Ask the Pastors S8 E12: Special Guest Marc Castro-“Pastoring in the wake of church hurt”

(00:02):

Hi, and welcome to Ask the Pastors, a special segment of the West Hills podcast where you get to ask and receive biblically grounded, pastorally sensitive answers from your pastoral staff. This is a special edition of Ask the Pastors on the road where it's not just our pastoral staff, but a special guest that you'll meet in just a moment. My name's That. I'm one of the pastors at West Hills.

(00:28):

My name's Will. I'm your lead pastor here at West Hills. And as Dad mentioned, we are blessed to have a special guest pastor joining our podcast this afternoon, Pastor Mark Castro of St. Paul's E-Free Church who needed a ride home from our district denomination conference. And we were happy to oblige. The only requirement was that he didn't know until we were halfway through the trip, home together that he was going to have to be our special guest question answer today for us on the podcast or else he was going to have to hitchhike the rest of the way home. So Mark, thanks for agreeing or consenting or-

(01:18):

Obligate.

(01:18):

Begrudgingly. I don't know what allowing yourself to be blackmailed into being on the podcast with us. And I guess if you want to start by just introducing yourself, giving us just the high level autobiographical, where are you from, how God called you to ministry and how long you've been at St. Paul's and in ministry in general and all of that. And then we'll introduce our topic after that.

(01:53):

Great. Well, thank you guys. Yeah. I mean, I didn't want to hitchhike, but I'm joking and happy to be involved in the podcast. And yeah, and it's great being with these guys, the conference. We had a great time and just good fellowship and connection with brothers and sisters in Christ. So leaders in the church, what a blessing. So yeah, I grew up in Los Angeles, Southern California. And a lot of times when I tell people that, and that now I'm in St. Louis, it's like, wow, we have winter here. You don't have that in LA, but I actually spent a lot of time in the Midwest in Minnesota and Iowa and now Missouri, St. Louis. So really the winter isn't that bad in St. Louis. When I've experienced Minnesota winter or even in Iowa, Des Moines winter is even worse. So I'm actually blessed to be in St. Louis.

(02:48):

But going back to being in LA, growing up over there, I was raised Catholic growing up and had that background, so I didn't grow up like e-free or evangelical or anything like that. But at least the way I see that experience is that I had a foundation of I believed in God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. So for that, I was thankful, but I always felt like there was ... I'm using my hands like you guys can see me anyway. And the way I would experience that, like I'd go to mass because I went to Catholic school and I would felt like I'm getting like I'm thirsty spiritually, like for living water and I'm only getting a sip of water. Imagine being dying of thirst and you only get a sip of water. Like, well, that tastes good, but I need a lot more.

(03:37):

So I had this desire in me to pursue that. And then these guys say this podcast can go as long as it needs to be, so I'll keep going. And anyway, and so I had that as a background of just believing in God. But then when I was a teenager, my mom passed away. She has complications with being a diabetic. She had kidney failure and then she passed away when I was 14. A month later, my uncle passed away. He had liver failure. And then four months after that, six months after that, my grandfather passed away in that summer. So it was like February, March, July. So you can figure out how many months all that was. But it was a crazy time as a teenager to go through something like that. It's tragic. There really isn't words to describe really just how painful that experience was.

(04:35):

But I just see God's grace through all of that too, where I had that Catholic background. I had a minimal understanding. I remember crying out to God knowing I need him, right? And yet I didn't really have the tools yet, but I was still just crying out to him like, "I need God, how I'm going to get through this without him." And then I went to this YMCA summer camp and it was led by a Baptist church in the area that was kind of the leadership of this in San Gabriel Valley, California. And they talked about, when I would go to this camp, it was from the ages of 12 to 17, so imagine I'm 14. So I would get in the gospel even already before these things would happen, but they would talk about Jesus like they knew him personally. And as I got glimpses of that, I knew that that is what I needed because Jesus would never leave me or forsake me.

(05:26):

So I just, through their ministry at 16, I came to know Jesus and saved me from my sins and just had that more of that understanding, more of that living water that I needed. And then I came to know Jesus. Then I, as I was finishing up high school, I woke up one morning, I believe this was a God desire, is that I really wanted to work with kids. So I started working at a preschool at my last year in high school, became a preschool teacher, and I would be, as I'm going to share, involved in kids ministry, family ministry. I think this is all part of God's plan. So I did that for a number of years, but started working with kids. I got connected to local church and the pastor there was a professor at a Bible college in the area, local one.

