Episode 15: On How Quickly a Pastor Should Make Changes
It’s tempting for a new pastor to show up with a laundry list of problems and jump in too quickly, often leaving a church worse off. How should a pastor go about making the necessary changes in his church? In this episode of Pastors Talk, Jonathan Leeman and Mark Dever sit down to discuss how quickly pastors should make alterations to their church. They tackle the mistakes young pastors may make, healthy habits new pastors should practice, and several situations that may call for immediate action or a slower pace.
- Mistakes Young Pastors Make
- What Should a New Pastor Focus On?
- Pastors Building Relationships
- How to Slowly Make Changes
Show Notes
- You’ve said before that young pastors have great acuity, but poor depth perception. Can you explain that? (1:00)
- What kinds of mistakes do young pastors take? (2:40)
- How did you moderate the pace of change at the beginning of your time at CHBC? (5:50)
- Is “change nothing in your first year” good advice? (9:45)
- What should a pastor give himself to in the first year? Why is preaching so crucial? (13:00)
- Should a pastor deliberately set out to build relationships with those who are disagreeable? How much does that help? (15:55)
- Why should some pastors not practice church discipline right away? (18:00)
- How much does handing out books help? (19:50)
- Three areas of things that might change. (23:00)
Transcript
The following is a lightly edited transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
On How Quickly a Pastor Should Make Changes
Jonathan Leeman
Hello, I am Jonathan Leeman.
Mark Dever
And I’m Mark Dever.
Jonathan Leeman
And welcome to this episode of Pastors Talk brought to you by 9Marks.
Mark Dever
Hey, is this one we’re doing on multitasking? You are good at that. I may be looking through some evaluations, but it might be to pay attention.
Jonathan Leeman
Even in these interviews, you proved somewhat adept at it. But 9Marks, in case you didn’t know, exists to equip church leaders with a biblical vision and practical resources for building healthy churches. Learn more at 9marks.org. And in these Pastor’s Talks, we do our best to do some inside baseball for pastors. And we’re going to go really inside baseball today and talk about Mark.
Mark Dever
Finances,
Jonathan Leeman
How quickly pastors should change stuff in their churches.
Mark Dever
I got an email about this today.
Jonathan Leeman
So I assume the guy in the email will care about four others will care.
Mark Dever
Uh huh.
Jonathan Leeman
You want to tell us about the email?
Mark Dever
If it turns out, okay, keep going.
Mistakes Young Pastors Make
Jonathan Leeman
You have a great way to talk about young pastors and their eyes.
Mark Dever
Yeah, the phrase I’ve used before is that… I- here’s the problem with young guys stuff. I think often young guys are very popular with young guys. They see them, they think they’re cool, they go do what they do. And that works for people their own age, and that’s about it. But then the problem is sometimes they become dismissive of young guys.
And older guys are sometimes also just dismissive of young guys. And I think older guys and younger guys both have really good things they bring to the table. And these are generalizations, of course, that, you know, you can in specifics show other cases.
But generally, I think young guys have great acuity. They see things that are right and wrong, often really accurately. But the way I put it is they have no depth perception. They don’t know how to walk from where they are to there, let alone lead the church there.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
Whereas old guys, often their acuity has gotten a little shaky, a little soft, fuzzy, but compromises, but they’ve got great depth perception. They know how to get people from here to another point. And if the two can work together, I think it’s often, it’s just so helpful.
Jonathan Leeman
Perhaps a bit simplistic, but kind of the young guys have all of their doctrinal meters and ecclesiology meters ready to go. The old guys have more of the humane.
Mark Dever
Yeah, you’ll need to talk to Sarah before you start doing that because Sarah and her family have run this for the last two generations.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
So if you don’t want to blow things up.
Jonathan Leeman
What would be some other illustrations of young pastor’s mistake? He sees things really clearly and yet he doesn’t have the pastoral, political, human skill at knowing how to love the church well.
