The Emotionally Healthy Church Critique - Book Report/Review Example

? The Emotionally Healthy Church Even though the church is a spiritual entity, it is important not to forget that members of the church are also humans like any one else. Being human being means that they would certainly have their fallibility. This is why the leader of the church, not just members, really needs to live in such a way that will not in any way portent any threat to the body of Christ. Pete Scazzero in his book, The Emotionally Healthy Church, teaches on how different people with different personalities that make up the church can live, optimizing their different personalities for the growth of the church, and not for its downfall. However, to attain the Olympus height of perfection Scazzero pays attention to the role pastors of the church have to play. As the church confronts the rapid and complex transformations that are ushering Western society into the twenty first century, many established churches and ministry organizations find themselves teetering between ineffectiveness and extinction. The reality is that they must change to meet the present and upcoming generation, and they must do so quickly. But the problem is that many lay leaders and pastors don’t know how to guide their churches into the kind of change that their churches more relevant and effective (Anderson, 1992, p.254). The opinion of Scazzero is that the church has placed a whole lot of importance on “crossing the line.” He makes mention of conversion and being born again as the ways to start the Christian life. All these, of course, mean that one has made a decision to follow Christ and all that is Christ’s. The point the author makes is that one cannot (claim to) be a Christian if one does not have a personal conviction. It is not the case that feigns to have a new life—a life that is full of the goodness of Christ, all one does is done in accordance to the ordinances of our Lord and master, Jesus Christ. However, many times, the truth is that some of the people that claim to be Christians are only Christ-like on the surface. When a deep search is done on their inside is carried out, it is most times discovered that their ‘holy’ lifestyle is but a facade. For most people, there are still certain parts of themselves that remain untouched, no matter how much sermon is preached. “A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.” (The Bible KJV Gal. 5:9). However, “God wants to share every area of your life, each and every day of your life. He longs to walk with you and talk with you” (Martins, 1996, p.19). These aspects of their lives that are yet to get touched by the word of God ultimately have negative effects on other members of the body of Christ. What can be obtained is that there is a “…conversion and reduction of the people in those parts unto the true worship of God and the Christian Religion” (Federer, 1994, pp. 625-626). As Christians, we believe that Christ is always present in the gathering of believers (even though He is not seen). A new meaning is given to this by Pete Scazzero. It is not as though he disagrees with the belief in the ‘unseen one’, what he just does is that he brings a relatively new dimension to our comprehension of the ever present one that is unseen. It has to do with how the people we come in touch with can be influenced by one’s lifestyle, actions and inactions. Even in the church, the role of the leaders cannot be underestimated. As Aristotle said: Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts (Pegues & Temple, 2010, p.13) The pastor must be able to balance the different abilities they have. Arrien (1993) divides these abilities into four interlinked categories: Warrior (availability), Healer (compassion), Visionary (genuineness), and Teacher (separateness). The people the leader comes in contact with are easily influenced by their lifestyle. The leadership abilities of leaders will automatically have impacts on the followers. For instance, if a leader has strong interpersonal relation with members, s/he would be able to understand the personality of individuals in the church and be able to understand the reason they act the way they do. People are molded or influenced to be who they are by the persons they come in contact with. Hence, the influence of the family on individuals should also never be taken lightly. “Except in rare instances, our family is the most powerful influential group that has affected who we are” (Scazzero, 2003, p.95). If a leader in the church understands this, it will help them understand why people put up certain behaviors. It is been proven that when there is an understanding between the leaders and the followers, the success of the “organization” is almost guaranteed Eims (1975). Like everything in life, being a pastor could be very challenging. It would surely come with its own stress. However, what is most important is that the pastor is able to handle it in the most effective way. In The Emotionally Healthy Church, Scazzero makes an attempt to help pastors survive in spite of challenges that often comes with the works of ministry. He does this by highlighting some of the errors some clerics commit as a result of spiritual immaturity. As Bennis (2009) puts it in On Becoming A Leader, “Most of us are shaped more by