Practical Counsel for Pastors Who Are Beginning to Discern the Times

Sep 11, 2024

Last week, Sola Ecclesia published my essay about pastors in “squishy” churches who are beginning to discern the times but feel stuck and can’t see a faithful path forward.

I’ve spoken to countless faithful shepherds the last few years who know they would pay a hefty price if they were more vocal on cultural issues.

Maybe this is you. Or maybe you know a pastor in this situation. If so, perhaps this essay will help.

I’ve also recorded this as a video essay and podcast. Links for both at the bottom.

*Sola Ecclesia* is the theological journal of Grimké Seminary, Founded in 2022, *Sola Ecclesia* is an extension of the theological vision of Grimké Seminary: to provide in-context theological training that is in, by, and for the church.

Over the past ten years or so, pastors have navigated some of the most morally complicated and emotionally turbulent ministry environments they’ve ever experienced. The world has changed around us in unprecedented ways that we’ve only just begun to comprehend.

One of the most helpful explanations of these cultural changes is the “Three Worlds of Evangelicalism” rubric proposed by Aaron Renn. His core observation, which began as an essay and later developed into a book, is that American society has grown increasingly hostile towards Christianity. Christianity was once regarded as a positive good for society by Christians and non-Christians alike. Renn calls this “positive world.” As the new millennia approached, that perception softened as Christianity was demoted in favor of a pluralistic “marketplace of ideas.” Renn calls this “neutral world.” But from around 2015 onward, our society’s view of Christianity has turned decidedly dark. Renn calls this “negative world.”

This simple formulation has great explanatory power to comprehend the immense ministry pressure modern pastors face, many of whom were trained in “neutral world” ministry tools that have become obsolete in the “negative world” we now occupy. This is not some abstract sociological phenomenon for professors to discuss in the faculty lounge. Nor is this merely an online phenomenon where keyboard warriors spar on social media about controversies that will blow over when a new controversy erupts. It’s much more practical and personal than that.

Whether we want to accept it or not, the “negative world” of 2024 is not the same as the “neutral world” of 2004. Every pastor must unflinchingly reckon with this new reality, though many will not be inclined to do so. Why?

The Challenge

Busy pastors have little time or interest in keeping up with the latest cultural trends or evangelical gossip. That’s what “discernment bloggers” spend all their time worrying about. But ordinary pastors I know don’t care about that stuff. It seems petty and immature. They want to preach the Bible, share the gospel, and disciple their people.

Besides, cultural discernment seems best left to the niche specialists who pay more attention to social trends than everyone else. Most pastors don’t have the time or energy to figure out how to “understand the times” like the men of Issachar (1 Chron. 12:32). It can be tedious trying to pay attention to who’s saying what, what they are saying, what they are refusing to say, and who they are associated with.

Many pastors are beginning to awaken to the cold, hard realities of the negative world. Bad ideas travel at lightning speed through the Christian subculture faster than pastors can keep up. Influential Christian thinkers are no longer seminary professors or experienced ministry practitioners. Now, the most influential Christian thought leaders often have zero theological or biblical training. Instead, they have an iPhone and charisma. Their ideas trickle down from social media channels to your small groups and Sunday school classes. The most pressing doctrinal issues of our day are framed more by influencers than those who have dedicated their lives to rigorous theological study. Ordinary people in our churches read their social media posts, listen to their podcasts, and watch their TikToks. Allie Beth Stuckey, a 32-year-old Christian influencer and social media star, probably has as much influence over the minds of Christian women as their pastors.

Observant pastors try to maintain a bird’s eye view of their congregations. They notice certain trends that play out in the lives of their people, such as those who demanded masks and jabs during COVID, who supported #blacklivesmatter by turning their profile pictures into black squares on Facebook, and an alarming number of kids in the youth group claiming to be gay or trans.

As a pastor begins to realize that something has radically shifted in our culture, it hits him hard. This is his “men of Issachar” moment, where the sober fact dawns that his ministry world has been turned upside down. The state of the world is much darker than he’d realized before, and he can no longer afford to pretend otherwise.