Stopping Programs In Church
Mark Dever
Well, let’s have or don’t have this. You know, let’s start this program or stop this one. And usually it’s not the starting the new one that gets you in trouble, so it’s the stopping the new one. Here’s the email I got this morning. It was from Bruce Winter. Bruce is a New Testament scholar at Acts. He’s retired now. He was a warden at Tindale House in Cambridge when I was there like 150 years ago.
And he just mentioned to me, I still remember coming to a service at your USA church- He’s Australian- and being told after the service by an older person- so this is like from 1997, I think Bruce was here literally 20 years ago, “many things have changed over the years since Mark came, but I do not know how it happened”, Which Bruce says, “which was a great testimony to your pastoral wisdom and gifts. Press on feeding the sheep with the word and pastoring them.
Jonathan Leeman
So what were you doing? You’re changing things. They didn’t know how things are.
Mark Dever
I think I always look for free things.
Jonathan Leeman
Uh huh.
Mark Dever
Like, this would cause a conflict, this would upset this person. This person would be upset. This I could change and nobody would care.
Jonathan Leeman
Nobody’s noticing that.
Mark Dever
Well, paying attention. Yeah. So like the flag, the famous flag thing, I thought nobody would notice. That’s the only reason I did it. I knew the price I was going to have to pay, I would have chosen not to have done it.
Jonathan Leeman
Pull the flag out of the main hall?
Mark Dever
I just didn’t know.
Jonathan Leeman
Right.
Mark Dever
So in my ignorance, I did it.
Jonathan Leeman
Right. Were there other things that nobody was paying attention to that you quickly swapped out?
Mark Dever
You know, different guys are different. So some pastors will notice some things will be more important than other pastors. I think for me, I was, I was very, very aware of the public service on Sunday morning, especially things that pertain to it. I was very aware of the truth of the word spoken or not. So when kids were singing songs about, you know, being Christians and, you know, and the children’s choir, I was just.
Jonathan Leeman
Cause you don’t think kids are Christians.
Mark Dever
Kids can be, but I think if we teach everybody that if you have a church background you’re a Christian and then when you’re 12 and you’re really worrying about life more seriously, you think, well I experienced that a couple years ago and there’s nothing to that. That’s just what I want to prevent.
Jonathan Leeman
So you’re sitting there listening to them sing songs that you would not have them sing.
Mark Dever
I’m caring about an announcement about a pro-life rally. I’m just thinking about everything I’m hearing because the church let me just sit here for three months and just listen June, July, August, September, really, I’m just listening to what’s going on at church. And just so much of it, just like, ‘I wouldn’t say it like that.
Oh, I wouldn’t do that. Oh, I wouldn’t do that there’. Yeah. So other guys, they might be very sensitive to other things. You know, maybe they came from an excellent Boy Scout background. They just can’t wait to get into Boy Scouts or RAs or Awanas or something, you know. So different guys are going to be sensitive to different things.
Jonathan Leeman
But I think right there is an illustration of you did, as it were, slow yourself down, gain more human understanding so that you could moderate the pace of change more judiciously.
Consulting Older Men On How a Pastor Should Make Changes
Mark Dever
I deliberately went out with pretty much all the older men for lunch, one-on-one, just to get to know them.
Jonathan Leeman
During that three months in which you weren’t preaching?
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
Quickly, pause on the old man. What was the three months not preaching?
Mark Dever
When we had agreed that I would come, I asked them, would they mind if I just had a few months where I just sat in the services and kind of got my family settled in America. We were moving from England. Asked if they’d mind if I got my family settled in the house and routines for school and just got to know them better, watched how they did things so I could kind of learn their idiom. I’m sure I didn’t put it like that to them, but so that I could learn their idiom and be able to speak.
Jonathan Leeman
Their culture.
Mark Dever
Yeah, be able to speak in a way that I would more likely be offending them when I meant to rather than when I didn’t mean to.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah. Okay. Back to the old men. You went out with the old men during that time.
Mark Dever
Just trying to find out where all the, you know, good restaurants were, you know. Because old men and me, the guys born, these guys would all have been born in like the 19 teens. Well, except Charlie, he’d been born like 1900.