(06:17):

And I was like, "Hey, Jesus saved me from my sins. I can't imagine doing anything but serving him." And so I pursued going to that Bible college where my pastor was a professor at, graduated from there, Life Pacific College, actually a small, a four square Bible college. If you guys know what that is, it's a Pentecostal denomination originated in Southern California. So I went there, got a bachelor's and I'll keep going here. All these could be a podcast in and of themselves, really, if I could tell you all the stories with all this. But then after I finished up or finishing up Bible college, a lot of my professors were encouraging me to continue on to seminary. One of my professors was finishing up his PhD at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pastina. We went to seminary there and during all this time, I was working at preschools, volunteering at my church, those kind of things.

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  (07:19):

  But then when I was going to seminary is when I kind of got my first, if you want to call it ministry job or I was getting paid for ministry, I working in elementary ministry at a large church in Pasadena, California, where I was overseeing like 250 elementary age kids and it was really a blast. I looked back on that time and it was a lot of fun, great experience while I was going through seminary. Then I finished up, got my MDiv and I met my wife, Andrea, in Southern California, found out she was from Des Moines, Iowa, that's ultimately where we got married. And then I was looking for another ministry position because these things happen. Again, this could be another podcast too, but I got let go from this church as they were restructuring. Churches can do that sometimes. So I was looking for a ministry position because I didn't have a job or I actually just was working, helping a church plant, getting paid very minimal, but just helping them out.

  (08:20):

  So I was looking for a full-time job. And then that's when I had my first experience with the Evangelical Free Church, which was in a small town, Albert Lee, Minnesota. And middle, it's like the opposite of coming from Los Angeles and moving to Albert Lee, Minnesota, but it was E-Free Church there just a little over two hours from Des Moines where we got married. So it was great, close to my in- laws and then her family there and was in Albert Lee for five and a half years as an associate pastor overseeing children's ministry, then youth and small groups, great experience. I love the church there. And then I went up to Lakeville, Minnesota at Trinity Evangelical Free Church. I was there for a few years also. And then I'm making sure Will doesn't get us in an accident here as we're driving. We're all good.

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  And you can edit that out if you need to in post production. No problem. So I was at Trinity Evangelical Free Church for a few years and then working also in kids' family ministry, youth ministry. I oversaw the staff. And then I got my first lead pastor position at a reform church in Norwalk, Iowa, which is a suburb of Des Moines. I was there for a couple of years also. And then that led me to, after that, God led me to St. Paul's in St. Louis, Missouri. So that's kind of where I'm at now. So I'll give it back to Will here. He can ask me or that for another question.

  (10:08):

  Thanks, brother, for sharing all that. And I mean, so many questions that we could have pursued just in light of your story and obviously dealing with personal suffering and trauma in the wake of your mother's passing. And I mean, thinking about what the unique perspective of, I'm assuming probably not a lot of evangelical pastors come from that kind of Catholic background either that you taught. So I mean, just so many different interesting rabbit trails we could chase there, but the one in particular that came to my mind in thinking about, okay, if we got a couple hours in the car with Mark and we've got him held hostage and what could we get him to reflect on for us that I'd really love? And I think our church might be edified to hear some of your unique perspective on. The one that really stood out to me was, and we'll think about how to title this episode, special guest, Mark Castro, but something like pastoring in the wake of church trauma or church hurt, something like that.

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  And with most of our ask the pastor questions, it's called ask the pastors for a reason where we've got our people at West Hills are able to submit questions we try and answer, and we do actually have quite a few questions in this vein, and in particular, a lot of them, other questions surround how would you advise or shepherd or council members coming from really toxic church environments or still now at hopefully what we hope at West Hills is a healthy church. I mean, it's a spectrum, no church is perfect, but there is somewhere or some kind of line where you cross from healthy into unhealthy, but we like to think that we're a pretty healthy church, but now in a place where they're processing previous churches that weren't healthy and the hurts and the sort of breaking of trust and all those kinds of things.

  (12:43):

  I mean, we've got people at West Hills that have been in our church for years now that are still really gun shy about your sermon thad from just this past Sunday was on being under God's authority and what godly authority looks like from Deuteronomy 17 and 18.

