God Never Said To Put Impossible Expectations On Christian Leaders

(** NOTE: throughout this post I consistently refer to “pastors” as “he”, but fully realize not all pastors are male. I simply chose one pronoun for the post and decided to stick with it all the way through for continuity.)

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Christian leaders fail because impossible expectations are placed on their shoulders and they are set up for failure the moment they mutter the words, "I sense I'm called by God into ministry."

Ravi Zacharias.

Carl Lentz.

Bill Hybels.

The list goes on. In many ways these men are abusers and there is no excuse for that. Regardless of what you think of Ravi Zacharias, he raped women. He abused his power in the most horrific of ways and (in my opinion) it has tainted his life's work so much so that it will never recover. He not only made a living of defending "the Truth", but he made a hobby out of hiding it and distorting it to justify his actions.

But this post isn't about Ravi or Carl, it's about "the Church" and the way that the Church sets people like Ravi and Carl up for failure by shining the brightest of spotlights on them and then placing impossible expectations and demands upon their shoulders.

Let's talk about these two things:

(1) The Spotlight.

(2) The Expectations.

Ravi, Carl, and countless others are absolute gods in the Evangelical world. Heck. They aren't gods, to some they are Gods ...

God's chosen servants.

God's chosen mouthpieces.

God's chosen prophet.

... And with those titles they are placed in the brightest of spotlights where every move and word and facial expression they make is put under a microscope where they live and breath and are forced to carry expectations that no human being can possibly carry for an extended period of time.

Expectations?

I know of pastors who live their lives in fear because although they need help they will never ask for it. Why? Because the moment they raise their hand and say ...

"I'm depressed."

"My marriage is a mess."

"I'm don't know what to do with my teenager."

"I'm lonely."

"I'm afraid."

"I'm not sure I believe in God anymore."

"Sometimes I don't want to get out of bed."

"I think I have an unhealthy attraction to the woman who sits in the middle pew every Sunday."

... The moment a pastor raises his or her hand and says, "I'm struggling", the alarms go up, the whispers start, and that pastor knows that his or her days are numbered.

"Did you hear the pastor is depressed."

"But I thought we're supposed to be joyful always? Isn't that what his sermon was about a few weeks ago?"

"Maybe he's not reading his Bible enough?"

"The pastor's marriage is a mess. His family isn't in order. Didn't Paul say that was a requirement for the elders of a church? Maybe he should take a leave of absence."

"The pastor is attracted to someone who isn't his wife?"

"The pastor has a drinking problem?"

As the spotlight gets brighter and brighter and draws in the attention of more and more people, the pastor's struggles and secrets go more and more into hiding because he's afraid that if his secrets ever come out and if anyone ever realizes that he doesn't have it as together as the world thinks he does or thinks he should.

Well.

Then he's going to find himself on a leave of absence or without a job or having lost the trust and the dedication of everyone who gathers around the spotlight every Sunday to hear him preach or gathers around his Instagram account every day to tap the heart and show some love.

And so the pastor hides the secrets ...

Buries them.

Puts on a nice face.

Smiles.

Nods.

Praises Jesus.

Says nice prayers.

Leads good Bible studies.

Preaches powerful sermons.

BUT.

The deeper the secrets go and the brighter the spotlight gets and the bigger the crowd becomes and the more fake the mask that he wears gets ... the more inevitable it is that the secrets will burst through the surface like a land mine and blow his life apart.

The affairs will come to the surface.

The divorce will seem to come out of nowhere.

His wife will tell the elders of his alcohol addiction.

He'll overdose on pain medication to hide the pain that he has no one to talk to about.

In short, pastors aren't allowed to fail and so they are forced into hiding; they aren't allowed to struggle, and they are expected to keep going - to keep preaching, to keep leading, to keep studying, to keep smiling, to keep pushing, to keep counseling, to keep writing, to keep raising money, to keep bringing people into the pews every Sunday, to keep casting vision, to keep doing things bigger and better and bigger and better and bigger and better.

People - God never said to do this.

What are we doing? Why is it like this? You can tell me all you want that it's not like that, but it is. I was a pastor for 5 years and although I pastored a small church that no one has ever heard of, the pressure was there. Our podcast has over 50,000 downloads from 30+ countries around the world and I've heard pastor's stories about the pressure that they feel.

It's real.

It's wrong.

It needs to change.

The reality is that God never said to place impossible expectations upon the shoulders of church leaders. God never said to hold them to a standard of excellence that no human being could ever achieve. God never said to do any of these things.

Yes, Ravi raped women. Yes, Carl had an affair. Yes, Bill Hybels did the things he did. YES. These men did these inexcusable things to themselves and as a result their work will likely forever be tainted.

BUT.

The church set the up for failure. The church has created a culture of spotlights where celebrity preachers and leaders get the stage and the attention and are forced to shoulder expectations that are unhealthy, unrealistic, and toxic.

It happens in megachurches.

It happens in small-town churches.

It happens in America.

It happens overseas.

... It happens everywhere and if it doesn't change, if the spotlight isn't turned down and if pastors aren't given the freedom to struggle and to fail without the fear of having their lives blown up, their jobs taken away, and their reputations smeared ... things will never get better and we'll see more Ravis, more Carls, and more Bills.

Sometimes I think the whole thing needs to be burned to the ground. Church, that is. Burn it all down and start again. I’m not going to take that statement apart here, but I think we need to ask - do we need pastors? Do we need one guy to stand up front every Sunday and lead us and teach us? Do we need that person to shoulder all the weight and all the responsibility of being "called by God" to "be his mouthpiece" or "his prophet" and to speak the truth, defend the truth, and teach the truth.

I don't think we do. I don’t think that’s what the Bible has in mind at all when it talks about leaders and shepherds and teachers. And so if the church can't turn off the spotlight and lower its expectations on pastors and leaders then I think it's time for the church to take its own leave of absence so we can explore other ways of living in community and moving through life in pursuit of the Divine.

… Because there are other ways. The model of church that most of us are used to doesn’t own the corner market on God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit or any of the things. And it’s not really even the oldest or most orthodox model anyways.