Jonathan Leeman
Goodness.
Wednesday Night Dinners
Mark Dever
But they’re 19 teens because I’m meeting in the 1990s. They’re all in their late 70s, early 80s. And we all have the same kind of taste in foods. It was great. You know, black eyed pea, here we come. So Boston Market, I mean, it was just, that’s right where I live. So, and I would just get their testimonies, get to know them and they would feel loved and appreciated being listened to.
And they were being loved and appreciated, but they would also feel that, and it would feel different than when I say something, if I like trying to change the Wednesday night dinner. We had pot, well, they weren’t potluck, they were paid dinners cooked by Cleveland, that his rolls were excellent. You know, we paid Cleveland, not much, like $10,000 a year at the time to come in on Wednesday nights and cook the dinner.
Jonathan Leeman
Well, for where the budget was at and where the church was.
Mark Dever
Oh, we had under a $300,000 budget. So you’re talking about more than 1/30th of our budget was that little meal every week.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
And that’s like more than one three, yeah. So that was not great.
Jonathan Leeman
That’s a mission commitment.
Mark Dever
Yeah. Well, that was bigger. Our mission commitments tend to be about $500 a month, or year. So to have $10,000 a year was bigger than any of our mission commitments at the time.
Jonathan Leeman
So you just changed that one?
Mark Dever
Well, that would be an example. That one I waited a couple of years on. But just looking at the budget, I knew we were losing money. We just cannot keep funding this. So I put the question to the members, and I don’t know if you were here by then, if you remember this at all, it was in the main hall.
Jonathan Leeman
Uh I don’t..
Mark Dever
If we had a members meeting, I think it’s a good idea for us to kill the Wednesday night dinners, which we had before the prayer meeting or the Wednesday night Bible study. So six to seven was dinner, seven to eight was the Bible study. And their concern was if you kill that, then nobody will come. And I said, well, we won’t get the people who want the dinner, but we might get the people who want the Bible study.
They might still come. And so this is not a vote on whether you like the Wednesday night dinners. We all like the Wednesday night dinners. Connie loved them. And we didn’t have to worry about cooking dinner for the family right before Bible study. It was great. But it’s just a matter of is this the best thing for us to do with our money. And that’s where we just decided as a church, no.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
You are, I think a lot of people who don’t know you have the impression that you’re a straight shooter. You’re not afraid of conflict if it’s necessary. But there is a conflict
Mark Dever
Pretty conflict averse.
Jonathan Leeman
But there is a conflict averse element to you.
Mark Dever
Oh yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
Kind of going back to the not going to pick a fight if you don’t have to.
Mark Dever
Right.
Jonathan Leeman
Only when you have to.
Mark Dever
Right.
Jonathan Leeman
Do you think the advice that guys often give or hear, change nothing in your first year, is good advice?
Mark Dever
No, I don’t think that’s good advice. Because guys give us these words that are just absolutely horrendous. And one of the reasons there’s needed to be a new pastor at the church is because some of those things that need to change. So no, that’s too broad. Now, if you only have two speeds, change everything or change nothing, OK, go for the change nothing. But I’m going to assume we got a lot of different speeds in there. And I’d be, I think, I think literally saying “changing nothing”, that’s I don’t want to make you feel guilty for doing some hard, good work that needs to be done when it goes to a place.
Because he can begin preaching expositionally and people could give him, you know, negative feedback from that when his servants may be OK. But they just really don’t like the word. They’re not that interested in it. They’re not hungry for it. So I think in his first year, I’m quite happy for the pastor to be preaching scripture, even if that’s not what they’re used to.
Jonathan Leeman
Sure. Is there a particular guy, kind of guy who pushes things too quickly?
Mark Dever
Um…
Jonathan Leeman
It’s not obvious to me there’s an answer to that, but I thought I’d ask it.
Mark Dever
Yeah, no, I don’t have an obvious answer to that either. I mean, they’re going to tend to be somebody who will speak more quickly.
Jonathan Leeman
I mean, we all know some personalities are a little more bold.
