and then moving to the next one.

There's all kinds of exceptions, but in general, churches don't vet their pastor enough and pastors don't vet their church enough. And you've got a match made in purgatory. Yeah.

They're, that's exactly the point because, you know, churches are shocked by what the pastor teaches and then, you know, the pastor is shocked because of the response he gets or whatever. Or, you know, I guess it could happen where the pastor is just really great.

And some other bigger church offers a lot more money and he jumps on it. So that's something too, you know, what, what kind of commitment does he have too?

I think. Steve, thank you very much for intercepting all those letters that come in to me and you intercept them. And I know they're for, they're for, you know, larger churches and raises and all that stuff, but you know.

Yeah. I'm just looking out for you. Okay. Thank you. I want to see you build your tenure. Mike Abendroth with Steve Cooley. No Compromise Radio. 11 reasons pastors are trusted less today. Number four, some church members have a strong entitlement mentality.

You've got to be kidding me. Has Tom Rainer ever been to a local church? Entitlement mentality, meet the needs of people. And so this pastor is not meeting my needs. Therefore, maybe he's got a personal problem, a sin problem.

I can't trust him. He can't even do the basics. Meet my needs.

Well, it is. And he notes, well, who takes the blame as the pastor? You know, if the church doesn't meet their needs, and I don't even know what that is or what that means, because why do you go to church in the first place?

If it's to have your needs met, you should probably stay home. If it's to go worship the living God and to hear his word and have it applied to your life, then I think you should go to church.

Well, if God is, you know, underneath my foot, then I should probably tell him flattering things. But if I am bowed flat before God, kiss the sun lest you perish, and blessed are those who take refuge in him, then my response to him taking me, the rebel, and making me into a friend should be praise and worship and I don't know.

Why do you go to church? Why even go to church if you're not going to give adoration and worship and honor to God corporately? I don't know.

I mean, just imagine sitting there. I cannot imagine this for my life, sitting there and just thinking, I'm really mad at the pastor. I really don't like this pastor.

Lord bless me as I worship you. And I'm going to denote the giving to a special missionary fund, because if I give it to the general fund, then maybe the pastor will get some of that. It goes to his salary.

I can't have that. Number five, social media encourages criticism from a distance. Steve, I think that guns, we should have permits and licenses to own a gun in Massachusetts. That's the way the government thinks of it because they're dangerous and you can cause a lot of damage with a Mossberg 12 gauge pump, right?

Somebody doesn't know how to use it or work it and they walk around with it. And so now it's the same thing except without a gun. But the assassinations of character, not bodies, happen with Facebook because you give Facebook to an immature person and you watch the H-E double toothpicks break loose.

Well, am I not allowed to express my opinion? Can I have an opinion? Are you just trying to suppress, you know, my freedoms? And if I don't, if I don't agree with something, I think I have a perfect right to say whatever I think.

Steve, you had a perfect comment a while ago and you said when somebody lobbed a little RPG over to us, you said, it's easy to be a critic. It is.

It's super easy to be a critic. I mean, you know, that's not a new idea. It goes back to Teddy Roosevelt. You know, it's not the critic who can't, it's the man who's in the arena kind of thing. And anybody can at the door, although they rarely do this at the door, blast you and say, you know, that was really a bad sermon.

I've heard better ones, you know, from female liberals or whatever, you know, they want to say. But Facebook, you know, because you have that facade of anonymity and you could just blast away. And it's easy to do that.

It's harder to actually think, well, you know what, I know preaching and teaching is hard work and I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt, even though that wasn't my favorite sermon of all time.

Tom Rayner, president and CEO of LifeWay Christian Resources, gives us the sixth reason why pastors are less trusted today. If you pastors have poor work ethics, I was going to say worth ethics.

Well, I was just thinking about this recently because why was I, it was, oh yeah, I know of a situation. How about this? Now you're going to think this is funny when I tell you. There's a pastor who's not just the pastor, he's also the police chaplain and he's also the mayor of the city.

And I heard that story and I just go, okay, now how much time do you think he puts into a sermon on Sunday? The mayor of a city, police chaplain, so he's got his finger and he's involved in other civil activities, and he's also the pastor who preaches on Sunday.

What kind of preparation do you think he does for his sermons? And I already know the answer is zero. You know, just about zero. He just picks a passage and he trusts that his loquaciousness, you know, his verbal skills are going to carry him through and they probably do for the people there, but that's not the work that he's to be doing.

And so, you know, it's easy then to just respect him less as a pastor because people listen to that and they go, well, anybody could do that.

Steve, there are many men at the church who work full-time jobs and they're working 40 to 60 hours a week. And don't we as pastors expect them to serve the local body in one way, shape, or form? It doesn't have to be under the roof of the church building.

They just need to use their spiritual gifts. And so everybody, if you're a Christian, you receive from the sovereign spirit a spiritual gift and you ought to use that for body life. We would all agree on that.

I think we would all agree. Yes, we would all agree. That's why we have spiritual gifts. So now we have 40 to 60 hours a week plus more time devoted to serve the Lord by serving the church. So we pastors, we can't work just 40 hours a week because we'll be hypocrites.

And so I don't ever write down how many hours I work a week, but I'm guessing it's between 70 and 80, 85. I'm pretty much always working. It's at home. If I'm even watching some TV show with the family, we were watching Twilight Zone the other night.

I'll admit it. Okay. Twilight Zones. We watch four of them. Well, at least it was in the Outer Limits. That's right. Well, our night gallery. I did learn that Rod Serling was awarded a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for his service in World War II.

Really? Yeah. I'm going to go home and watch them. No, I'm just kidding. Had a heart attack, went to the hospital, had heart surgery, died a couple weeks later at age 50. Wow. He was that young? Yeah.