negative experiences than by positive ones.” (110). The challenges of being a pastor might be more difficult even in a small church (Allen 2001). One of the most thrilling parts of the book is that rather than write about how to build an emotionally healthy church out of context, Scazzero builds his point mainly out of his personal experience, both with the members of his own congregation and that of others. Basically, what he has written in the book is what has worked for the congregations in which they have been applied. By probing his own inner weakness, Scazzero arrives at a juncture where he undertook some momentous actions that drove him toward the attainment for his yearning to realize an emotionally healthy church. He discovered how to make use of his emotions in his relationship with others, realizing that emotional attachments cannot be removed either from the relationships we have with our fellow human beings and that which we have with God. This is evidence to show that he does write about something which he is not experienced about. Consequently, the tendency for the reader to apply what is higher than that of the author who writes what he himself has never practiced. On the application of the archetypes presented by Scazzero, the reader automatically believes that they and their own churches would become good examples for other people to emulate and even want to study. Personally, in my ministry, we experienced a major crisis, one which is similar to one of the experiences narrated in the book. An assistant pastor who had been with the church for over ten years had a disagreement with another assistant pastor. Then he decided to start his own church. He left the church with a significant portion of the congregation. During this period, the church was practically in disarray. Certainly, after reading Scazzero’s The Emotionally Healthy Church, I would be able to handle it in a better way if anything like that happens next time. Even though the use of ample examples to illustrate what he has to say is good, one may have expected that he gave more examples. More examples would be a great advantage to those that do not easily comprehend. However, as with everything in life, one person’s food is another person’s poison. In contrast to my personal opinion, some would rather have lesser examples. “Emotional health and spiritual health are inseparable… it is not possible for a Christian to be spiritually mature while remaining emotionally immature” (Scazzero, 2003, p.50). This is a saddening reality which makes certain churches believe they are succeeding even though they are failing. In many cases, these kinds of people do not really discover that some issues are beaming large until a major crisis occurs. John R.W. Stott in Between Two Worlds expresses his belief that preaching can overcome the anti-authority mood and the cybernetic revolution in the contemporary world. What it cannot overcome is a loss of confidence in the gospel on the part of those who proclaim it (Pollard, 2003). Many times Christians do not attain maturity, either spiritually or emotionally, because we try to use intuitive knowledge to comprehend the things of God (Anderson, 1992). There are people who really love but are hindered from totally comprehending what God has for them because they always bring in their emotions. In the church today, “we have so many people who are passionate for God and His work, yet who are unconnected to their own emotions or those around them” (Scazzero, 2003, p.37). Most times, this has to do with their faith in God. They claim to have faith in God but they find it very difficult to believe totally in Him and what he tells them. In the end, in a church where such negativities persist, the weakness of the church as a result of such will be exposed. When Christians totally believe in God, then it would be easier to build the successful church of the twenty first century (Anderson, 1992). “Emotions were discounted in much of the evangelical teaching I heard growing up. We are taught about facts, faith and feelings –in that order” (Scazzero 2010). Scazzero expresses his opinion on how factual information has been given emphasis over and above emotions. The emphasis on facts is now so much that people perceive emotions with a lot of misgivings. The non-placement of emphasis on emotions in relating with God has led to a lack of understanding about the man-God relationship. However, when humans have a strong relationship with their creator, their lives are immensely touched (Rhodes, 1996). Of course, God really has nothing to suffer; it is humans that suffer the most as a result of their lack of knowledge about what they should actually be knowledgeable about. This is not unconnected to the fact that we are in a scientific age. And scientists are mostly of the opinion that those that are highly emotive are the ones that lack the ability to think properly. One wonder if it is not better to be emotive and know more about God than not to be emotive and know little or nothing about God. The Jesus I worshipped, by contract was very much God and much less a man. I never understood, for example, the account of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here we see a full human Jesus-emotionally depressed, mentally confused, and spiritually overwhelmed.  He is being pushed to the edge of human limits…It is no wonder some people reject this fleshly, human, struggling, not alwaysone-hundred-percent-sure-of-the-will-of-God Jesus (Scazzero, 2003, p.54) If Jesus Himself could have lived on earth not only recognizing the important place of emotions but also expressing it, one wonders why some of His followers have refused to acknowledge the important role emotions can play in our daily lives (Macartney 1995). Reid (2002) asks “If Evangelicals claim to be indwelled by Christ, then why don’t they share even a glimpse of the love for the lost which Jesus has?” This is particularly because to be an evangelical (or preacher), you must have compassion for the people to whom you preach. More so, as a follower of Christ, the importance of knowing the power that is in emotional vitality and its application played a very significant role in the growth of Scazzero as a preacher, and of New Life as a church. The Bible does not overlook the emotional quotient of our humanity… Our Lord Himself had a powerful emotional life as a man who could weep in sorrow, be strong in anger, and yet experience the fullness of joy (Scazzero 2003, p.8) The show of emotionalism by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ beckons on the church of today to do a serious examination of the imbalances that exist between emotions and other aspects of their Christian faith.  When Christians allow emotions find its way into them, it is apt to state that they would be more compassionate and they will not merely carry out activities but they will render service both to God and to fellow humans. One must not fail to mention that many of the miracles Jesus performed when He was on earth were done because he was compassionate. Scazzero’s The Emotionally Healthy Church is a book that deserves to be commended for helping to bring an end to the crisis that has befallen the body of Christ. However, one would rather wish that there was never a need for it in the first place. However, as the church is yet to attain perfection, such a book effectively serves the desired effect. One other thing I would have personally liked to have more of in the book is the citation of the word of God. The role this would play in convincing readers about the message of the book cannot be overemphasized. This is why the Bible says, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path” (The Bible KJV: Psalm 119: 105). In my opinion, the more the word of God that is cited, the better comprehension readers are bound to have. The word of God is a necessary element in everything that concerns the body of Christ (McGee, 1992). Certainly, Scazzero’s The Emotionally Healthy Church cuts across as a book that lived up to its billing. Many readers are definitely not disappointed by what is written in it. Yet, the book may have done better had it deleted or included some other elements. For example, I personally think that far too much emphasis was placed on the role the Shepherd of the church has to play in keeping the church in one piece. Scazzero seems to gives little pride of place to the congregants as an entity that is able to decide on certain thing on their own. He seems to overemphasize the power of the leader to influence the congregants. He doesn’t really give cognizance to the fact that no matter how distinguished a pastor is at church governance, there are still bound to be some persons that would cut across as nuts too hard to crack. So, if the book were mine, I would have placed a little more emphasis on the role the followership can play without necessary seeking the intervention or assistance of the leader. Despite the fact that features could have been added to the book, just as some other ones could have been removed, Scazzero’s The Emotionally Healthy Church cuts across as a book that cannot be pushed aside as far as leading an emotionally balanced church is concerned. References Allen, B. (2001). Before You: When Ministry Is Not What You Thought. Grand Rapids: Kregel Anderson, L. (1992). A Church for the 21st Century. Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House Publishers Arrien, A. (1993). The Four-Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer, and Visionary: SanFrancisco: Harper. Bennis, W. (2009). On Becoming a Leader. New York: Basic Books Eims, L. (1975). Be the Leader You Were Meant To Be: Biblical Principles of Leadership Wheaton: Victor Books. Federer, W.J. (1994). America’s God and Country: Encyclopedia of Quotations. Coppell, TX: Fame Publishing Macartney, C.E.N. (1995). The Faith Once Delivered. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications Martins, C. (2009). Passionate Prayer. Eugene: Harvest House Publishers McGee, J.V. (1992). Feasting On the Word. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers Pegues, S. D., & Temple, R. (2010). Why Smart People Make Dumb Decisions. Oregon: Harvest House Publishers Pollard, F. (2003). The Preaching Pastor Reid, A.I. (2002). Radically Unchurched: Who They Are and How to Reach Them. Grand Rapids: Kregel Rhodes, R. (1996). The Heart of Christianity. Oregon: Harvest Scazzero, P. (2003). The Emotionally Healthy Church. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan The Holy Bible, King James Version (2008). Dallas: Franchrix Publishers Read More