Mark Dever
Yeah.
The Importance of Knowing Yourself As a Pastor
Jonathan Leeman
And you need to know yourself.
Mark Dever
Yeah, I can think of one person who’s been here as an intern who told me about somebody else that they weren’t qualified to be a pastor. And I’m pretty sure after he’s been a pastor five years, he’s not going to speak with quite that heavy a foot.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
You know, I love the instinct and the basic direction may or may not have been correct. I love his willingness to step. I like that. But the firmness with which he assumed that and said that as if I also knew that. Yeah, time will change that. You’ll see God do more things that he wouldn’t have planned or assumed from what he knew.
Jonathan Leeman
Well, that’s some of the fuzzification,
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
Fuzzing of the old man, which can be helpful.
The Importance Of Having A Clear Vision When Making Change
Mark Dever
Yes. Now at the same time, you want an acuity. So if there’s no acuity vision when you start, you probably shouldn’t even go into the pastorate. You’ve got to have a clear vision of what needs to go on or else you’ll just get pulled into non-action. You know.
Jonathan Leeman
Or wrong action.
Mark Dever
Yeah, or drift with wrong action.
Jonathan Leeman
Does a business or programmatic mindset make one push things too quickly?
Mark Dever
Well, again, not necessarily. Could do if you’re only taking into account, can this get done? Yes, it can get done if you’re not more naturally taking into account some of the emotional cost or the relational cost or just other kinds of prices that you pay for things.
Jonathan Leeman
Well, I think what occurs to me, what’s behind that question?
Mark Dever
If I’ve got a brother who has a business background, I like that.
Jonathan Leeman
Of course.
Mark Dever
They probably know how to get some things done. They probably know how to work with people.
What Should A New Pastor Focus on?
Jonathan Leeman
At the same time, what’s behind that question is the recognition that your church is more like a family and less like a business.
Mark Dever
That’s right. That’s very true. And that’s well said, brother. That’s helpful.
Jonathan Leeman
And I know my children take a long time to grow and mature and to gain new understandings. And know, pastoring is more like raising children than it is like mergers and acquisitions.
Mark Dever
That’s right.
Jonathan Leeman
Or whatever the case is. What should a pastor give himself to especially in the first year?
Mark Dever
Praying and preaching, and evangelizing, and discipling.
Jonathan Leeman
And handing out books.
Mark Dever
Part of the discipling.
Jonathan Leeman
You also had people in to teach in your first year.
Mark Dever
I did, though that was not a lot and that was more just for the fun of having friends around and I was in DC, people were coming through anyway. So.
Prioritizing Changes in Preaching
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah. Why is preaching the main thing, teaching the main thing you should give yourself to in that first year?
Mark Dever
Well, because that’s when the church assembles. The main thing that they will do when they assemble, as far as the longest single amount of time, it won’t be watching baptisms and having the Lord’s Supper. It could be praying. It probably is not going to be singing. It won’t be offering.
Jonathan Leeman
You’re not going to change the singing.
Mark Dever
No, I’m just trying to think what do you spend the most time? It’s listening to the sermon.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
That’s what you’re going to spend more time than anything else doing.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah. So that is literally the main time the church is together in terms of lion’s share of actual minutes passed. And you want to make sure that that which is generative, seminal, which creates the word the word preached as your new excellent book “The Word Centered Church” makes clear- you want to make sure that that is as… I don’t know if I quite want to say as good as you can do it, but, but you do try to do a very good job with that.
Focus On the People
Jonathan Leeman
Well, it also occurs to me that if the church is the people
Mark Dever
Yeah
Jonathan Leeman
You can put artificial structures on top of them, but fundamentally as New Covenant believers, we’re pastoring for heart change.
Mark Dever
Right.
Jonathan Leeman
So, you know, structure or not, whatever, what I need is people whose hearts want the right things.
Mark Dever
I need Jeanette to want to evangelize her Muslim neighbors.
Jonathan Leeman
Right. And so you’re teaching Jeanette about the gospel
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
And about evangelism so that she is choosing to do it.