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  But a lot of what that brings up is obviously for a lot of us is the opposite and questions about bad authority and when to submit to bad authority and when to stay at a church and when you know it's time to leave and all those kinds of things. I say all of that as context for this question about pastoring in the wake of church trauma or hurt because, Mark, I'll let you share as much or as little of the context as you want that you think would be helpful for our listeners. But before you even got to St. Louis, St. Paul's was on my radar even as we were ... I think actually when you came to St. Louis is right around the time we were also discussing with, as a matter of fact, I think I met our district superintendent, Mike Shields, because he was down in St. Louis meeting with the elder council and maybe even the congregation at St. Paul's, still trying to clean up some of the mess that had accrued over a period of years.

  (14:15):

  And I'll let you give us some of the timeline of that maybe. But anyway, just that that's a church, yours is a church, St. Paul's that has been through a lot in the last, I don't know if it's eight to 10 years or maybe even going back farther than that, but I mean, a lot of people look at the pastorate there and the job that you said yes to. And you, I mean, I've got a lot of follow-up probably questions after hearing you reflect on it, but I mean, I think you knew somewhat, more or less, what you were stepping into. It wasn't like they were trying to pull the wool over your eyes and pretend to be a healthy church. I mean, they were, I think, pretty honest with you about, this is a church that has really been through a really difficult season here for years now and is going to need a custodian of sorts, pastoral custodian to help clean up some of this mess.

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  So anyway, I'll let you start with the context and then we've got some questions for you too about what you learned through that and lessons, but give us some context for understanding what it is that you were stepping into in the pastor at St. Paul's.

  (15:37):

  Yeah, thanks for that question. Well, yeah, and I really appreciate the congregation's honesty there. Like you were saying, the elders, Mike Shields, the district superintendent, like you were saying, and even I know people were praying for St. Paul's, which I just wanted to have that slight tangent of the district was, other churches in the FCA and the district were just wanting to be a support in any way. And Will has done that. Other pastors have done that for me and like our district staff. So we're just, I'm thankful that St. Paul's is in this district for that support.

  (16:21):

  But yeah, and for context, and the timeline is interesting. I think it could definitely go back to at least COVID, maybe a little bit before that. As you guys know, you guys went through COVID as a church. That could just be a very difficult time for any church as people had to go online and how do you meet in person? All those things was very polarizing time for the church. And then there was some pastoral transition, a lot of pastoral transition. I don't think I'll get into the weeds on that, but quite a few pastors left, staff left, support staff left, elders resigned. It was just a very difficult time for the church. And again, I'm thankful because this predated me to have Mike Shields, Todd Brooks, others come alongside St. Paul's is just a blessing. The congregation just is so appreciative of those men.

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  And then like I said, the other churches praying for St. Paul's through that time. And then when I got there, and I had to pray and discern like, am I going to come here, I should say first. And as I said, the congregation was the leadership there at first, honest about that, and yet there was potential there. And I just really believe that with St. Paul's being right there, Creevcor Olivet, and you guys are more familiar with St. Louis, I'm still trying to figure out my directions around here without any mountains or different things that I'm used to, landmarks of where north, south, east, west is. But anyway, where St. Paul's is located, I just feel like it's so strategic for gospel impact that I'm like, I just believe that God wasn't done with St. Paul's. And at the same time, as Will was saying, is that's even hard to say with people who are going through church hurt.

  (18:22):

  Like what, God's going to use me right now, I'm just trying to survive. So I also realized that this church needs a shepherd, which I believe that is a strength of mine, is to shepherd, to care, to weep with those who weep, mourn with those who mourn, those who rejoice as we're called to do that, not just as a pastor, but the whole body of Christ were to be that way. So I'm happy to be that way. One thing that I was asked and I heard, and I even mentioned in one of my first sermons at St. Paul's is people were wondering or asking themselves, who would come here? Like what pastor would want to come here because of what they went through? And I just flipped it around and I just said, "Well, I don't deserve to be here." This is God's grace. It is a grace to be a part of God's church, to be a shepherd of his church.

  (19:23):

  It is a gift. It's something that I don't deserve as an imperfect shepherd with Jesus really as the true shepherd. So that's how I told them is that it is by God's grace that I'm here. I don't deserve to be here and I'm thankful to be here to be the shepherd of St. Paul's. And I meant that, of course, very genuinely believe that no matter where the church is at with health or unhealth hurt or not hurt, is that it is a grace, it is a gift and an honor and really a responsibility as a shepherd to care for his flock at St. Paul's. So that's, at least when I got there was to be present with people, weep with those who weep, to have that kind of perspective to mourn. But one thing I'd add is to mourn with hope, right? We don't just mourn and there is no hope.

