- We have been invited by passers-by to visit their church on Sunday–after telling them we pastored a congregation. (This has happened more than once.)
- A local mega-church pastor, who knew who we were, once openly tried to recruit one of our college girls to leave our house church and come to his mega-church.
- While attending an Easter pageant at one of the larger churches in town, our teenage son was approached by a grinning church volunteer who shoved a tract in his hand, apparently assuming he was not a Christian because he was not dressed like a typical youth-grouper.
- I have known two different pastors in two different states who were voted in by the church board, and then were locked out of the building when the pastors refused to play politics or be manipulated. (One had the contents of his office dumped in the parking lot.) In both cases, the majority of the congregation followed the new pastor out of the church and helped him start another one, while the stubborn church boards got stuck with the mortgage. 🙂
- The day we launched this church (before we morphed into a house church), our very first visitor was a young guy in a three-piece suit who called himself “Jeremiah” and identified himself as a “prophet to the nations.” He told us he operated in all of the five-fold gifts. He had snuck out of a nearby mega-church to come check us out, apparently thinking he might find a ground-floor ministry opportunity.
- One of our folks had a waitress at a restaurant tell him she was going into ministry because “there was good money in it, if you tell people what they want to hear.” She then tried to hit on him, knowing he was married.
- One Sunday morning, one of our ladies who was preganant got morning sick while stopping at an apartment complex to pick someone up for church. As she bent over on the lawn, a lady ran up to her, tried to cast the devil out of her, handed her a brochure for her church, and walked away without another word. (It was the same church where my son had been handed the tract.)
Can you relate? Got any crazy church stories to tell?
Wayward Son
Musician. Composer. Recovering perfectionist. Minister-in-transition. Lover of puns. Hijacker of rock song references. Questioner of the status quo.
I'm not really a rebel. Just a sincere Christ-follower with a thirst for significance that gets me into trouble. My quest has taken me over the fence of institutional Christianity. Here are some of my random thoughts along the way. Read along, join in the conversation. Just be nice.
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I lived in Tulsa, OK, went to ORU, so yes I can relate 🙂
heh, heh…
oh geepers i got a bunch..
how about my ex pastor was trying to help my wife divorce me because i “committed spiritual adultery” by question his authority?
or because i said the congregation needs to know the youth pastor had an inappropriate relationship with an underage teen girl i did not understand covering…
sad, so sad…
appreciate ya
Brother Frankie
BFC
Jeff,
Ha ha ha! Sigh…some of these are just, so sad. Especially the one about the gal giving the tract to the pregnant woman. How unrelational. She could have easily gone up to the woman, asked her what was wrong, if she needed anything, and found out why she was sick.
Anyway, I love this picture of you, Jeff! Smiles 🙂
Blessings,
~Amy 🙂
Jeff –
I have to share this one even though it didn’t happen to me personally. A friend of mine (who was a youth pastor at the same time I was) told me this story on the way back from a Third Day Concert that our youth groups had gone to together. This is the story as he related it to me…
Hey, you know that church across the street from yours? (Jeff, you know the one I am referring to.) I dated a girl during high school who went there. I visited her church one Sunday morning. About half way through the service they had some lady up front praying for her. While they were praying, she suddenly just took off running around the sanctuary. She made about two good laps, with some pastors and ushers chasing her, when she failed to make a corner, ran into the wall, and fell out on the floor. The girl leaned over to me and said, “She just got slain in the Spirit.” I told her, “No…she just ran into a wall.”
I couldn’t remember if I had to you that one or now, Jeff.
Jeff,
It’s definitely sad how messed up church people can be!!
It’s also sad how lost people can see through the game of how to get rich in ministry, better than the people who are being gamed by it.
Blessings,
Gary
I on several occasions had some folks from a rather large fundamentalist church at my door trying to convert me – even after I told them I was on staff at a church in town. They would continually drop by while “soul-winning” in my neighborhood and try to get me to pray the “sinner’s prayer” with them. Good times…
BTW – Jeff, I like the pic – is that your “confused St. Francis” pose?
Tulsa does seem to have it’s craziness.
My friend went to a Church that wanted you to throw up in a bucket to get rid of sins. Never was sure what THAT was about.
One of my personal favorites was the “beating Church” I think in Jenks or Glenpool. Made the papers after a guy showed up at work with such injuries that it frightened his coworkers.
I wonder why we can’t just be regular folks?