During the course of the last month I have learned of two different pastors of two different small, independent churches in my area that have been involved in bilking their congregations and as a result these churches have imploded, leaving their congregants confused, hurt and demoralized. I have friends that attended each of these two churches and have spent some time with a number of them offering encouragement and counsel.

That both of these were somewhat charismatic ‘health and wealth’ pastors is not the main point of this post, although I have previously in other posts addressed my concerns with the lack of biblical support for the ‘Prosperity Gospel.’ What concerns me more at the present about these two separate unrelated incidents is how so many of these small ‘bible churches’ lack any real degree of oversight at the church level, both spiritually as well as from the business side of things and how that can result in unmitigated disaster for the congregants at such churches when the pastor goes astray.

Like I’ve told my friends that attended these churches, pastors are merely human beings just like us, and are subject to all of the failings and sins that we are. We hope that our pastors have developed a much closer relationship with God than we as laity have and therefore are perhaps a little less prone to the various distractions such as greed and lust than we are, but unfortunately that isn’t always the case.

One of the biggest problems that I see in some of these situations is that there is little or no oversight over the church or the pastor him or herself. In a larger church there is of course the deacons and/or elders that provide some sort of oversight and in a church that is part of a larger denomination such as the United Methodists there is oversight from above in the form of bishop or what-have-you.

In a small independent church however, the buck often stops at the pastor himself. The pastor has full accountability and the church is in his hands alone. There is quite often nobody looking over his shoulder on occasion to insure that all is as it should be and the church is naively trusting that since this man is ‘a man of God’ that all is well and will always stay that way. Of course, anybody who reads the news knows that is not always the case; the news reports are always quick to pick up on when a pastor of one church or another has fallen.

Another big problem that I see with small independent churches is that oftentimes the pastor himself has nobody to turn to when his faith starts to waver. I’ll grant that many independent pastors try and network with other pastors in other churches, but that is not always the case. Quite often the pastor finds himself at the top of his spiritual mountain and when trouble come he has no one to lay his burden upon and receive encouragement and/or counsel.

The fall from the top can sometimes be a fast and slippery slope, especially when there is no one around to throw you a lifeline.

I had the opportunity over the summer to spend some time with one of these two pastors at a weekend retreat. He was relating to me how he was struggling with a fairly large apparent error that he had found in the New Testament book of Hebrews and it was troubling him greatly. He is a fundamentalist and had for all of his life believed in biblical inerrancy, and I wonder if this might not have been a part of his fall down the slippery slope. I, of course, have dispensed with inerrancy and am quite comfortable with that, but being a layman of a different Christian tradition than him I found that I was really not able to offer him much in the way of support that he would have been able to live with. I was concerned at that time last summer that something was going wrong in his walk with God but felt unqualified to do or say much about it.

Now don’t get me wrong, there are a great many fine and wonderful men and women of God that are doing great things for the Kingdom of God in small, independent churches across the globe. Also, in reality it is quite easy for a ‘man of the cloth’ in any church, large or small to ‘fall from grace.’

I’m not saying that people shouldn’t be a part of a church just because it is small and independent. There are a great many spiritual leaders who have started out in small churches and have done great things for God. What I am saying is that you should check the credentials of whoever your preacher is and make sure that your pastor has others that he is making himself accountable to.

It is not a good thing to be at the very top of your own spiritual mountain with no one to turn to when troubles arise, as they invariably will. Although God is always present to throw a lifeline when one is needed, He often uses other people within the Body of Christ to actually hand that lifeline out when it is needed. When a person, whether a layman or clergy, has isolated themselves at the top of a spiritual mountain it can be quick and dangerous slippery slope to the bottom.

I’ll continue to keep my friends who attended these two churches in my prayers and hope that they realize that God has not failed them. God never fails us, but people often will. I trust in God with all of my heart, mind, soul and strength, but I watch people very carefully, especially if I sense that they are alone at the top of a spiritual mountain.

My wife and I watched the 20/20 interview with former Presidential Candidate John Edwards’ aid Andrew Young. Young has written an expose’ called ‘The Politician’ on all of John Edwards shenanigans over the last few years, and I have to admit that I was a little surprised at just how deep all of the deception and lies that Edwards had propagated ran. What was even more disturbing is how John Edwards had used his considerable charm and charisma to convince all of those around him to further promulgate the lies and deception that he was living in. Of course, what is most disturbing is that this man could have possible become the leader of the free world.

When Edwards was running for President, something about him didn’t ring true for me. My wife thought that he was the nation’s brightest hope, but I wasn’t quite so sure. You see, I’ve run across quite a few con men over the years, and have developed a knack for smelling them out.

Whenever someone seems too good to be true, my experience is that they normally are. John Edwards seemed to me to be one of these too good to be true sort of guys. He smiled just a little too big, spoke just a little too wise and then there was that intangible ‘something about him’ quality that I’ve learned how to pick up on over the years that made me wonder.

Charisma. How many people over the years who have had this gift have misused it for their own gain and to the great detriment of others?

It amazes me sometimes how many people just buy into one charismatic leader of another’s hype and spin without ever thinking twice about it. Not until, of course, it is too late and when the deception is revealed countless people have lost their money, self-worth, and sometimes even their very souls.

For those who read my blog, you’re aware of course about the Great Deception that I grew up in with the Worldwide Church of God and Herbert W. Armstrong. Armstrong was a very charismatic religious leader who deceived hundreds of thousands over the course of five decades and damaged or destroyed countless innocent lives. I saw through his charisma and spin campaign by the time that I was sixteen and got away as fast as I could. Even so, it still took many years for me to recover from the experience.

Perhaps this early life experience is why I am very cautious of someone who looks too good or talks too wise. There have been several times over the course of my life when I fairly early on perceived that someone was full of crap, while everyone else was singing accolades to this person.

My wife and I attended a ‘prosperity gospel’ church for several months when we were back in our twenties. It was a pretty large church and the young pastor had about as much charisma as any that I’ve seen. All of the church members loved him, and every week many of them gave this man much more money than they could afford, just because this pastor said to. Of course, it was ‘seed money’, and this charismatic pastor assured them all that they would receive their money back ‘pressed down and flowing over.’ I was wary right away and after a few months was 100% convinced that this guy was as full as crap as they come. My wife and I quit attending the church, but many stayed on, throwing their money vainly away as this man squandered their hard-earned cash on his lavish lifestyle.

There have been others over the years that I have picked up on, and had my suspicions turn out to be true. Just this last year I was introduced to a pastor of church that several friends of mine attend of whom I immediately felt that something wasn’t quite right. I just found out last month that he was siphoning funds from his church and his supposed friends and now many of them are deeply hurt and demoralized. One of his ‘closest friends’ actually lost his business because of this preacher’s greed and deception.

Not everyone with the gift of charisma misuses it. There have been a great many people over the years that have had this gift and have done great good with it. Winston Churchill, Mahatma Ghandi, Billy Graham, and Martin Luther King Jr. come to mind.

But seemingly for every Winston Churchill there is an Adolph Hitler, and for every Billy Graham there is a David Koresh.

I myself have come to the point to where I pretty much try to ignore charisma and spin altogether and look at everyone and their program, whether political or religious, objectively. And when ‘my little voice’ tells me that something is not quite right about someone, I am getting better at listening to it.

I feel really sorry for all of the people that John Edwards has hurt, but I’m very thankful that he did not become our President. Maybe other people should start listening to their own ‘little voice’ and when someone seems to good to be true, they need to ask themselves why. And if they don’t have their own ‘little voice’ perhaps they should listen to people that do.