When and Why to Leave Your Church (Part 2)

In my last post I began a consideration of why people leave their churches, which came from a recent Voices of Faith question. I identified three general categories of reasons, Economic, Theological, and Personal. We had gotten through the first two but need still to deal with personal reasons people leave churches.

Personal

These are almost always the least well-supported reasons for leaving a church.
Before getting too deep into this let me identify two main types of relationships that people have with their home churches today.
One is the traditional relationship in which you bind yourself to a congregation by the taking of membership vows and voluntarily place yourself under the spiritual authority of a local body and its elders.
The other is the laid-back 21st century American non-committal type of church relationship. Many churches, especially non-denominational churches simply don't have a membership, or the idea of membership is very loose. People come and go as their appetites change, and the leadership of the church does not pay too much (if any) attention to it. And church discipline is not even on the radar. A comparison of these two will have to wait for another time. Let me simply say that the second option, as popular as it is, makes proper, biblical functioning of the church body and its ruling body nearly impossible. But lets return to people leaving their church. 
Once you have joined yourself to a congregation and placed yourself under the care of that church and its elders (assuming the first model of church membership mentioned above), it should only be for the most serious of reasons that you would be willing to break the vows you made when you joined, which fall into the two previous categories, economic or theological.
Unfortunately, we have stood this on its head in the church. Staying with or leaving a church for theological or doctrinal reasons rarely happens (most people have very little idea of what their church believes, unfortunately), and personal preferences become the most important things in people's minds.
And just what are these personal reasons that have become paramount in the thinking of many? Let me list just a few:

The pastor preaches too long, too short, too doctrinally.
The service is too long, has too many prayers, too few songs, or the songs are too lively, too slow, too whatever.
There are not enough programs for my children. For my spouse.
There is not enough parking, the seats are uncomfortable. Another congregation member was rude to me or my kids.
The pastor or the elders call me too often, not often enough.
Or, heaven forbid, the pastor or the elders have approached me about a sin and dared to point out to me that I as a Christian must flee from it. Adults, as it turns out, don't like discipline any more than teenagers do, and are just as apt to run to their room and slam the door. Regardless of the fact that if the elders aren't confronting us with sin then they are not doing their job as God has called them. If people today had a correct idea of the church and a true understanding of how it should function, people would be more likely (and more justified) to leave a church if the elders did not approach them, than if they did. Imagine that!

I could go on and on, but generally, these problems come down to this, I am not being accommodated as I feel I should be.

These are the reasons that people most often leave a church, and it is a sad thing. This mindset contributes to, and has to a large degree arisen from, the "church growth" mindset that the church is more of a country club and the focus of a church is on providing whatever the members say that they want.
You've likely heard this before, but it is true, the church is less like a country club than it is like a hospital, and what drives a church (or what should drive a church) is what is necessary, really necessary, for the spiritual health of its people, people who are committed to being there for the long term, for the full "course of treatment." The marching orders for the pastor and the elders of a church come from the pages of scripture, not from the latest poll. Christ is the head of the church, not me, not you. And that is good. Because he knows what is best for us. And we need to submit to that, not be ready to run, when the pastor gets to know me a little too well, to the church down the street where I can be anonymous.

So, people leave churches for a variety of reasons, some good, most not. Why do you attend the church you do? What were your priorities in choosing the church you attend? What would cause you to leave? Really considering these questions and answering them honestly to yourself can be very revealing regarding what you really think of the church.

Pastor Gene