Life is a journey. But no one ever tells you that every journey includes gnats and mosquitoes. Let’s take a road trip.
March 1997—I’m leading worship in my church when a man filled with more than just the Spirit approaches me after the service with a prophetic utterance about me. (I don’t attend a church where this stuff happens.) He puts his hand on my forehead and pushes. I don’t fall over. I don’t know that I’m supposed to. I now have a massive headache. He walks away, convinced that I’m not full of the Spirit.
January 2001—I’m leading worship in my church, and we’re finishing a four-song worship set. As I set my guitar on its stand, a woman in the front row flips me off. I keep walking off stage. She confronts me after the service, “I wasn’t done worshipping yet!” So she did what any frustrated Christian would do, she gave me the bird.
September 2005—I’m leading worship in my church and the bass player misses his cue to come in. There is no bass. I look back, and he has vomited on the stage. He has crawled off stage, and is lying on the floor. People are staring at me. The lyrics to “God of Wonders” seem to get lost.
March 2008—I’m leading worship in my church as the seven-year-old daughter of our drummer runs onto the stage during the announcements and screams, “Daddy! Daddy! I’m gonna be sick!” Her father gets up and escorts her off stage. The pastor, who’s making the announcements, does the worst thing he could ever do—nothing. He acts like nothing happened, and keeps going.
Something awful happens to everyone who begins a staff relationship with a church. The very minute we start receiving financial compensation for our work, we begin pretending our spiritual status is a bit more impressive than the normal layperson. It doesn’t stem from pride, and it’s not something we ever intend to do. On the contrary, our hearts want to help people who are needy. But in order to help them, we subtly believe that we can no longer be needy ourselves. It is, in our estimation, a necessity of ministering to “real” people. But the paradoxical sting comes in that very moment, when we ourselves become something less than real.
This attitude begins in a very mild state. At first, it’s really no big deal. But left unchecked over the years, it grows. The chasm between authenticity and superficiality widens. We begin to exhibit an attitude of spiritual superiority. For some, our jobs depend on it; we could actually get fired if we admitted that our lives aren’t spotless. For others, self-disclosure is uncomfortable, so we don’t go there. Still others fain transparency, speaking publicly of past sin issues, but never disclosing current ones.
Back to my journey, events like the ones I’ve described were not just pain-in-the-butt things that randomly happened. They were events that God allowed to happen to me to remind me that I am still the needy one. I am not the one in control of this grand thing we call “church.” More important, these events remind me that I’m not even in control of myself. The only thing I’m really in control of is my facade. And even that’s suspect. Our videos will go awry, our worship sets will bog down, and our sermons will fall flat, all of which leave us with a decision as to how we will respond.
It’s easy to recognize a church leader who won’t embrace the gnats and mosquitoes. They talk mostly about themselves and their unique congregations. They don’t share personal stories of struggles and pain. They slap at the mosquitoes while denying their very presence. They talk about numbers, not grace. Their offices are filled with people explaining why they failed … again.
Then there are church leaders who embrace the bugs and insects. These leaders are far more interested in who they’re talking to, rather than the person in the mirror. They willingly share stories of personal struggle and intense, painful experiences. They are soft. They are gracious. Their email responses are more than just one sentence. Their offices are filled with broken people.
Today, I wish we would all just admit together that we, as church leaders, are as needy as the most sinful person in our congregations. We are the dysfunctional ones. We are the ones who need to be in small groups. We are the ones who need to share our faith more openly. We are the ones who need to read the Bible more, pray more, and show a lost world the kindness of Christ’s holistic compassion.
From one broken person to another, the gnats and mosquitoes are God’s gift to us. They fly into our lives to help us take off the masks we have so carefully fashioned for ourselves. In the end, we learn what it’s like to live in this beautiful vulnerability. There’s nothing else like it in the entire world.
Gary Molander lives with his wife and three daughters in Clovis, CA. Gary is the co-owner of Floodgate Productions, and leads worship at his church.