I’ve been through this and heard similar testimonies from more pastors than I can count. One pastor said, “As the world got crazier, my thinking got clearer.” He realized that naiveté was a luxury he could not afford. God called him to “shepherd the flock of God,” and their souls were at stake. He could not allow himself to be naïve, turning a blind eye towards the evil as it encroached upon his people. He was becoming more sober-minded, choosing to courageously face unpleasant ministry realities.

He is now a pastor who, after recognizing the “negative world, realizes he is leading a church that still thinks it is in the “neutral world.” He needs to make some changes to prepare for what lies ahead. So what should he do?

Counting the Cost

First, he realizes that if he talks about the truth of reality as he sees it and with the urgency the moment requires, his congregants could become angry, panic, and revolt. If he tells them what he really thinks, they may push back and send him packing. But if he says nothing, their errors will go uncorrected, and they’ll be left increasingly vulnerable to whatever heresy some 19-year-old kid with a YouTube account happens to be saying.

As pastors awaken to the evils that have taken hold of our society, I’ve noticed some of them becoming more vocal online. Plain-spoken boldness is a muscle they’ve not exercised in the past, but they’re hitting the weights now. As they express unpopular opinions, with the perceived requisite of great care and nuance, they are like kids at the pool checking the water by dipping their toes. The same happens in churches. Little by little, they get bolder in the pulpit, inching dangerously close to the line of controversy without crossing it.

There is a legitimate fear these pastors experience. I get it. They don’t want to be seen as unhinged provocateurs recklessly stirring up controversy. These pastors are trapped in broadly evangelical churches with anxious people who have a low threshold for conflict. The functional liberalism of some portion of the congregation is a conditioned response to the neutral world tools that formed them, such as gospel centrism, winsome third-wayism, faithful presence passivity, and punch-right-coddle-leftism. All these ministry strategies were effective at drawing left-leaning urban millennials, the most coveted demographic of the neutral world church planting boom. But now, these same left-of-center millennials are the pastor’s biggest liability. If a pastor, waking up to the importance of biblical fidelity in a negative world, crosses the line, they’ll sabotage him.

Some of the left-leaning urban millennials he reached a decade ago with neutral world tools have now become key donors, ministry leaders, and elders. Some of them are now in the prime of their careers, comfortably cocooned in their middle-class lives. He’s afraid of losing them. He wants to courageously lead and protect them, disciple them towards greater faithfulness, and equip them for the dark days ahead. But they are reluctant to change. Some of them now occupy the most visible positions of influence in the church. Anxious people crave familiarity and routine. They like their neutral world church mirage and don’t want any red-pilled pastor leading them out of it.

But these congregants don’t realize that the neutral world is gone. The negative world is here. And from how things are going, we’re headed for a clown world circus show in the years ahead. Sooner or later, biblically faithful, negative world pastors in “neutral world” churches will either be “outed” for what they truly believe or quietly keep things to themselves, hoping no one notices. There isn’t a “pain-free” option. It’s coming, one way or another. He’ll either face the pain of confronting controversial issues head-on or the internal anguish of his own cowardice. If he takes the former route, he could potentially lose large numbers of key members or even lose his job. If he takes the latter route, he’ll be watching the cancer of progressivism eat his church from the inside out, knowing he could have fought to prevent it.

Gangrene and Leaven

Bad ideas are contagious. Paul compares them to gangrene, a deadly disease that kills healthy tissue as it spreads through the body (2 Tim. 2:17). Neutral world ministry tools are the equivalent of seeker-sensitive church growth strategies catering to Reformed scruples. These tools are effective for getting respectable, intellectual unbelievers to church through flattery and pandering, promising to confront their sins winsomely while confronting sins on the right with blood earnestness. This style of ministry can appeal to Christians formed in the Reformed tradition because it provides confessional cover for their affirmations of homosexuality and women’s ordination through an accepted ministry paradigm. It’s the kind of Christianity that doesn’t embarrass them in public.

