Sexuality and Gender

I don’t want to have a series of posts on relationships that neglects an important one: That of pastor and congregant.

I have never been a pastor.  I never want to be one.  I don’t even want to be married to one.  It isn’t because of the education, training, and hard work required to become a pastor.  It’s because I don’t want to be in the position of leading a congregation.

If we’re completely honest, most of us have no real idea how to relate well to our pastors.  There are several faulty ways in which we interact with our clergy:

1. Setting them on pedestals, viewing them as heroes.  The problem with this approach is that we may see our pastors as being above humanity in some way.  It is all the more crushing when they make mistakes, whether sinful or unintentional.

2. Believing the pastor is responsible for all outcomes.  In this situation, the pastor receives credit when the church is doing well.  If the church is growing, the pastor is praised for bringing in more people.  If the ministries are thriving, it’s because the pastor encourages his or her leaders in just the right way.  But just as quickly as people celebrate the pastor’s “victories,” they might turn on him or her if things begin to go downhill.  The pastor might be accused of being a poor leader, of failing to reach out, or even just of delivering lousy sermons.

3. Treating the pastor as a local celebrity.  This is different from the first mistake.  In this type of relationship, the pastor becomes the star of church news.  In other words, gossip.  Just like people read entertainment magazines to catch up on what their favorite actors and singers are doing, people want to know exactly what the pastor is up to in his or her personal life.  It becomes justified because the pastor, like a movie star, is an entity rather than a person.  This situation often affects the pastor’s spouse directly.

4. Fault-finding.  Again, this is different from ascribing to the pastor responsibility for all things.  Fault-finders simply look for negative things to hound the pastor about.  It can range from minutiae (the drippy sink in the second floor ladies’ bathroom, the crack in the floor tile third from the wall outside the sanctuary) to the unrelated (the broken link in the prayer telephone tree) to the ridiculous (the national debt).  Some people really just like to complain.

5. Wanting the pastor to meet your every need.  There are congregants who simply cannot, or will not, find someone else to lean on.  These are people who make three appointments a week to meet with the pastor for “spiritual care.”  Naturally, if a pastor provides the service of counseling, there will be people who require it.  That is not what I mean here.  I am talking about the people who rush to the front of the greeting line after the Sunday service and hold everyone up by rehashing their entire week.  People who simply suck up the pastor’s time and energy and leave little for anyone else.

Given all of that, I wonder how pastors can ever feel as though they trust the very people they are leading.

The good news is, we can avoid those relational traps.  We can extend the same grace to our pastors that we ourselves want and need.  We can understand that we, the congregants, are just as responsible for the church’s outcomes as the pastor.  We can keep our mouths shut about non-essentials (like what the pastor’s wife wore yesterday) and speak privately and directly to the pastor about things that do matter.  We can look for the good rather than the bad when it comes to non-spiritual issues.  And we can reduce the pastor’s burden by being the love that someone else needs.

My husband and I just celebrated our 14th anniversary.  Sometimes, I simply can’t believe how privileged I am to be married to my husband.  That’s not to say we are perfect or that our relationship is perfect.  I just can’t imagine life without this wonderful man by my side.

These days, marriage seems so expendable.  We live in an age when so much of our lives can be used, tossed, and replaced.  We have disposable dishes, razors, and diapers.  We use pre-packaged consumables.  Even our correspondence, such as texts and e-mails, can be readily eliminated at the stroke of a key.  Sadly, we seem to be treating marriage the same way.  Even more unfortunately, the church often seems to turn a blind eye.

I think part of the problem is that no one wants to hear the truth:  Marriage takes work and it isn’t always going to be candy hearts and long-stem roses, and there are no easy solutions to making it work.  We seem to want to have it all.  We want romance, mystery, and passion.  We want steady companionship.  We want to read books on relationships and have everything fall into place.  When those things don’t work out the way we were expecting, we tend to treat the relationship as just another item for the trash heap.

Those books on marriage don’t always help, either.  They are often full of statements about what women or men are like, which may or may not match reality.  I get very tired of hearing about what I, as a wife, am supposed to “need.”  Often, my husband and I don’t see ourselves in those types of books or messages.  One reason for that is that people are much more varied.  It would be much more useful if the authors of advice for couples would recommend getting to know what your partner is actually like, rather than a generalization about “most” men or women.  Al classic example of this would be the (in my opinion, highly outdated) Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus.  My husband and I used to joke that perhaps we were from both Mars and Venus, or possibly neither.