  (20:15):

  We have, of course, we mourn for people who pass away and that is hard, but if they have trust and faith in Jesus, then we know we have hope of eternal life. And the same way when we mourn loss, when we're not, we haven't died, that there's still hope there. And to encourage them that there is hope and God can still work here and is working here and to celebrate those things and to point people in that direction as well. One thing I wanted to say too, that was a factor for me wanting to come to St. Paul's was the transition team at the time really helped to ... The transition team are the people that were kind of in leadership in place when there wasn't a lead pastor, but they really helped the church to keep things simple, but to keep focused on the great commission, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that Jesus has commanded, right?

  (21:18):

  The great commission, focused on that in the great commandment, right? To love God and to love your neighbor, right, to love others. So they really just said, with everything that has happened, let's refocus on what it means to be the church, right? To make disciples, to love one another, to love God. And that's on my heart too. And as I said earlier with St. Paul's being located in St. Louis where it's located, that we have an opportunity here to make disciples, to love God, to love others here in this community. So it's been a blessing for now almost two and a half years now to be at St. Paul's, but Will might have some more questions for me before I keep going.

  (22:02):

  Yeah. Thank you. So I don't think I'm sharing anything here that's not public record, public knowledge, but as you're going through your candidating phase with St. Paul's and all of that, and you're getting more of a picture for the kind of church and the kind of position role you're stepping into all of that, let's fast forward even to the point where you've packed up, you've said yes, you've packed up the U-Haul, you're driving down or flying whatever to St. Louis, you're on the flight and you're thinking through it to yourself, what are my first priorities in establishing myself amongst this church in light of the fact that, again, you're going into it eyes wide open. This is a church that, whatever the timeline went, eight to 10 years prior, you had a pastor going through very public legal accusations of abuse that culminated in him stepping away from that.

  (23:22):

  Then you've got interim, then you've got, they find another guy who's there a handful of years, doesn't last, he gets run out, then you've got another interim guy that gets run out. So you've got, I don't know how many pastors it was that were kind of chewed up and spit out in between there, or if that's a fair characterization of it or not. You shared with Thad and I about even congregational vote of no confidence in the elder board that almost passed, but didn't ... So again, you know that this is the context that you're stepping into. Which way do I go here? 61 South. Okay. All right, we're back. We're podcasting on the road, guys. I got to make sure I'm not going to the wrong state.

  (24:23):

  All the microphones.

  (24:24):

  I'm sorry. Yeah. So anyway, Mark, you get the gist of it. That's the kind of situation you are saying yes to, stepping into. What were your practical priorities? I mean, I would have to imagine, again, establishing trust. I mean, for any of us in pastoral ministry, certainly for me, that was kind of number one is, as a shepherd, you have to earn the trust of the sheep you're going to be leading, but I just have to believe that that has to feel like an extra uphill battle when you've got, again, sheep that have maybe been through that many different shepherds recently. And again, experience maybe, is it fair to say some of that bad, bad authority, bad leadership, or I don't know. I'd love to hear you help our people think through how is a leader stepping into a situation in the wake of some of those trials, what's your first priorities there?

  (25:49):

  Yeah. I think one thing when you go into, like you shared, there was some difficult ... A season, a lot of trust needs to be rebuilt, all of those things, and then I'm coming in new, am I going to change a lot of things? What's going to happen? But I need to just come and love people and just be present and not look to change anything. And I'm one that I need to be in prayer, right? Seek the Lord be in his word and get to know the congregation and not just assume that this needs to happen or that needs to happen. Maybe it does, but I saw it too as it's a marathon, not a sprint in ministry and discipleship that that's the case no matter what the context is. It is a marathon. And just to be present with people through that, through funerals, doing a lot of funerals there and just being present through real grief and mourning and knowing them seeing me be a shepherd and caring for them in that way, preaching the gospel, you can never not do that.

  (26:56):

  So as a pastor, hopefully, it's our prayer for pastors. Keep preaching the gospel. So they just see me as somebody who loves the gospel, shares that. Every time I go up in the pulpit and preach the Bible, preach the gospel, they see my heart. And like I said, going through life events with them, knowing that they're seeing me. And again, not to pat myself on the back, but even my elder chair will say like Marqe Minnie didn't change anything. He was just wanting to get to know us and not rock the boat or anything. And I feel like that was clearly received. That is wise advice to any pastor, I would think, in any context, but especially when trust needs to be rebuilt, when there's church hurt or trauma or whatever, it's like, let's stabilize some things. I'm not going anywhere. We're going to walk through this together.

