TREND:  Angry Church Members Now Turn to Blogs for Release

Orginally published on Thursday, October 05, 2006 at 6:12 AM
by Todd Rhoades

This has been on my mind for some time now... the power of the internet (blogs in particular) and the destruction they can do in the midst of church conflict. I've seen blogs pop up in many church conflicts in the past six months... Calvary of Albuquerque had a few blogs supporting the pastor who resigned (even one with a petition to get him to return). BCC in Nashville also had a few member blogs up and going on both sides of their recent conflict. Now, the huge Bellevue Baptist Church (Adrian Roger's old church) is in the midst of conflict; and guess what's fueling the fire... a person, and a blog. I was going to write at length about this subject, but found this article online... so let's start here:

Bellevue Baptist Church is on the cutting edge of a growing trend - at least when it comes to conflict. Like members from several other prominent churches nationwide, congregants at the Memphis-area megachurch are using web sites and blogs to post details about ongoing dissent within the ranks.

But do such high-tech tactics empower church members to address conflict or merely make the conflict worse while airing a church’s dirty laundry to the world?

The issue at Bellevue involves Pastor Steve Gaines and a group of longtime church members, who say he’s receiving an inappropriately high salary, is pushing the church toward an elder-led system, and has forced out a popular music director.

Others have said Gaines uses intimidation and arrogance as his main modus operandus. Still more say they feel it’s too soon to change the 30,000-member church after the 2005 death of legendary pastor Adrian Rogers. Gaines, along with a strong contingent behind him, has denied the allegations.

As part of their protest, Bellevue members created http://www.bellevuetruth.blogspot.com and savingbellevue, which includes letters from members, a transcript of an interview with a concerned deacon, and links to sites of churches in comparable straits. As of Sept. 26, the site had received more than 90,000 hits.

Across town at Germantown Baptist Church, and hundreds of miles away at Montrose Baptist Church in Rockville, Md., congregants have faced similar divisions and used similar methods to disseminate information and garner support. At First Baptist Church in Colleyville, Texas, bloggers brought scrutiny to financial dealings that led to the pastor’s resignation.

All four church conflicts involved conservative churches divided over leadership style and use of authority. But the trend to take those battles to cyberspace is not limited to conservative churches.

In Germantown, member Clark Finch helped organize savegbc to rally members against instituting elder rule at the 9,000-member church. Finch and other opponents used the anti-elder website to enlist historians, professors and laypeople to save their church “from the improper use of elders,” Finch told Associated Baptist Press (ABP). He supports “leading elders” but not “ruling elders,” a role he said constitutes a dangerous departure from biblical descriptions of the office. So far, the opposition to elder-rule has held sway.

In Rockville, confusion about financial conflicts of interest caused the apparent need for an alternative information source - a web site called “Friends of Montrose Baptist” (montrosebaptist). The site was instrumental in communication between church members during the scandal. Although pastor Ray Hope resigned in 2002 after church leaders investigated his involvement in recruiting students to attend the church’s school, the web site still posts chats, news and reviews for “those who have been wacked-upside-the-head [sic] with the 2x4 of spiritual abuse, but still love God.”

Blog and web site proponents claim they need the online vehicle to level the playing field. The technology lets them publish information - like church financial statements or proposed bylaws - that would otherwise be hidden by dictatorial pastors and elders. Supporters also say blogs are necessary to distribute information actively blocked by other, more conventional channels. Some supporters say opposing factions within a church need a forum to communicate their concerns.

William Thornton, an Atlanta resident who has not met Bellevue pastor Gaines, wrote on Baptistlife that the pastor had been not only inept at dealing with direct criticism, but he lacked the skills to deal with online criticism as well.

“I think it’s the same old story of blogging being ignored until it is recognized that thousands of people are reading one side of a story,” Thornton wrote. “Gaines might [do well to] drive across town and talk to Sam Shaw at Germantown Baptist, who was skewered by bloggers and web sites on a church proposal that was defeated and eventually led to his resignation.”

Bob Perry, congregational-health team leader of the Baptist General Convention of Missouri, disagrees with the need to use blogs as weapons. Perry told ABP that blogging about denominational politics on a national level is useful to inform mass audiences via a broad medium - bloggers recently helped effect reforms in the Southern Baptist Convention and its North American Mission Board - but it’s unacceptable, he continued, to use blogs for conflict resolution in individual churches.

“I think at the local church level, it is very, very wrong,” Perry said. “I just can’t imagine that there’s any real value to this.”

Read the rest of this article here at The Biblical Recorder…

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Can you see the power of a blog during church conflict?  It can really be a mess?  How can you as a church prepare for this eventuality?  Let’s face it; if anyone gets hacked off at your church, they’re fifteen minutes away from putting up a blog and sending out emails to get people involved.  And you have no control over what they will say.  How can you defend yourself and/or your church?  Maybe there are some reading this who have been the target of a blog writer.  Please share your experience in our comments section…

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Hi... I'm Todd Rhoades. I'm a Christ-follower, husband, father and I love to connect leaders with other leaders. Hopefully you'll find something here at MMI you like and will return often. If you want, you can find out more about me or follow my every step on Twitter.

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