The Biggest Danger For The Future of Methodists

As many of you know, I was a member of the North Alabama Conference (United Methodists) for 8 years by being a member of two of their churches during that time. During that time, I heard many sentiments expressed about the current struggles for Methodists. Methodists moaned that they were a minority in the land of Southern Baptists. They didn’t moan just because they were a minority, but because they continue to be a shrinking minority. This means less congregants, which means less churches and less money to do everything they want to do. That is definitely a frustrating thing to go through.

The current bishop, Will Willimon, believes that a large part of the problem is poor leadership. While I can agree that there is a problem w/poor leadership (and I think this can be said for all denominations to a smaller or larger degree), the agreement stops there. Because how he measures leadership is different from me. For him, the best way to tell if a church has spiritual vitality is by looking at church attendance numbers. Click here to read his words on that matter. This idea is also mentioned in this other article. Here’s another. To those who would say it’s not about the numbers, he would disagree in yet another article.

My response? While I disagree with the bishop, that doesn’t make him a bad person–it just makes him pretty much like so many other modern church leaders out there. I think we would all do ourselves a favor if we remembered that the same Jesus that said, “You will know them by their fruit,” (but clearly isn’t talking about numbers there) also said, “Many will come to me saying, Lord, Lord did we not do these many great things?” And Jesus says that He will say, I never knew you.” I think we are on dangerous grounds when we think we can judge a ministry by quantitative measurements. If we do that, Jesus’ ministry ended up a failure. He kept turning away crowds and could have had a much grander church than what was left when He died on the cross.

Oftentimes, a church is dwindling in size because it is indeed not a spiritually healthy church. If that is indeed the case, and it is apparent that the church refuses to get healthy, close it down! But isn’t it possible to have a spiritually healthy church that is currently declining in attendance? I can think of a number of scenarios where this would be the case. And there are also spiritually unhealthy churches that are thriving when it comes to the numbers. In my opinion, those churches should be shut down just as much as the one that’s dwindling—and maybe even more, because its spiritual unhealthiness is spreading like wildfire. Only when we are in relationship with a congregation can we determine whether it is a spiritually healthy church or not; otherwise numbers are all we can go by–and numbers often don’t tell the real story.

If we want to judge-by-number (sorry for the intentional correlation to another childish activity) to determine spiritual health, let’s all renounce our Savior and start following Mohammed. His religion is the fastest growing one out there, while we complain about our declining churches.

But as bad as the numbers are for Methodists, I don’t see the decline in membership as the biggest danger for the future of Methodism. Instead, the biggest danger I see is in the face of such decline, a desire to re-affirm our culture’s false sense of spiritual security in order to attract more people into the Church. It’s a theology that teaches we are all brothers and sisters in Christ, regardless of whether you believe in Him or not. Do your ears feel tickled yet? This lie degrades the Gospel and Scripture–the very foundation of the Christian faith. It’s what I encountered personally, and the latest example has been the Bishop’s reaction to the remarks of the new governor of Alabama.

I didn’t personally witness the governor’s remarks, and I’m not convinced it was the wisest thing to do in his position. An unbelieving nation isn’t going to understand his intentions (although I would expect Church leaders to get it). I’m sure Governor Bentley believes that God created us all, therefore we are God’s children in that sense of the word. But that is different than being brothers and sisters “in Christ.” Now we’re talking about God’s spiritual/eternal family. Of course, the governor could have just been saying these things to appeal to all those Southern Baptist constituents in his state. I wouldn’t be surprised. But that’s not my point here. The Bishop’s reaction wasn’t based on the appropriateness of the governor’s remarks, but instead the Bishop claims his remarks were theologically incorrect. Bishop Willimon believes that we are all “brothers and sisters in Christ” whether we believe in Him or not. If you read the comments that follow his article, you will see that Methodists are divided on the issue as to whether you must believe in Christ in order be a fellow brother or sister in Christ. (Most of the time, the Bishop’s posts get 1 or 2 comments, not 34!) I was one of the ones who were very disappointed to learn that the Bishop is convinced we all are brothers and sisters in Christ regardless. I was also expecting better exegesis (interpretation) of Scripture from someone as schooled in theology as he is. Clearly, when Jesus teaches us to pray by saying “Our Father,” the context reveals He’s referring to all of His followers who are praying together. Didn’t Jesus say that some of us humans were sons of the devil? Didn’t He say that some of us are “goats,” who will be cast into outer darkness where there is weeping/gnashing of teeth? Didn’t He say only a few of us would find the narrow way? Didn’t He say that those who do the will of His Father were his brothers and sisters? Didn’t Paul say that the wrath of God will be poured out on those who are disobeying God? The Bishop isn’t so much disagreeing with the governor as much as he apparently disagrees with Scripture.

I think Willimon’s real concern is that the unchurched people his denomination would like to attract to their churches might perceive Christians to be mean if we teach that everyone isn’t part of Christ’s spiritual family. If I said that you are not part of my family, but I want you to become part of my family…is that being mean or is that a loving way to say the truth? It’s not like the governor said, “You’re not part of my family, and I don’t want you to be!” He said the opposite.  Didn’t Jesus at some point say to the people of Jerusalem, “How long have I desired to gather you together as a hen gathers her chicks, but you would not let me”? Is Jesus being mean for saying that some of us refuse to be part of the fold?

It’s clear from Scripture that the Gospel teaches us that we are eternally lost without faith in Christ. The Bishop seems uncomfortable to accept this. Regardless of whether the membership of the North Alabama Conference is growing or declining, evaluating our faithfulness to the Gospel is a better way to evaluate our spiritual vitality. As long as we make numbers the priority, we will continue to see such “politically correct” statements in the attempt to grow our denomination or our churches. If it works and our numbers increase, are we comfortable in saying we are now increasing our “spiritual health”?

Maybe I and several others have misunderstood the Bishop as much as he seems to misunderstand Scripture. If what the Bishop seems to state in that article is indeed his theological position, it is precisely this sentiment and denial of the Gospel and Scripture that is the biggest danger for Methodism. John Wesley would vehemently disagree with the Bishop (see my comment #31). The Bible and Jesus’ own words completely stand against such a “feel-good” theology. Let the numbers continue to dwindle until the Gospel as preached by Wesley returns to the Methodist pulpits. Even if a poor, helpless congregant has nowhere else to turn except to those God-forsaken Southern Baptists.