  (27:54):

  God's got us. And even for me, just practically as a pastor, I could come into this and think, maybe this isn't going to work. But I do believe that God's called me here and God's got me. He's got my family. I'm married. We have two daughters that are seven and nine. I don't want to be moving them around a lot as my kids get older and as I want them to develop relationships in the church and in the community, the same with my wife, that we really just want to be present and be in it and live life with people and that they would see that as just genuine love, shepherding, presence, and then pointing them to Jesus and pointing them to the hope that we do have that, hey, there is a future for St. Paul's. There's a future for us together with what God has for us.

  (28:47):

  So I don't know if ... Did I answer your question? Feel free to ask some more.

  (28:53):

  I think you did, but now I'm really interested in have to ask a follow-up, which is I'm interested to hear you say that even amongst ... I think it's for sure your answer of just wanting to love people, just wanting to shepherd people. Like that for any of us, like you said, walking into any context as a pastor, any church context, that ought to be the first priority, certainly in terms of establishing trust. I thought it was interesting though to hear you say, "I didn't come in wanting to change a lot." That that was part of how you knew you were going to develop trust was not by coming in kind of guns blazing, changing things because I think a lot of people from the outside looking in, again, at the church context that you're walking into would say of all situations, sometimes the language that we use in the church is like a replant, a replant of a church where it's like this thing, we're not going to necessarily close the church.

  (30:03):

  I mean, sometimes you do. I mean, sometimes you say St. Paul's has ... The name is so damaged that we're going to close down St. Paul's and relaunch a new church in the same building and call it something else or whatever. And so it's a replant. Of all situations, I think a lot of people would have looked at St. Paul's as like, they just need a replant. Like you got to tear it down to the studs and rebuild it from the ground up. They need to bring someone in who's basically a church planner or replanter or whatever you want to call it, entrepreneur kind of thing. And that church is going to have to get to the point where they recognize just how dire the situation is and they're ready to ask for that or whatever, that a lot of people would look at that situation and say ... I think of even the question that I asked our elder council after I had been associate pastor at West Hills for three and a half years, and before I said yes to being the lead pastor and transitioning was like, I want to hear you all as the current elder council tell me what's the state of the church?

  (31:21):

  Because it's like it's real easy if you're the St. Louis Cardinals, you've got a record, right? I mean, you can look at how bad they were last year and say, "You missed the playoffs for this many seasons in a row now. This is not what people pay season tickets to come see." Something's got to give. We need a change of manager, we need to change the roster, the batting order. Something's got to change here if we want to make the playoffs. You keep doing the same thing, you're going to keep getting the same results. So for you, as you're coming into ... I wanted to know that. I wanted to know ... It's harder in a church to know you don't get scored on wins and losses. I mean, you get attendance and you get giving and you got some metrics, but we all know really unhealthy churches theologically, let's say, that attract a lot of people.

  (32:15):

  We don't want to be Lakewood Joel Osteen's church or whatever. So you can get butts in the seats, you can get money in the plates, but that doesn't mean you're doing it right. And the opposite is true too. So for us, establishing a baseline, what would health look like at this church and how healthy are we or unhealthy are we so that I know is this a, you just want me to really plug and play and be just like my predecessor versus, no, everybody here acknowledges things are really bad. We need to tear this down to the studs and rebuild. I have to believe that ... Did some of those conversations happen in your transition into St. Paul's? And I guess I'm just curious what gave you that sense of peace about like, yeah, no, like God, this is a church that's ... Because I can see it from both angles too.

  (33:23):

  I can see what you're saying as far as like, this is a church that's been around for a long, long time, 60 something years and long before me. And I'm not, who am I to come in and just blow the whole thing up? And no, I just want to meet them where they're at. So I don't know. I'd be curious to hear you reflect more on it from that perspective. Okay.

  (33:47):

  Yeah. When I was interviewing and praying and considering going to St. Paul's, the people that I talked with, the search team, some of the elders, they were very much hopeful that we wouldn't need to do what you were saying, Will, like close it and do a church plant kind of a thing. But at the same time, I was aware that there's options on the table, right, so to speak. I don't want to look at it cold like you prayerfully consider what are those. To me, the scenario that I would ... I mean, if God's going to do what he wants to do, if he wants to close any church, he can do that. But my prayer was, well, we see we have a good core group. That's the other thing you got to see. You got a good core church there still that loves Jesus, that wants to continue to meet and gather and worship and make disciples, and that's great.

