That pastor was Jonathan Edwards, called “unquestionably America’s greatest theologian.”
- Keep yourself close to the Lord and wait (I Peter 2:25)
It’s His flock and not yours. It’s His church and not yours. If there is a battle to be fought for the flock, let the Shepherd handle it.
Refuse to Play
A church I know is being threatened by the insistence of a few leaders that the pastor leave, in spite of the support he enjoys from the congregation. When a deacon told those few how Scripture says such issues are to be handled, he was surprised by their response. As he later told the pastor, “They said they don’t care what the Bible says, they just want the preacher gone.”
When one of the contrarians took the pulpit at the end of a worship service to read his charges against the pastor, people got up and walked out. Others stood and walked to the altar and began to pray.
That’s how to end a church fight before it starts. Refuse to play.
The faithful should keep doing their jobs, stay in their assigned positions, support their minister, and refuse to tear up a great church in order to get their way.
If you are the pastor or a teacher: teach this passage and these principles again and again. Teach them once and they will forget. You have to constantly drill them into the minds and hearts of the Lord’s people in order for them to carry them out in a time of crisis.
“Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.” — Matthew 5:9