This is similar to Jesus’s illustration of the “leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees” (Matt. 16:11). Bad ideas spread through a church like leaven spreads through a lump of dough. Paul said the same thing about a church’s tolerance for sexual sin. “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened” (1 Cor. 5:6–7). In other words, bad ideas need to be corrected early before they spread.

Unfortunately, many neutral-world churches built with neutral-world tools have been thoroughly leavened with destructive unbiblical ideas. It will take courage and discipline for faithful pastors to correct them. Otherwise, gangrenous ideas are normalized as unspoken expectations in the church. These unbiblical ideas are eventually institutionalized as those who hold them assume leadership posts.

This is the dilemma an emboldened pastor faces. He wakes up and realizes that wicked ideologies of BLM, critical theory, LGBTQ affirmation, and statism have leavened his supposedly Reformed, confessional church. He may have an elder whose semi-feminist wife functions as a proxy elder, invisibly steering her husband. Another elder might have an outgoing, popular teenage son who is effeminate and would easily sway impressionable kids to affirm him if he came out as gay. He might have significant donors in the church who are fully vocal in their support of Black Lives Matter and other “social justice” causes. There may be a well-respected church member who works for a world-renowned children’s hospital in town that specializes in “gender-affirming care” for minors—she doesn’t want to attract attention by word getting out that her church doesn’t approve. There may be influential small group leaders who start to voice “concerns” about the pastor’s preaching about homosexuality, abortion, and feminism, fearing it will drive away unbelievers for being insufficiently winsome.

They don’t need to be in the majority. It only takes a few in key positions to steer the culture of the whole church. A little leaven is all it takes.

So, what’s his next move? Broadly speaking, the emboldened pastor has two basic options: appease or engage.

Option One: Appease

The passive route is the path of least resistance. Keep things quiet and avoid controversy. Don’t challenge unbiblical thinking in your congregation. Be vague and evasive if you’re asked a direct question you know will create conflict if you answer. Don’t confront cultural sins. Only say things publicly that you know won’t make people angry. Stay on message. Make winsomeness the measure of your ministry. Continue teaching feel-good sermons with limited application, while surrendering the church to worldly catechesis the rest of the week.

Your cowardice will hardly be noticed. You don’t have to say anything challenging. You can appease the error by simply ignoring it. If anyone draws attention to cultural sin or unbiblical ideologies and calls upon you to correct it, you can say you’re being patient and gracious.

You can enjoy the upside of having a relatively peaceful ministry that neither offends nor challenges anyone. The downside, of course, is a dereliction of your pastoral duty. You become more of a company man. Preach your sermons. Collect your paycheck. Retire comfortably. Sear your conscience. “Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain is a righteous man who gives way before the wicked” (Prov. 25:26).

Clearly, this is not an option. The only biblically faithful option is to engage.

Option Two: Engage

Engaging with false ideology to defend the faith and protect your congregants is admittedly a high-risk, high-reward scenario. It can be quite costly to speak out on the errors your people are actually facing. If you confront the oppressive progressive ideology with the Word of God, feathers will be ruffled. But these are the dominant ideologies poisoning our culture and leavening the church. Good elders are like an immune system in the church, preventing disease before it starts. That means speaking biblical truth—boldly and graciously—as it pertains to cultural Marxism, homosexuality, trans ideology, critical theory, statism, or whatever the next progressive fad is.

Doing so forces the issue out into the open, where unspoken assumptions can be addressed in the light of Scripture. It may be unpopular at the moment and will require study, preparation, and nerves of steel, but these are the kinds of anti-fragile churches that will survive and thrive in the coming years.

You probably already know which sermons and topics will upset people. Confronting feminism may upset your closest elder’s wife. Confronting the sins that comprise LGBTQ ideology may cause generous donors to leave because they have a gay child. Talking about the glory of marriage and motherhood may prompt angry emails from single women who use their singleness to prioritize a career over the biblical command for women to prioritize their home and family.

Whatever the particular needs of your church are, you are the one to address them. It won’t be easy, but it’s worth it.

What Could Engagement Cost You?

For the emboldened pastor, leading your church in a new direction will be costly. But the cost is worth it. Here is a short list of things to consider.