  (34:50):

  You have some just practical financial viability there, although that has decreased. So there is still a runway, so to speak, of we can still have an impact here. We still have a runway of whatever that year is, five, 10 years, that this church can be viable, not only with just being able to gather for worship, to have some critical mass to do that, but then they still do a lot of different gatherings and outreach and different things that we want to do and that we're still able to do. So let's go for it. That was kind of my perspective with that. Again, that option could be on the table, but right now I'm thinking that's not going to happen, but I think it's just okay to just say, "Yeah, that could be an option to plant a church down the road." But right now we're still very much viable to be St. Paul's as it's been with, as I said, I didn't make really much of any changes that my first year or so there.

  (35:55):

  But at the same time, we have made some intentional changes since then to hopefully make some more gospel impact in our city. So did that answer your question, Will?

  (36:12):

  Yeah, it did. And again, I just really appreciate your heart in that. Number one, like you said, keep the gospel the main thing. And number two, just bring stability because what it sounds like the church had experienced for almost a decade leading up to you getting there was just in a word instability and your desire to like, yeah, if I come in and start changing the name and changing this, it's like that's just more instability. And I just want to try and offer this church stability for a season for a change, no change for a change. Anyway, so that makes sense. And I think that's really, there's a lot of wisdom in that. So Mark, what would you say, again, not just for pastors in general now, because most of our listeners aren't pastors anyway, but let's just say anyone in any kind of leadership role, whether that's as a parent or as a spouse, as an employer, a boss at work, whatever that role of authority, because that's what you're assuming as a pastor coming into the church there, what would you say are a couple things specifically stepping into, again, a context of hurt, where you know that the folks under your care have seen and personally experienced people in that role before you, that exact pulpit, that exact whatever where there's been maybe a pretty severe breach of trust and I know we were talking even before we got on the podcast where you said like a lot of, I don't remember the numbers you gave in terms of membership and attendance, but a lot of people left St. Paul's over the course of those years and you were even honest enough to say like, knowing what you know of the situation like, you can't fault them.

  (38:36):

  And we all, I think agree that there are breaches of trust and just instability that is enough that we would say like, yeah, I mean, it makes sense that you would leave that church in that situation. At the same time, like you also said, gosh, more power to the folks who stuck around, the folks who stuck it out and said, no, St. Paul's is my church and I'm not giving up on it and I want to be a part of bringing the health and the change to the church that we know God desires to see for it. And so God bless those folks. But what would you say to other folks who might be listening to this on both sides of that, the leaders stepping into a situation where I know like, wow, I'm being called here to shepherd and lead folks who've really been through a lot and I want to steward that and care for them well and through that.

  (39:50):

  And then also, I'd be curious even more so to hear you reflect on what would you say to folks who've been on the other side of that and who have been the victims, frankly, of hurts and trauma and what you've gotten, I'm sure you've had a lot of conversations with folks that have been right there. So what have you learned about, and maybe even you can speak specifically to church hurt because that's a unique kind of hurt, unique kind of breach of trust when you're talking about spiritual authority. So just any, I don't know, insights or takeaways that you've gleaned in your two and a half years now of really walking through it.

  (40:39):

  Thanks. Yeah. As a leader, it can definitely be overwhelming because there's definitely over, I think I said earlier, responsibility as a shepherd, but even just any leader like Will was saying here, if you're leading in other capacities, there just can be that pressure of people being hurt. How do you help them? You could feel like, "Am I in over my head?" And in some ways that could be a good place to be because you bring some humility that I don't got to figure it out. And I think that's ... I used to be one in my younger days, and I'm not super old yet, I don't think, but younger days, "Oh, I got this figured out. This is going to be easy." And then you just come in and you think, "I can help these people, no problem." And then like, "Oh wait, no." And then I'm not relying on the Lord or listening to him or in prayer or in the word and then listening to the people and then asking them, "How can I help you?

  (41:37):

  " And not just assuming I got it figured out. So I kind of appreciate just for me, like I need Jesus to be able to care for somebody and hurt, right? So tell me your story, let me listen, let me ask questions if I didn't quite understand what the situation is, right? And then to ask, how can I pray for you or how can I help? How can I walk with you through that? I may have some ideas. If they have nothing, I could say, "Yeah, you need me to call you. We want to have coffee once a week. We need to whatever." You want to be a part of my small group that I have because I have a small group that we meet weekly, whatever it is, I can give them those ideas, but I would rather ask them, first of all, how can I help you?