Another issue clouding marriage is the way Christians hold up a “Biblical” standard for marriage.  Most marriage-themed messages focus on the concepts of submission, leading the family with love, and Proverbs 31.  While none of those things are specifically bad, there is a certain underlying code which all good Christians are supposed to follow in their marriages.  The problem is, no one seems to be able to actually translate the code into real-life terms.  I can recall, when I was a teenager, asking some of the adults at church what an example of “submission” would be.  I was told that it meant that if a husband had a “call” from God, the wife was expected to follow along and trust her husband.  If she felt the call, on the other hand, then she was to “confirm” it with her husband and they could determine what to do.  This has never been how my husband and I interact.  If he tells me he is hearing God speak, I trust that—but the same holds true if I say it.  When we need to make any kind of decision, we talk and share as partners.  We are utterly equal in our relationship.  This extends to everything, including household duties.  It’s true I stay home with the kids, but this is more practical than traditional.  He simply earns more money.  Had it been reversed, I would have been the one working outside the home.  Honestly, I think he would have loved being a stay-at-home dad.

In the end, I think what we need is not a more narrow, specific definition of the marital relationship.  We need a broader vision of what it means to be partners in our homes.  We also need to develop the desire to really know our partners, instead of relying on our own imaginings or those of the relational self-help authors.

Recently, some friends let me know that what I have written has really stretched them and given them things to think about.  Besides being flattered that I’ve made an impression, I also feel a sense that I am on the right track.  I hope that I can continue to help people grow.  In that vein, I hope that my next several posts will encourage people to think deeply about the way we interact with each other and what it means to wear our internal faith on the outside.  I’m blogging a series of posts about the ways we deal with others in our relationships–friendship, marriage, and reaching out to others even when that may challenge our preconceived ideas.

I’m going to start by telling you something about myself.  I make hash of my relationships all the time.  I don’t mean that I occasionally forget to call my BFF back or that I speak sharply to the kids out of frustration or I forget my husband’s birthday (although I have done all of those things).  I mean that I can be a nag to my family, I have a wicked temper, and sometimes I come off as uncaring, disinterested, and/or self-absorbed.  I have left so many relational messes that it would take several filing cabinets to hold notes on all the sordid details.  I am often completely clueless when it comes to dealing with other people.

Why am I explaining all this?  Trust me, it’s not to drum up sympathy or unload my guilt.  First, I want to make it clear that I am as human as the next person.  Sometimes it can be too easy to fool ourselves into believing that there are not actually people behind the posts we read, particularly if the blogger is exhorting us to live more fully Christian lives.  It’s the same thing that happens to pastors, leaders, teachers, and parents.  Second, even though I make mistakes, there are still things I have to offer.  I learn and grow by reading and listening to what others have to say when it comes to my own weak points.  I hope that what I offer does the same.  Like me, you may wonder if your transgressions might stand in the way of leading or teaching others.  I can assure you that is not the case—you, too, have much to offer.  If I share what I know in the areas where I don’t struggle with you, perhaps you will do the same for me.

One of the reasons we all struggle to navigate the waters of relationships is that relating always involves—wait for it—other people.  (I know, that’s a shocker.  We all thought we were doing it in a vacuum.)  It is impossible to see what is going on inside someone else’s brain.  We have to rely entirely on the other person for verbal and non-verbal signals.  For some of us, this comes fairly naturally.  Some people are extroverts, drawing their strength from relating to and being around others.  They read social cues readily and are usually well equipped to carry out societal norms.  For others of us, relationships are infinitely more problematic.  Introverts, while not necessarily shy, don’t thrive on social energy.  Some people, even if not introverted, have difficulty interpreting social cues.  Reading the cues is, at its worst, frustrating and exhausting.  The results can be disastrous.

No matter which end of the relational spectrum you tend towards, we all need to think carefully about the way we treat other people.  We may not have control over personality traits that influence how we find our way in love and friendship.  What we can control is the way that we conduct ourselves.  We have absolute power over our actions and words.  Learning to speak and act in a Christ-like fashion is the first step toward improving our interactions with others.