Mark Dever
Loving her, encouraging her. I mentioned things in my own life that went on today that Connie said that, oh, she’s probably right. Just for seeing me soft before the Lord and pliable and just in a hundred different ways.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah. So if the changes aren’t actually coming from the people themselves, there’s a sense in which you’re missing the whole point.
Mark Dever
Well, I don’t know coming from the people themselves.
Jonathan Leeman
Well, my point – that’s what I mean. You’re teaching, they’re changing, they’re growing.
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
It’s emerging from them through your teaching.
Mark Dever
Hopefully I’m changing, growing and hopefully I am sharing some things in ways that they’ll hear without being defensive and will be encouraged by good example and testimonies too.
Should Pastors Deliberately Build Relationships With Disagreeable People?
Jonathan Leeman
Speaking of defensiveness, did you deliberately set out to build relationships with those who were disagreeable or disagreed?
Mark Dever
You know, I don’t know that, I think my short answer to that is no. I don’t know that we had a group of people who were disagreeable to me. A few people had voted against me coming as the pastor, but they weren’t any kind of party in the church. When I came, I think most people had goodwill toward me and wanted me to do well.
And, you know, various people could be difficult to deal with, over a different thing. You know, Matt, who I worked with. Well, Matt could say no to things, and that wasn’t his instinct, but sometimes he could in a way that I wouldn’t understand. But I could talk with him like a brother.
But, you know, some of the older folks, there were some of them who would tend to more say no. But again, I don’t think it was usually out of hostility. Now, a few years on, when we got to certain movements were changing the constitution to have elders, that’s where there was more, the kind of flag thing had been a precursor.
There was a more organized opposition to some change. But even that, I knew the individuals by then. I’d been here for a few years and I loved these people and most of them knew that I loved them, I think. And I didn’t, except for maybe a couple of exceptions, I didn’t feel any personal animosity from them to me. I never felt personal animosity toward any of them.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah. But doesn’t developing a relationship with them, help them follow you.
Mark Dever
Oh yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
Where they might be tempted to push back.
Mark Dever
Oh yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
So I mean there was one brother who’s going into a church and I knew that church somewhat well. And I encouraged the brother going into this church as the new senior pastor to make sure to build a friendship with Joe. Just because I knew Joe would have influence and strong opinions and a useful thing to do.
Mark Dever
Yeah. Yeah, very useful.
How to Slowly Make Change
Jonathan Leeman
Another illustration of trying to think carefully about pace of change. You wrote an article called Don’t Do It.
Mark Dever
Haha- I did.
Jonathan Leeman
Why you shouldn’t practice church discipline? I mean, are you telling pastors to disobey the Bible there?
Avoiding Church Discipline
Mark Dever
I’m telling pastors to be more concerned with their churches maturing and being able to do something than their immediate punctiliar obedience. So, if I bypass doing church discipline, and what would be good to do, in 15 cases it would be obvious if the church were healthier, but during that time I think I’m actually building the trust and doing the teaching so that the church understands what this is and is actually going to be in a position to follow me, then I think me passing up 15 egregious times, when the church has been passing them up for a hundred years anyway, 15 more of those, in order to have brought them to a place where now as a whole we really are going to do this, is probably wiser than as soon as I get there and have any levers, I use whatever levers I have to make sure we excommunicate this brother for his sin when I think that the church won’t understand what it’s doing possibly. They’ll misunderstand it. And they’ll formally do what I’m telling them, instructing them to do, but it’s just like, yeah, this is like a disaster.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah, yeah. It occurs to me, we should probably do a Pastor’s talk on leading your church in a church discipline.
Mark Dever
Yeah, yeah. Maybe that’s kind of what this one is.
Handing Out Books
Jonathan Leeman
That would be a…Well, I mean on that particular topic. Note to Alex, write that down. Tell me briefly about your philosophy of handing out books and how that’s subtly bringing change.
Mark Dever
Well.
Jonathan Leeman
How many books would you say you pass out a week?
