Mega-Church Pastors, A Brood of Vipers

If you want to read something that will turn your stomach, take a look at this article in Forbes Magazine. It’s about the five richest Mega-Church ministers in Nigeria. These guys are financially raping their poor parishioners and flying around the world in private jets. It is absolutely disgraceful. These words that Jesus said two thousand years ago are just as applicable today; “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.” (Matt 23:25-26).

Rich Nigerian ministers are not the only ones who are greedy and self-indulgent. Many Mega-Church pastors in the USA are living lavish lifestyles on the backs of their parishioners and ignoring basic codes of conduct and ethics. The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA) is an accreditation group that sets standards for responsible nonprofit organization stewardship; board governance, financial transparency, integrity in fundraising, and proper use of charity resources. Thank the Lord many large churches belong to this organization and follow its mandates. However, you might or might not be surprised to find out who isn’t.

Transparent finances are a must for any non-profit organization. At the bare minimum, all of the church’s financial records should be available to the membership. Apparently not for the following fabulously successful missions (link); Creflo Dollar Ministries; New Birth Missionary Baptist Church (Eddie Long), Kenneth Copeland Ministries, Without Walls International Church (Randy and Paula White). Not only can’t a parishioner and/or contributor get financial records from these organizations but the Senate Finance Committee was blown off as well. They’re not the only ones of course, they are just the most noticeable. As their ministers fly around the world in private jets, drive amazing cars and live in fabulous mansions, is it any surprise that they don’t want their people to know their compensation packages?

Ministers should not ask for donations to pay their salaries, and sell books to their contributors at the same time. This is in the covenant of standards that I signed when I because a minister. It is not ethical to make money off of the people who pay my salary. Take a look at Creflo Dollar’s bookstore website. While selling lot’s of books, there is also a request for donations. Now if either the book sales or the donations are going to a specific cause, then that is not an ethical violation. However, since the website doesn’t say where the money is going, and we don’t know the finances of this ministry, it is possible that a lot of the money is going into the man’s pockets. Big church or little, if a pastor is selling something to his/her parishioners and pocketing the money, then he/she is a total sleaze.

Many of these ministries do not release the names of the governing boards. Many of them have their employee’s sign confidentiality agreements. The Senate Finance Committee found instances of fear and intimidation when requesting information from the ministries. All of these issues raise a red flag for these churches. But the law gives non-profits a great amount of latitude. None of these ministries have broken the law, unless congress changes it.

However, you can do something about it. You can demand fiscal and ethical accountability at your church. You can demand transparency of spending and decision making. You can demand that your church acts within the guidelines of the ECFA. And if the leadership tells you to get lost, you should leave and go to a church that is run by basic ethical standards. Don’t get ripped off by wealthy ‘teachers of the law’ who are just a bunch of hypocrites.

Peace,

Pastor Bill Whitehead

Personal Ministry Versus Crystal Cathedral and Sarah Palin

The Crystal Cathedral in California, the first so-called Mega-Church, is in bankruptcy court. Too much mega-debt and not enough mega-giving. As they haggle with their creditors, Sarah Palin is traveling the northeast visiting sites associated with the founding of our country. She was at the Liberty Bell the other day, an object that is a total fraud, but makes for a nice photo-op. I’m going to use these two examples as a way to contrast what many of us think ministry is, with what ministry actually is.

The Crystal Cathedral offers so much more than our little First Baptist does. They have programs and services for everyone. They take polls and surveys and find out the needs of their constituents and address those needs with the best that money can buy. If they find out a large number of their people want special worship services for their pet Chihuahua’s, then by golly on Tuesday evenings, there will be a special worship service focused on cute little short haired dogs. However, if the people in the pews need personal ministry, that is more difficult. The professional staff is few in number, and the membership is large. The ministers can only provide personal ministry to a small percentage of the church. Volunteer ministers are called upon to reach out to the rest of the folk through small group missions. The system does work, but a lot of people just show up on Sunday and sit in the pews, and a chance to minister and be ministered to passes them by.

Famous people, like Sarah Palin, are even more distant. At the very least, a person who makes an effort can speak personally with the Senior Pastor, or one of the staff. The closest any of us can get to someone famous is a handshake on a receiving line, or ‘personal’ messages on Twitter. The cult of celebrity is creating the illusion of personal contact, without all of the messy bother of actual personal contact. Without saying whether I like her or not, I can say that she is great at establishing a bond with people without meeting them. This is not ministry, of course. But for many, like those who follow the infamous Harold Camping, the illusion of personal ministry is powerful.

But mega-celebrity is just a mega-sham. Ministry is personal. In the story of the Woman with Uncontrollable Bleeding (Luke 8:40-56), Jesus stopped his mission of mercy to a sick girl and asked the famous question – who touched me? A woman, who was healed by just touching his cloak, was sinking back into the crowd without further contact with him. Jesus insisted on speaking with her. He wanted to look her in the eye and minister to her personally. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus’ ministry is personal. He makes lots of speeches, but his most powerful ministry is doing good as he passed by.
Jesus’ handling of crowds is a different matter. The story of the miracle of the loaves and fish in the sixth chapter of John has Jesus walking away from a crowd of 5,000. He retreats to the other side of the lake for some quiet time. Some of the crowd follows him and what does he do? He scolds them by saying they are motivated by the desire for more food! Can you imagine a celebrity like Sarah Palin scolding her audience? It won’t happen, because today, numbers are everything. To Jesus, individuals mattered, numbers didn’t.

I was friends with a man for a brief time who was a big fan of a radio preacher. He thought the world of this man on the airwaves, even though he only met him once. He didn’t think so highly of me or my church family, and said so on numerous occasions. I tried my best to minister to him, but he cursed me out and disappeared. I hope he finds what he is looking for, but he was looking in the wrong place. He was looking for personal ministry, without the bother of getting along with people. Celebrities and Mega-Churches offer a lot. But ministry will always be one on one.

God bless you,

Pastor Bill