Thanks!!

Hi Mark,

Thanks for the comment and your honesty. This post was not an attack on the church – it is an attack on pathetic church “beliefs”. It’s a post primarily about theology. I’m afraid that when theology is bad, it is bad, and there’s pretty much no other way of saying it. In fact, better it’s said than kept quiet.

The kind of theology in view here is mostly the shallow type of theology in a big part of the church today – the formula-based, principles, Pelagian kind of theology where if you can’t hold up you’re obviously not Christian enough. As I said in my post: “Over the years when I really had to face my depression head-on I realised that modern Christian pop-theology offers no real answer: it’s too shallow, full of clichés, and only seems to work for the strong.”

Thanks Liezel 🙂 Thanks for stopping by.

Anyone can attack the perceived weaknesses of others with their words, but that’s not what our Author and Finisher wants us to do.

Mark

Thanks Jennifer. And thanks for the honesty! The kind of pressure many people do put on pastors is ridiculous. Here’s the thing: I’d follow an honest, even depressed, pastor any day. For me it’s the exact kind of thinking that forces a pastor to have to smile when things are going badly for them that’s the kind of thinking that needs to be addressed.

I don’t want a pastor with shiny teeth, I want a pastor with a Bible and dirty hair who knows how to wrestle with God. I know how pastors have to deal with measuring success – you pretty much can’t. Your day is filled with so much random stuff that by the end of it it can feel as if you really didn’t do anything at all! Unfortunately, though, the pressure of success within modern church culture (perhaps thanks to the church growth movement) has made pastors needing to be the perfect image of a person who’s got it all together. But they don’t need to be. They don’t need to be a “success”, they just need to be real and in love with Jesus and their Bible and all the *actual* Biblical requirements listed in 1 Timothy 3 and other places. (Note: nothing there about having to have an amazing church that’s growing at light speed; looking the part; or even being a great preacher etc.).

I work with pastors every day (I work for my church as a full-time deacon) and have plenty of friends who are full-time pastors. I know the struggle. I want to even be one myself one day, when the time is right! But I think your point is valid: you can’t blame some pastors for simply not knowing how to deal with depressed people in their church. I don’t. Many pastors I know don’t understand it fully, but they make an effort to have good theology, and subsequently they actually understand it very well. But I do blame pastors who are preoccupied with success and ambition and have a shallow theology on pretty much everything, regurgitating what they see / hear on TBN and what they read in the latest Christian best seller, etc. That sort of leading is not leading.

Thanks Frank!

Thanks Jonathan! Really appreciate that! 🙂