Mark Dever
20
Jonathan Leeman
20? Are you serious?
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
When?
Mark Dever
10 on Sunday night usually.
Jonathan Leeman
10? Okay.
Mark Dever
10 Wednesday night usually.
Jonathan Leeman
Really?
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
Does the church pay?
Mark Dever
Some weeks I’ll do five, but usually it’s 10.
Jonathan Leeman
Does the church pay for that?
Mark Dever
Yeah, basically yes.
Jonathan Leeman
So you have a budget for it?
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
What books are they?
Mark Dever
Well, last night at Bible study I gave away a copy I found at a used books store of basic writings of Jonathan Edwards. I gave away Greg Gilbert’s “Why Trust the Bible”. I gave away five copies of my book on Discipling. I gave away the book I did with Michael Lawrence on ‘It Is Well’.
Jonathan Leeman
On the Atonement.
Mark Dever
Yeah.
What Type Of Books Are Being Given Away?
Jonathan Leeman
What kind of books are you giving away?
Mark Dever
I’m just trying to give away stuff that I think Christians will find helpful and up-building. Maybe a devotional I give out, maybe Matthew Henry’s ‘Way to Pray’, I give out two copies of that. A Band of Truths just republished. Classics by Packer, Knowing God, Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God.
Jonathan Leeman
I’ve heard you say what you’re not giving out is also.
Mark Dever
Yeah, they’ll notice there never is a title by Joel Osteen. There never is a title by, you know, Joyce Meyer. There never is a title by TD Jakes. There never is a title by… I can just keep going.
Jonathan Leeman
Do you give away books only when you agree with everything in them?
Mark Dever
No. But probably pretty close. Puritan paperbacks- give them away all the time from Banner of Truth. Martin Luther stuff I give away. Roland Bainton “Here I Stand” gave away a copy of Sunday Night. Biography.
Jonathan Leeman
And what are you hoping to accomplish with this?
Why You Should Give Out Books?
Mark Dever
Well, you know, Ryan last night took the copy of Why I Trust the Bible. He said he’ll talk to me about it by Labor Day. He’ll get it done and talk to me about it by then. So there’s one brother in our church hopefully instructed and built up.
But you know, I gave away 10 copies last night of books. So Lord willing there be 10 brothers and sisters who are instructed and built up. Furthermore, everybody in that room heard the names of the authors and everybody in that room heard the names of the books.
And just doing that once, I don’t know how much effect it had. It’d be good for those 10 people, mildly good for people. But if it’s every Sunday night, drip, drip, drip, every Wednesday night, and I’ve been doing it not for a year, but 20 some odd years, well, it just begins to affect the church.
It’s a whole other way that, you know, even if most of the people in your church aren’t readers, you know, if I got, If I’ve got out of a thousand people a pool of a hundred who tend to read books, so 10% of them, that’s not bad because they have friendships with the others. They tend to affect them.
Jonathan Leeman
I was about to say, but Mark, you’re in Washington, DC, you have a “read-y” congregation.
Mark Dever
Yeah.
Jonathan Leeman
And you’re saying, ‘doesn’t matter’.
Mark Dever
Does not matter at all. That is an excuse. An excuse. I could tell you about people here who had little education, who start to read. I can tell you about people in other churches where they go, ‘oh, we don’t have a reading culture here’. It’s like, yeah, I understand. You know. Started giving me out books, it was just amazing.
I remember being told by this guy who I won’t call his name, he may listen to these, he is now up in Maine. When I first tried to give him a book, he just thought I was crazy. He was the kind of guy who worked on engines.
He said, “I don’t read”. And I said, “well, I’m sorry, can you read”? “Well, yeah, I can read”. Ah, well, here, this is a short book. I want you to read this and let’s get back and we’ll talk about it. And slowly but surely he just began to read. And it just like, I just don’t take not reading as an answer.
Jonathan Leeman
We’re about out of time, but I got to get these in. Three different areas of things you might change. Helping guys have some sense of triage here.
Mark Dever
Like you got to go into a church?