1. Count the cost. Don’t be naive. You could have a mass exodus of close friends leaving the church. The church could split. You could get fired. Any number of things could happen, so it is best to be prepared for anything.

2. Prepare your own soul. Meditate on Matthew 5:11–12 and the book of 1 Peter. Pray that God will strengthen you to “suffer for doing good” (1 Pet. 3:17). Read memoirs and biographies of your Christian heroes who courageously endured great trials.

3. Acknowledge your own errors. If you’ve changed your view on something (or many things), acknowledge them publicly. Don’t be afraid of saying, “I used to think X, but now I’ve come to believe Y. Let me show you from Scripture how I came to this conclusion.” Not only is it morally right to acknowledge error, but the goodwill gained from such acknowledgments could build trust as you try to lead your congregation in a more faithful direction.

4. Keep your nerve. Anxious people can attempt to soothe themselves by scapegoating and attacking anyone who increases their anxiety, especially the anxiety that comes from deeply held beliefs. Be prepared for slander and accusation as the heat gets turned up. Because of their natural (and good) desire to nourish and protect relationships, women can be especially tempted to commit sins in this area when a pastor intentionally brings up important matters that will create godly conflict. This is one of the greatest challenges pastors face and is worthy of its own treatment in another article.

For more on this, read Joe Rigney’s book “Leadership and Emotional Sabotage” (review at Sola Ecclesia here).

5. Assemble a team of allies. Jesus sent his disciples out two by two because it’s not good to do ministry alone. Find your allies and rally them to pray for you, support you, and counsel you. They may or may not be your elders. Some elders can be a pastor’s greatest opponents. If you don’t have any allies at your church, find them online if necessary.

6. Be as innocent as a dove. Your character matters. The qualifications for eldership require the pastor to be a godly man who is above reproach. Repent of your own sin and walk in integrity. If you have hidden sins you haven’t addressed, they will be exposed.

7. Be as wise as a serpent. You need a plan. Be deliberate and intentional. For example, if feminism is a problem in your church, you might consider a sermon series or teaching a class about biblical sexuality. Be shrewd. Recruit those who agree with you to use their influence to show support in practical ways. Make a list of likely detractors and pursue them individually for discipleship ahead of time.

8. Prepare to lose friends. Your wife will lose friends, too. Every friendship you have in the church is unalterably affected by the fact that you are the pastor. Pastors don’t get to have normal friendships. The pastor (and his wife) can have real friendships, but not normal friendships. When a pastor’s friend is unsatisfied and leaves the church, it can’t not be personal to a degree. They are leaving because of some dissatisfaction with the church related to the pastor’s personal failings to minister to them or a problem the pastor failed to address. Christians disagree all the time and can maintain their relationship, but the pastor knows that his disagreements may cause friends to leave the church. This pressurizes everything he says and every relationship he has. His wife, too.

9. Study your bylaws. Your church is internally governed by its bylaws, so ensure you know how conflicts are resolved. What authority do you have to deal with troublesome members, elders, or staff? What authority does the church have to fire you?

10. Prepare an exit ramp. Unfortunately, faithful men don’t always win. There’s nothing wrong with preparing an optional exit strategy so you can provide for your family.

Conclusion

I’ve been in ministry for over twenty years, and I’ve seen these patterns play out numerous times in various churches. I’ve had several friends face significant crises in their churches. Some pastors have been mercilessly slandered by their people in their congregations. Some were fired. Some receptive congregations followed these pastors’ lead and submitted to God’s Word.

I have my own battle scars from ministry trials. I don’t regret my own choice to engage rather than to refuse to take action. My conscience wouldn’t allow any other path. My greatest comfort through every ministry trial has been the numerous biblical promises to the end that God rewards his faithful shepherds. One of my favorite passages is where Peter exhorts the elders to “shepherd the flock of God that is among you” (1 Pet. 5:2). This passage contains a beautiful promise that should encourage the heart of any faithful pastor: “When the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory” (1 Pet. 5:4). Cling to this promise, brothers. God promises an eternal reward for every pastor who ministers faithfully.