  (42:21):

  What do you need? How can I pray for you not to make that assumption? And I had people even come to me and just be really frustrated or angry about the situations going on at St. Paul's with a minimal hope and then just trying to walk them through that and pointing them to Jesus and just, "Hey, God's got us." So whether St. Paul closes tomorrow or it lasts another actually 180 years, God's got us and just trying to encourage them in that as well. But I think listen, don't assume you got it figured out. Be in prayer as you're listening to the person, right? And then ask questions and ask them how you can help them. And then I think the other part of the question was just about if you've been through hurt and I just want to say I'm sorry. I'm sorry if the church has hurt you.

  (43:15):

  I feel somewhat responsible even though I'm not, I guess, but just as a shepherd and if I see other shepherds or other leaders that have hurt other people, I mourn for that and I'm sorry. If you lost trust in the church over the years and had to leave, as Will was saying, I don't blame people if they left St. Paul's over the years and I'm thankful for those that have stayed through that time as well. Just church hurt is hard. I've been through it too, and been through church hurt. And so like I said, I'm sorry. I apologize. Jesus loves you. Don't think that those that have hurt you are like that's what Jesus wanted or anything like that. Jesus' heart is for his people. He laid down his life for you. That's how much he loves you. So remember that. And as I said earlier, with weeping with those who weep, that's what we do and that's what I would want to do.

  (44:24):

  I'm sure that and Will and other leaders at the church would be happy to walk you through that if you're going through that hurt and it's just to cry. Sometimes you don't even have the right words, you just weep and you hug or whatever, whatever's appropriate and you're just present with someone and that just can mean everything. And then even the word you might think too with the words to say. And Paul says in Romans eight about how the Holy Spirit groans, worthless groans. And I'm praying in accordance to the will of God. You might not even have the words, but God is there as you're present. If someone's present with you or you're present with someone else, I just think that can be a real beautiful thing is you don't have to have the right words to help someone. And you might even know that too.

  (45:10):

  Sometimes when you've gone through church hurt, someone might say the wrong thing to you like, "Oh, just get over it, " or whatever, and that isn't helpful. So sometimes the less is more with that kind of a thing and just being present with people through that. So that's my hope too, is if you've gone through hurt, others can surround you and be present with you, rebuild that trust. And then at the same time, I wish this wasn't true. You might get hurt again because imperfect people are in the church and I'm one of them. So keep that in mind too and just know that Jesus though, he's the one I said at the beginning with my testimony, Jesus will never leave you or forsake you. That's why I came to know Jesus through no fault necessarily of them. I loved ones that passed away, not that hurt.

  (46:05):

  They didn't like do that intentionally like other kind of hurt can be. But I knew that Jesus, he's alive, right? He is with me. He's present with me. He'll walk with me through everything. People may come and go in my life, but I have Jesus. So I just want to encourage you with that too, if you're going through it and you don't trust or you're hurting, Jesus will be with you and he'll never leave you forsake you. So continue to go to him, go to him always.

  (46:34):

  Well, that's really good. Thank you. Really beautiful gospel reminders. I love how you remind all of us that, yeah, the church is going to let you down because we're sinful people. We're imperfect. Try to be representatives of the Lord, but we do it in perfect. And then others, I mean, there really are wolves amongst the sheep, right? And I mean, the New Testament spends a lot of time on warning us against that and imposter pastors within the church kind of thing that are really there for their own selfish gain. And so, I mean, I think that Bear's mentioning too is like, yeah, don't confuse your former bad pastor with Jesus and also don't confuse your former bad pastor with your current, imperfect, but not a wolf pastor. You know what I mean? I love your humility in that mark of saying like, "Yeah, I'm going to let you down too." I'd say, tell all our new members that or candidates in our membership class is like, "Look, I'm going to let you down because I'm imperfect." And yet there is a difference between an imperfect shepherd and a wolf who's not a shepherd.

  (48:01):

  And so anyway, just having categories fit, I wonder if we could end Mark on, I don't know, just a story or two of hope, even like a real, I don't know, tangible kind of practical thing, if there's anything that stands out to you, kind of putting you on the spot with that. But I know you ... Certainly the fact that you're still there two and a half years later in and of itself, I would say is a cause for celebration and a testimony of hope because, I mean, you were mentioning to us the member at St. Paul's just a couple months ago that mentioned to you what was it on kind of like your two year anniversary or whatever. I can't believe you're still here, to be honest. I didn't think you'd make it two years. And again, when maybe they've gotten used to that many shepherds come and go, or just knowing, having some kind of self-awareness about some of the dysfunction there and like who's going to put up with this for more than a couple years kind of thing.

