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Power corrupts

By Hedgehog.

The saying goes that “power corrupts, and absoluter power corrupts absolutely”. Sadly nowhere is that more true than in the life of the local church.

A friend was telling me recently about a little local difficulty in his church. One of the elders was becoming increasingly frail, and was eventually encouraged to stand down, only to take up a position on the sidelines from which he criticised (both loudly and publicly) the work of his replacement and the minister. The crunch came when the retired elder persuaded a member of his family (the organist) to threaten to resign unless the minister allowed him to choose the hymns and play them as he wished. The minister (fortunately) was too experienced to fall into that trap and accepted the resignation! The resulting explosion of fury was both unpleasant and counter-productive as the congregation divided in their opinion as to whether the minister had done the right thing.

As it happens, that story had a satisfactory - if not happy - ending. The minister rode out the storm and many of those who had taken sides against him came to see that they had been manipulated.

But why in heaven’s name do we play these power games in church life? After all, we claim to be followers of a Saviour who refused all invitations to seek power or to abuse the power he had. This is being written in the early days of Lent, and I’m once again astonished by the story of the temptations of Christ in the wilderness. Faced with an open invitation to grasp and use power, Jesus refuses to play the game, and does so apparently without any certainty that his powerlessness would be the very thing which has led to the wonder of the Christian religion.

And that same Saviour was later crucified, perhaps the greateset demonstration of powerlessness in all the world's religions. So we really have no excuse for playing these power games in the church, for every attempt to grasp power and to control is a denial of the Lord we profess.

I am reminded of the wise words of a college friend of mine when, nearly 20 years ago, I was telling him about a crisis in my own church. He said: “Remember this: when there is any dispute in the church, it’s all and always about power”. My experience then and since has been that he was absolutely right. Then and there I made then a decision to which I have stuck firmly ever since: when someone offers their resignation, I always accept it, although often with regret. Why do I always accept? Because there are only two reasons people offer to resign. Either they genuinely do want to stop doing that job and perhaps do something else instead; or they are trying to manipulate me or someone else. If the former is true, then it is pastorally sensible to allow them the space they clearly desire. If the latter, then it is equally pastorally sensible to deny them the power they are trying to take.

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