Desperate (or switched on) clergy?

I chanced across an advert' for a church service this week.

Well actually I chanced across eight from the same person (on the same day) all of which were almost pleading with the reader to come to their church services. Then, quite by coincidence, I found them on Twitter and, Facebook? Yes you've probably guessed, the same services were advertised there too! So this got me wondering and so I trotted over to some of the other social media sites and found that they were quite prolific.

Now I think there is great merit to be found in social media sites with regard to disseminating information, dialoguing with people and being grounded but there was something in what I had stumbled across that caused me to think that what I was reading was bordering on the desperate and tacky rather than merely seeking to engage. It was all a bit like those conversations where you know the other person isn't going to come to Back to Church Sunday' or perhaps those where you struggle to make excuses for the fact that you won't be popping round to enjoy 'an evening with . . . .'

One of our church members recently recounted an encounter where they asked someone to a church event. Before they were halfway through the invitation the other person said, "We're busy on that day!"  "But I haven't told you the date yet," protested our evangelistic hero. "Oh, we're busy every ___day," came the reply. The sad thing is that this is a repeat of last year's encounter with the same person and probably the year before that as well - and I get to the stage where I don't think it's worth throwing 'good money after bad' and that the time comes when we shake the dust off of our shoes and leave them to their own designs, even if there was once a relationship. The door is always open and the welcome is always there for those who wish to come - even after a number of year's absence - but the time comes when you decide to use your energy where it is valued and effective (and yes, I know about the persistent woman and the magistrate!).

As one of my favourite sayings puts it,

'If you lend someone a tenner and never see them again, it was probably worth it!'

This applies equally well to some who have come and gone in that their departure can sometimes release us to be effective elsewhere.

But, as is often the case, I digress and so let us return to the desperation stakes minister.

The more I read the posts the more I felt saddened rather than uplifted and so I decided to give them a call to find out what they were doing and why (and how I might support them in prayer and any other ways). It transpired that they, like so many of us, were in the middle of an exercise to reduce clergy numbers and the events, services and other attractions on offer were part of an attempt to attract more people and get them known in the area so that people (especially pointyheaded people) would see how much they were doing and find their sacrificial sheep elsewhere.

I tried to tell them that reducing clergy numbers is about doing church more effectively and efficiently and is not (well it shouldn't be) a popularity contest! The idea that by throwing loads of services at the wall some of them will stick and a successful church will emerge from the shadows to help deflect the axeman's blow is folly and, in my humble (and brain-limited) opinion, will only cause more clergy depression and desperation. The potential for some to act like dancing bears to attract the crowds or start writing in the local paper about everything the church is doing in the hope that the community will be impressed is doing the wrong stuff for the wrong reasons.

So I write this saddened and concerned - we prayed on the telephone and I think I have found a potential friend in the social media minister. But the wounds, pressure and desire to perform to appease those above and continue to support those around them is neither healthy (for minister, congregation or Church) nor God-honouring.

Church - how do you do yours?

(and God: How should we be doing it? Give us a clue!)

ps. Think He has if we read our Bibles ;-)