Ministerial Martial Law
I've always found legalism to be repulsive and death-dealing, but if I were to adopt a "rule" of some kind, maybe even declare ministerial martial law...
Manipulation has no place in ministry, period. No matter how good your goal may be, it's always completely, absolutely, unquestionably sinful to use manipulation to achieve some end.
Last year, I ran into a "ministry" that used manipulation to "get people broken down so we can build them back up" -- the way it worked was that they would run a retreat, break people down through some pretty heavy tactics, and then love-bomb them into accepting a new paradigm. Some of you are now pulling at your hair and screaming "that's what cults do!", and you're absolutely correct.
Back in my Providence College days in the mid-80's, I wrote a paper for our Cults class entitled "Cultic Aspects of Fundamentalism" (NOTE: this did not make me popular with certain students and faculty, but the professor of the class gave me an "A"). I wrote it after reading a check-list in Moody Monthly's magazine that listed "eight sure-fire markers of a cult" and I couldn't help but notice that six of the eight markers could be applied to many youth ministry models that I had seen. So, I wrote the paper to point out that, if we really believe that what we believe is the Truth, then our methodology had better be on a much higher level of integrity than the cults on which we are looking down.
The ministry that I encountered last year was an eye-opener. I had quite a long discourse with the pastor who was leading these retreats. He told me that half of his congregation had been through them, all of his leadership team, and -- here's where I get upset as a 20-year veteran of youth ministry -- all of the youth. It was basically an ingrained part of their church culture. Near the end of our two-hour dialogue, he admitted, "Yes, it's highly manipulative, but it's to a good end, so that's okay."
Wrong.
(sort of along the lines of "don't ever do this or you will be shot for treason")...it would be this:
Manipulation has no place in ministry, period. No matter how good your goal may be, it's always completely, absolutely, unquestionably sinful to use manipulation to achieve some end.
Last year, I ran into a "ministry" that used manipulation to "get people broken down so we can build them back up" -- the way it worked was that they would run a retreat, break people down through some pretty heavy tactics, and then love-bomb them into accepting a new paradigm. Some of you are now pulling at your hair and screaming "that's what cults do!", and you're absolutely correct.
Back in my Providence College days in the mid-80's, I wrote a paper for our Cults class entitled "Cultic Aspects of Fundamentalism" (NOTE: this did not make me popular with certain students and faculty, but the professor of the class gave me an "A"). I wrote it after reading a check-list in Moody Monthly's magazine that listed "eight sure-fire markers of a cult" and I couldn't help but notice that six of the eight markers could be applied to many youth ministry models that I had seen. So, I wrote the paper to point out that, if we really believe that what we believe is the Truth, then our methodology had better be on a much higher level of integrity than the cults on which we are looking down.
The ministry that I encountered last year was an eye-opener. I had quite a long discourse with the pastor who was leading these retreats. He told me that half of his congregation had been through them, all of his leadership team, and -- here's where I get upset as a 20-year veteran of youth ministry -- all of the youth. It was basically an ingrained part of their church culture. Near the end of our two-hour dialogue, he admitted, "Yes, it's highly manipulative, but it's to a good end, so that's okay."
Wrong.
posted by Robbymac at
4:47 AM
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