I know what I like to believe about our church, but if it’s not an objective doctrinal issue (that your old church denies and we affirm or vice versa) it is a subjective matter. ‘My last minister wasn’t very pastoral’ is hard because, much as I’d love to believe our church would be better, fact is that ‘being pastoral’ is in the eye of the beholder. If you couldn’t stay because you just didn’t feel there was enough community, exactly how much community is acceptable and what ought that to look like in practice? We might believe, along with most of our church, our community is alright, but you might have different ideas altogether. The list of possibilities is endless.

There are times when people leave churches that you can credibly tell them that a move to your place would resolve their problem. If you have joined my church because yours has started denying the trinity or have decided that they want to be known as a local ‘affirming’ church, then sure, you’ll be able to join us and not find that to be a problem. If your issue is very specifically doctrinal, and you are genuinely happy with all other aspects of your church up until that point, then you may well be fine.

But nine times out of ten, that is not the reality. Most people are not looking to move churches because of a genuine gospel issue, but tend rather to have a fringe issue writ large. Even in cases where there are some doctrinal concerns, it is unusual for that to be their only issue. In jumping ship, they are often not leaving only over a doctrinal matter but find that is but one issue among a sea of others.

The problems is that, under those circumstances, I can’t promise things will be any different with us. I know what I like to believe about our church, but if it’s not an objective doctrinal issue (that your old church denies and we affirm or vice versa) it is a subjective matter. ‘My last minister wasn’t very pastoral’ is hard because, much as I’d love to believe our church would be better, fact is that ‘being pastoral’ is in the eye of the beholder. If you couldn’t stay because you just didn’t feel there was enough community, exactly how much community is acceptable and what ought that to look like in practice? We might believe, along with most of our church, our community is alright, but you might have different ideas altogether. The list of possibilities is endless.

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