Jonathan Leeman
When you go into a church.
How To Build Church Membership
Mark Dever
Well, the preaching that you’re responsible for immediately, how you take in members, gigantically important, and often not that cared about by members of the church. Now, specific examples they’ll care about that you’ll hit and step on like a mine. But the process. as a whole, they’ll think that’s the pastor’s purview anyway. So how you take in members.
Jonathan Leeman
By that you mean I need to be able to sit down with them and have a conversation with them, interview them, membership classes.
Mark Dever
Need to make sure they believe some things and they understand some things. They intend to live certain ways.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah, those things I’m changing around. And what I’m preaching, I’m going to do.
Mark Dever
That’s pretty much it.
Changing Church Documents
Jonathan Leeman
What about statement of faith stuff?
Mark Dever
Well, I wouldn’t go to a church if you don’t agree with the statement of faith.
Jonathan Leeman
Let’s say it’s too narrow or it’s too broad.
Mark Dever
I wouldn’t go there if you don’t agree with the statement of faith.
Jonathan Leeman
You came here and there was stuff that you didn’t like.
Mark Dever
In the statement of faith?
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah, about alcohol.
Mark Dever
That was not in the statement of faith, that was in the church covenant.
Jonathan Leeman
Church documents.
Mark Dever
Well, there’s a big difference between the constitution of covenant and the statement of faith.
Jonathan Leeman
Right. Okay. Let’s say in the church documents then.
Mark Dever
Okay.
Jonathan Leeman
Let me stick on statement of faith. Let’s just say it’s too expansive. It’s too broad. There’s too many things that you don’t think we should have to agree upon. Like you agree with everything in it.
Mark Dever
Uh-huh.
Jonathan Leeman
You know, it’s a 1689 or something.
Mark Dever
Right. OK.
Jonathan Leeman
You just don’t think we need to be able to divide the body.
Mark Dever
Yeah. And then I think then I would represent to them, love the statement, think it probably is too prescriptive of what you really need for church membership. That’s because this was really just a revision of a Presbyterian document, which is written as an Anglican document, which is really just explaining what the bishops would teach, not what any individual communicant had to believe. So this was not written for a congregational setting.
How Quickly Do You Push Change?
Jonathan Leeman
How quickly would you push to change it though?
Mark Dever
Just depends on the weather in the church, man.
Jonathan Leeman
How quickly would you push to change things in the church covenant that you think were legalistic
Mark Dever
Again, depends on the weather in the church. I’m not going to be very helpful to you there.
Jonathan Leeman
Church structure stuff, moving to elders, installing members meetings.
Mark Dever
People are often more attached to what they do than what they believe. Just practically, just like don’t say bad things about Jesus, but on the whole, if you stop doing the picnic committee that’s taking care of the Memorial Day picnic for the last 70 years, that may be a bigger deal than whether or not you meet on Sunday or Saturday or whether or not you sing hymns or not or whether or not you have a guitar in the service or not.
I mean, it’s just, you just never know depending on where you are, what things are gonna cause people conniptions. And your understanding of definite atonement may not bother them nearly so much as the idea you had of canceling the Labor Day picnic.
Jonathan Leeman
Yeah.
Mark Dever
So you’ve just got to be very careful about whose bunions you’re stepping on.
Jonathan Leeman
Bunions?
Mark Dever
Yeah. As you get older, you’ll know more.
Jonathan Leeman
Any final comments, brother, on pace of change? How quickly to move, how not quickly to move?
Mark Dever
It’s part of the wonderful, spectacular fun that is the pastorate. If God has called you into a church, he’ll provide counselors and wisdom and if they don’t have enough wisdom, just call Jonathan Leeman. 202-543-6111, ask for Jonathan Leeman.
Jonathan Leeman
There we go. Thank you for your time, brother.
Mark Dever
Thank you, man.
Subscribe to Pastors Talk
Pastors Talk
A weekly conversation between Jonathan Leeman and Mark Dever about practical aspects of the Christian life and pastoral ministry.
Subscribe and Listen to on: