Stewardship of Power
Arthur DeKruyter
In a church, the stewardship of power is more important than the stewardship of money.
—Arthur DeKruyter After a year and a half in my present ministry, I suddenly was plunged into a crisis: four board members were leading a movement to oust me. These were the turbulent days of the McCarthy era, and the four trustees were convinced we should identify with a politically ultra-conservative group. I insisted that the church was not a political organization. They questioned my priorities. They told me I was "unfit to pastor the congregation." "If you ask for my resignation and can explain your reasons to the congregation, I will do so," I replied. But they weren't willing to present their reasons publicly. So they appointed an investigating committee which eventually, of course, would find reason to get rid of me. So I, along with two trustees who understood the situation, went to every family in the congregation that week. We told each one what was going on. Those four board members felt the pressure and left the church, eventually taking a quarter of the congregation with them. That "solved" one problem but created another. With the departure of these four, our board was left without a quorum. We couldn't even hold a congregational meeting to elect a new board because only the board had the authority to call a congregational meeting. Naturally, in such a divisive situation, I was concerned about who, in fact, legally controlled the assets of the church—the four dissident board members, who constituted a quorum, or the minority who remained. So I contacted an attorney and reviewed our church's constitution. I discovered that our constitution specified that the chairman of the board (in this case, the pastor) had full authority to ...
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