  (49:07):

  But that in and of itself obviously I would say is that's super hopeful that God has sustained you in your tenure there thus far, but for the grace of God. But even, I don't know if there are specific stories that you could share anonymously of other congregants there and just some of the healing that you've seen. I mean, I know obviously Fed and I can think of examples at West Hills of folks that have come from other churches that went through a major split or a pastoral failure or whatever it was and they come and, like I said, we can think of the folks that kind of told me upfront coming in like, "Just to let you know, I'll probably never join the church because signing on that dotted line of membership and saying, yes, I'm going to submit to the elders authority, I'll never do it again," kind of thing.

  (50:01):

  And then we can think of folks that have come around and that God's brought real healing and they've gotten back to a point where they're like, "Yeah, they've done that work for themselves that you talk about, whether it was with a counselor or whatever." And also just being hopefully under imperfect but good authority for long enough where they learn not to project like, "Oh yeah, not all pastors are the same, not all churches are the same." And yeah, I can trust you guys. So I wonder if you have any stories that come to mind for you of, I don't know, of just stories of hope worth ending on with St. Paul's or maybe it's still in progress or anything that stands out?

  (50:46):

  Yeah, that's a really good question. Will's putting me on the spot. No, that's fine. First thing that kind of came to my mind was, now St. Paul's had a history of confirmation, which is students professing their faith as they've grown up in the church. And we've actually had five students do that this year and complete that. And four of them were baptized to a believer baptism and that was just a real celebration. I think people were like, we haven't done this since I think 2020, so six years without students doing that, making that profession of faith. And we really haven't had very many baptisms either. So to see now those four, we've had six baptisms since I've been a pastor there and that's just been a blessing to see that new life, that profession of faith, the hope there, the celebration of God working and God's grace and the hearts of these people, the young people especially.

  (51:49):

  And I think that's just been just amazing. So I think people see that. I've heard people say, and this can be kind of an untangible kind of a thing, that before when things were rough, it was like you went there and it was like the air was sucked out of the room, right? It didn't feel like it was a good place. Now it's like even new people are coming in saying, "God's love is here, his joy is here." There is a hope at St. Paul's now. And I just go by God's grace that that can be the case and always pointing to him, whether it's the confirmation, students professing their faith and getting baptized, seeing some new young people coming in and hearing too, like we're an older congregation, but some young people coming in and just feeling so welcomed and so loved and then hearing them say that and just how you can see how things have turned where yes, there's hope here, yes, there's Jesus here, we want other people to be a part of that.

  (52:53):

  We're welcoming them, we're seeing visitors come most every week now and they're sensing that like something is different here, God is here, his love is here, his hope is here. Maybe I'm going to come back. I want to be a part of this. And that's been really exciting. We have a new members class too with 10 new people becoming members right now and we're in the middle of that and just seeing God working there, that's just going to be another celebration when we have them up there here in a few weeks celebrating some new members, joining our mission here to make disciples and to love God and love others.

  (53:31):

  Praise God for the work that he's doing at St. Paul's through you and using him as an instrument of that. And Mark, thanks again so much for being willing to share openly with us and let us hold you hostage and pick your brain on some of that. And I really do pray that it blesses some of our listeners and some of the folks at our church as they seek to not only work through in some of their cases, past hurts, but also lead and work alongside others in the church that may be hurting and healing in some of those ways. So thanks brother and thanks for ending on that note too of just the hope. I mean, because that's what it's all about, right? Like you said, I mean, in some ways the saddest part of all of it is obviously you grieve for the folks who are hurt in the process, but the fact that the gospel gets obscured and our calling, like you said, to make disciples of Christ and to exalt him in all things.

  (54:42):

  I mean, but hearing, yeah, first baptisms in six years, that's amazing. Praise God for that. 10 people in the new member class, praise God and praise God for your faithfulness too to, like you said, refuse to give up on a church that was hurting and in need of some healing. So God can do it and you guys are proof, so praise God for it.

  (55:15):

  Yeah. Thanks, Mark. Well, that's it for this week's special episode of Ask the Pastors. Remember, you can ask your questions each week at West Hills through the connection card, infobar or QR code, or submit your questions online at westhillstl.org. Thanks again for listening, and we'll catch you next week.