“. . . Is it possible that our criteria for such decisions are out of line with the Lord’s? What if he wants our present church commitment to be a dominating priority, and we relegate it to a matter of small importance? Will this not make all ideas of guidance an empty delusion? Clearly, it is vital for us to know the ‘rating’ our existing church commitment should be given on our scale of priorities.”

Wrong motives for leaving

When the next trial arises in our lives, will we have the right priorities? In Romans 16.10 Paul salutes Apelles, who was ‘approved in Christ’, which means that he had gained the victory in a great test or trial. He had come through that trial on the Lord’s side, proving his power in his situation. Many fall in the time of trial without even a struggle, and consequently they may suffer years of unhappiness without real spiritual usefulness. Some have gone into a spiritual wilderness because matters of career or location became the biggest influence in their lives, causing them to abandon their place in the service of the Lord.

In times of trial or decision, we need to search our hearts to see what desires are really influencing us. We know of people who have moved from the inner city because they did not care for built-up areas, and longed for green fields and beauty. The assumption of these friends was that other Christian city-dwellers adored the polluted air and grimy buildings. Clearly if all members of inner-city churches followed the natural desire to flee to more pleasant districts there would be no evangelical churches left in our most densely populated areas.

Countless Christians stand fast in other undesirable and unattractive locations, remaining for the sake of their local church and its testimony. Where in the Bible do we read that the first rule of guidance is that we are to seek the most congenial and attractive surroundings? It is the worldling who makes his own pleasure and enjoyment his first priority, but we are to stay or go wherever the Lord positions us, realising that trials and temptations await us in an ‘Eden’ just as much as in a ‘Babylon’.

There are other factors also which carry people away from their churches unnecessarily. Every pastor has experience of members who have moved away from their fellowship because they had some besetting weakness they would not control. Their spiritual lives suffered, they became unhappy, and eventually decided that the fault was not in them but in their church. They began to sulk and complain, and soon became convinced that they were not receiving spiritual food, help or fellowship. Eventually they left the church, but not because the Lord had led them on. A high and worthy view of the local church may have helped them not to turn against their church, but they did not have such a view, and the church soon became a punch-bag for the release of tensions and dissatisfaction.

C. H. Spurgeon may well have been describing this in Sermons in Candles. Alongside an engraving of a very odd-shaped candle, unable to fit into any holder or stand, he wrote:

‘I know persons who cannot get on anywhere; but, according to their own belief, the fault is not in themselves, but in their surroundings. I could sketch you a brother who is unable to do any good because all the churches are so faulty. He was once with us, but he came to know us too well, and grew disgusted with our dogmatism and want of taste. He went to the Independents who have so much more culture, breadth, and liberality. He grew weary of what he called ‘cold dignity’. He wanted more fire, and therefore favoured the Methodists with his patronage. Alas! he did not find them the flaming zealots he had supposed them to be: he very soon outgrew both them and their doctrines, and joined our most excellent friends, the Presbyterians.

These proved to be by far too high and dry for him, and he became rather sweet upon the Swedenborgians, and would have joined them had not his wife led him among the Episcopalians. Here he might have enjoyed the otium cum dignitate, have taken it easy with admirable propriety, and have even grown into a churchwarden; but he was not content; and before long I heard that he was an Exclusive Brother!

There I leave him, hoping that he may be better in his new line than he has ever been in the old ones. ‘The course of nature could no further go’: if he has not fallen among a loving united people now, where will he find them? Yet I expect that as Adam left Paradise so will he ultimately fall from his high estate.’

An unsettled member’s heart-searching must be ready to unearth unsavoury motives. Why would we want to leave our church? Sometimes people become disenchanted through thinking of themselves more highly than they ought to think, becoming very upset because their perceived talents are not sufficiently recognised, and they are not given early respect or office. They soon think they will be much better off in another (much ‘better’) church, and having lost their biblical loyalty, they may eventually make their move.