So anyway, we're just going on a rabbit trail here. But I have my computer out and I'm working on messages and thinking and ruminating over these issues. There's always something to do, radio or ministry or follow-up or email.

So pastors ought not to lead by laziness. Well, when does it stop?

You know, when do you get to stop being the pastor? When do you just get to say, well, you know, today I'm just not going to be a pastor. I'm not going to think about this coming sermon this Sunday, and I'm not going to worry about the people, and I'm not going to pray, and I'm not going to...

When does that stop?

Steve, the one that comes to my mind in terms of the most impactful for me, teaching the lesson that pastors have to be on duty. My mother had recently died, probably two months earlier, and I was at home and I got a phone call.

Hi, my mother is dying of cancer, or dying in the hospital. Can you come and visit? And so I tried to get a hold of you, tried to get a hold of Jeffrey's, nobody else is around. And I just thought, you know, can I do this?

Well, of course I can. I know how to walk into a hospital, and I used to work in hospitals, and feel comfortable pastorally there, but I didn't want to do it. I didn't want to go. It's not like I didn't want to go serve someone else, but I had just played this scene out already.

Morphine drip, you know, the face of death, slow breathing. It's like, you know, they breathe, and then they stop breathing for 20 seconds, and then they take another breath. I thought, I just did this thing.

And so going back to the hospital after that, you just are never off duty. And even, and this is, I mean, we're glad to be pastors, but if you have a church, if you have a pastor and you're listening today, you ought to be praying for your pastors, because even when you aren't on duty actively, you have to be ready to be on duty at a moment's notice.

So there's the fire pole that you have to be ready at all times to slide down, to go off to put out some fire, because things happen regularly and often.

What about putting a fire pole here in the, uh...

If it could be Batman-like so it can go up as well, and then we can change our outfit as we go. Our clothing, yeah.

Yeah. Wouldn't that be good? Yeah. We just come, slide down, we're in a suit and tie and ready to go. All right.

Scapegoats, Cynicism, and Leadership Expectations

Number seven. We got to hurry up, Steve. We're never going to make these. Pastors are often the scapegoats for fear and change. Yes, they are. Moving along. Okay. Number eight. There's pervasive cynicism in our society.

No, there's not.

There isn't. I disagree with that. Well, it's hard not to be cynical. I think we, you know, we were talking about that earlier. We get so used to being told lies. Everybody lies all the time, you know?

And I mean, I'm dodging phone calls at home, not from people at the church, but I've got telemarketers calling me and every, you know, it's just like, everybody's out for something from me. And so, yeah, I think there's cynicism in our society, and rightfully so, you know?

It's hard.

Steve, I know it's your day off, but. Yeah.

Yeah. Could you do this or could you give me that or, yeah, yeah, those phone calls come.

I used to get phone calls on Monday. I'm looking for somebody's phone number and thought maybe you could help me. This is early on before, you know, the church was trained that, you know, I have a wife and kids and unless it's emergency, could I just spend time with them today?

You know, I'll be thinking about you all day, but at least I'll be with my kids. Could you give me the phone number? So one time, this really dense guy, most of the time I'd say, sure, no problem. Here's the phone number.

You know, in the future, if you could just look up the number, I'd appreciate it. And one guy wouldn't get the message. He's since moved on to greener pastures, of course, and dabbled coming back here, but we don't have a good youth program.

So I think I pretty much had to tell him, yeah, I sure can. Here's the phone number. You got a pen ready? 4 -1 -1.

Well, at least you didn't say 9 -1 -1.

Oh, yeah, 6 -1 -1. There's a failure number nine of some pastors in two key areas, leadership and emotional intelligence. Now, I have no idea what emotional intelligence is. I can tell if someone's fuming mad, I can usually see that.

Okay. Yeah, I think that's what they mean.

Healthy interpersonal skills. He writes there. They have nothing. So, you know, it's being able to sense, read the HALO data. Yes.

What's HALO data? Again, it's an acronym for something. Do you hear anything? What's your acumen? I don't know. What's your layabout rating? I don't know. Stop, look, and listen. Yeah. Take the HALO off.

Competence, Vision, and Church Decline

Number 10, there are higher expectations today for pastors to be competent, even dynamic leaders. And I would interrupt my own self as I wait for you, Steve, to say pastors have to have it all now. It's not just preach, but you've got to be a mentor, leader, administration.

You've got to do it all. You've got to cast a vision.

You have to be the CEO. If you're not a godly version of Steve Jobs, you're doing a bad job.

This whole vision casting thing, Steve, it makes me think I'm some pastoral diviner. I have a divining rod and I'm just walking around trying to find spiritual water in this oasis. Well, without a vision, the people perish.

Okay. Number 11, Tom Rainer's CP opinion, Christian post contributor, 11 reason pastors are trusted less today. Coming in at number 11. I have no idea what he means. More churches are dying in America today.

Well, what does that mean? Oh, the pastors are blamed for the 100 ,000 churches per year that die.

It's their fault because if the pastor was doing his job right, the church wouldn't die. The question is, is that true? It may be in some cases, absolutely. If the pastor's not preaching the word, if his sermons are boring, people aren't growing, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

But more often, what are pastors to do? Equip the people there for the work of evangelism, there to do the work. Is it the pastor's fault? Well, I would argue in most cases, probably not.

Tom does say at the end, I think this is excellent and allow me one footnote, Rainer says, please pray for your pastor. Amen. That'll preach. Mike Abendroth with Steve Cooley, nocompromiseradio .com. You can write Steve, Tuesday guy at NoCoRadio, No Compromise Radio, or info at No Compromise Radio.

Yes, you can.

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