One major reason I can think of is financial. If ‘the worker deserves his wages’, then the payers also deserve proper work. I believe that means if you pay a church or religious leaders ten percent of your income, you should have certain expectations as to their conduct, attitude, morality and spiritual example.
Don’t let religious leaders coerce or pressure you into thinking “it’s God’s command, you must contribute”. Sure, it’s a command from God to support church leadership, but a church leadership you believe in and trust. Otherwise, you can take your ten percent elsewhere -give it to another church, or a charity, or simply to the poor, if your faith prompts you to.
I believe the bible also calls us to be shrewd, wise and discerning. You’re not paying ten percent of your income to be lied to, spiritually bullied, looked down upon, emotionally abused, psychologically manipulated, exploited or used for the selfish ambition of church leaders. They have no right to exploit their congregations and take financial liberties at the expense of the grass roots members. That’s simply sheer arrogance, because it’s the grass roots members who literally support them.
I’m honing on this point a little, because I’ve been looking at the music industry recently for interest’s sake, being somewhat of a keen songwriter (though it’s just a hobby), but time and time again I see artists and bands who make it give utmost respect and gratitude to their fans, because it’s fans who put their food on the table.
Now, sure enough church leaders are spiritual guides, and they have authority to teach people to obey the teachings of the bible etc… but ‘lording it over’ is not supported by the bible. I say this, as is a theme from my blog, in light of my experience of being in the ICOC. The concept of ‘accountability’ became far too ‘top heavy’.
In leaders’ ambitions for more members, baptisms, visitors and the ultimate goal of the ’superchurch’, they loaded heavy burdens on their congregations, both financial and in the way of evangelistic ‘works’. It wasn’t until 2003 that many, but not all, leaders were brought to account themselves. It’s little wonder the ICOC had such an issue with low retention of members.
But it wasn’t so much the accountability itself, it was the attitude of leaders. Many changes have been made since 2003, but the attitudes of some haven’t changed. Possibly because many leaders are leading the way they were taught and indoctrinated by Kip Mckeanism for so many years. Many still hold to one-on-one discipling which opens the way for control and systematic abuse.
You need to test your church culture, the ways leaders lead, their attitudes, because you are investing in them -in both time and money, and in your spiritual endeavor of salvation. Do you want to invest in leaders who are deceitful? Arrogant? Manipulative? And you need to test, because these things are not obvious. Corrupt religious leaders know how to say the ‘right things’, to spiritually fake it.
How do you test? That’s up to you. Who’s going to be afraid of you asking lots of questions? A leader of integrity, or a corrupt leader? Maybe you need to be observant. Maybe the devil’s in the details. Maybe you need to get away for a certain time to gain some objectivity? Abusive groups tend to exert a lot of pressure. Sincere Christians may out of genuine concern, but they should be considerate enough to give people space. Do they want servile robots or edified Christians with an empowered faith?
Another thing to consider -sometimes the top leadership can be corrupt, while those sandwiched in the middle can be sincere in their concern, but they’re just taught to go along with the system. My experience in the ICOC, it was this middle-level of leadership that was the most overworked and abused.
