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Nine Traits of Mean Churches

Thom S. Rainer

Growing Healthy Churches Together

“My church is a mean church!”

I received two emails this week from church members who made that very statement. The members are from two different churches in two different states. One of the churches belongs to a denomination; the other is non-denominational. In both cases the church members made the decision to drop out of local church life altogether.

Yes, I tried to reason with the two members. I told them that no church is perfect. If they had any doubt, I wrote, look at the two letters the Apostle Paul wrote to the church at Corinth. I failed in convincing them to stay in their churches. I pray they will become active in other churches later.

I love local churches. But I have to admit, I am hearing more from long-term members who are quitting church life completely. One member wrote me, “The non-Christians I associate with are much nicer people than the members of my church.”

Ouch. That really hurt.

So, after receiving the second email, I began to assimilate all the information I could find where church members had written me about their “mean” churches. They may not have used the word “mean” specifically, but the intent was the same. I then collected characteristics of these churches, and I found nine that were common. I call these the “nine traits of mean churches.”

1. Too many decisions are made in the cloak of darkness. Only a select few members really know what’s going on. The attitude of those elitists is that the typical member doesn’t really need to know.
2. The pastor and/or staff are treated poorly. Decisions are made about them without a fair process. Complaints are often numerous and veiled. Many of these churches are known for firing pastors and/or staff with little apparent cause.
3. Power groups tenaciously hold on to their power. The power group may be a formal group such as a committee, elders, or deacons. But the group can also be informal—no official role but great informal authority. Power groups avoid and detest accountability, which leads to the next point.
4. There is lack of clear accountability for major decisions and/or expenditures. The church has no clear system in place to make certain that a few outlier members cannot accumulate great power and authority.
5. Leaders of the power groups have an acrimonious spirit. Though they may make first impressions of kindness and gentleness, the mean streak emerges if you try to cross them.
6. A number of the members see those outside of the church as “them” or “those people.” Thus the church is at odds with many in the community instead of embracing them with the love of Christ.
7. Many members have an inward focus; they view the church as a place to get their own preferences and wants fulfilled. They are the opposite of the description of church members in 1 Corinthians 12, where Paul describes them as functioning members for the greater good of the body of Christ.
8. Many people in the community view these churches negatively. Those on the outside often refer to these churches as “fighting and firing churches.” The community members detect no love for them from these churches.
9. Most of the members are silent when power plays and bad decisions take place.They don’t want to stand up to the power group. They are afraid to ask questions. Their silence allows the power abuses to continue.

Are mean churches really increasing in number? My anecdotal information would indicate they are.

The Problem With James Malm

James Malm loves to picture himself as the most enlightened converted man to ever grace the Church of God.  Bob Thiel is a theological simpleton compared to Malm. He knows more than Herbert Armstrong, Rod Meredith, Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry and Vic Kubik combined.  His interpretations of the Bible and prophecy is the only correct version that is possible.

James Malm is a professional Judaizer who bastardizes the law to fit his own perverted interpretations.  Like Meredith, Pack and Flurry, Malm spits upon everything Jesus taught or did. The law always trumps.

It just irritates the hell of Malm that so many people understand they are no longer bound to a bunch of rules that we set up specifically for a tribe of people centuries ago in order to separate them from the nations around them.  It irritates the hell out of Malm that those who understand the new covenant are free from the law.  Its more important to him to be found doing something than to understand that it has already been done.

Its more important for him to promote a pissed off angry god that is just itching to fry 2/3's of humanity than it is to show love.  Love has no place in the law of Malm.  The law does not produce love, nor does it produce faith.

Paul says, “If by grace, then it cannot be based on works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace” (Romans 11:6). Praise the Lord, “Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1).

From the comments:

James Malm is just another rebel who did not pay attention in the WCG. James left the WCG in 1985 while HWA was still alive to try to think for himself. His wife got into that sacred names nonsense and divorced him for not going along with it too. James got into calendar confusion. Garbling the gospel probably brought yet another curse on him. James wants to mangle everything that HWA had taught, and then think that he himself must be someone great for messing up everything. 

Some other goofy little rebels who like to defend James Malm and his heresies do not necessarily want to go and actually submit to him in his group. They just like to do their little part to promote rebellion and heresy by claiming that one can learn the odd thing from James (emphasis on odd), but no way will they really trust him enough to actually go with the troublemaker. It seems like they want to do their own little part to help James cause confusion, division, and trouble without actually letting him cause too much trouble for themselves personally.

The most disconcerting thing with Malm is how ability to brainwash his acolytes into believing every single piece of filth that the teaches.  Just like vile Gerald Flurry and Dave Pack, Malm is brainwashing his followers to cut off all contact with family members.  How sick is that?

"Constance" (or whatever she is calling herself these days) is my mother. This along with provocations by Malm to head to Petra to prove that one is a true believer are so disconcerting. These cults are dangerous--not only for the potential Jim Jones ending or the destruction they create in families and personal finances. They create mental illness through emotional dis-regulation. After a number of years, it's like a shell of a person that repeats indoctrination a with no one home. This makes me sad and hopeless feeling. 

Malm is just as big a fraud as Bob Thiel is.  Both of these men have self-appointed themselves to the "positions" they think they have.  Both Malm and Thiel believe they are one of the two witnesses, are apostles, and are the end-time revealers of essential knowledge that God is revealing through them.

Both are liars that have never learned anything from all the previous liars they follow in the Church of God.

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