Pastor + Author
Do you challenge them? Appease them? Or abandon them?
Here’s a video teaching that I did on this topic from my book, The Discipleship Opportunity: Leading a Great-Commission Church in a Post-Everything World.
If you would like to dig deeper into this topic, check out chapter 6 of The Discipleship Opportunity, where I unpack—not only what we can do with the consumers in our churches—but how we can preach and speak to them too.
On October 6, 2025, I was delighted to accept the Writer of Colour Award at The Word Awards for my latest book, The Discipleship Opportunity: Leading a Great-Commission Church in a Post-Everything World. As I was writing this book, the question burning in my heart, my soul, and my mind was how we could be more faithful to Jesus’ Great Commission in this post-everything world we’re living in. I’m so grateful to hear all the stories from the pastors and church leaders who have told me about the different ways this book has caused them to rethink and shift how they disciple, preach, and evangelize.
The Word Awards is an annual awards program hosted by The Word Guild to honour the best of Canadian Christian writing from the previous year.
Here’s a link to the press release.
Thank you for your support!
The implication of this is that we’ve all been shaped into perpetual consumers conditioned to expect comfort, convenience, and choice everywhere we go and in all that we do.
As a result, it’s no surprise that this ethos has also seeped into the church.
Just consider this powerful insight on this dilemma from Eugene Peterson’s Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity,
If I receive my primary social identity as a consumer, it follows that my primary expectation of the people I meet is that I get something from them for which I am prepared to pay a price. I buy merchandise from the department store, health from the physician, legal power from the lawyer. Does it not follow that in this kind of society my parishioner will have commercialized expectations of me? None of the honored professions has escaped commercialization, so why should the pastorate? This has produced in our time the opprobrious practice of pastors manipulating their so-called flocks on the same principles that managers use to run supermarkets.
The pastors of America have metamorphosed into a company of shopkeepers, and the shops they keep are churches. They are preoccupied with shopkeeper’s concerns— how to keep the customers happy, how to lure customers away from competitors down the street, how to package the goods so that the customers will lay out more money.
Gosh. No wonder it’s so easy to slip into viewing upset congregants as “customers,” and then as “shopkeepers” to become consumed with “shopkeeper’s concerns—how to keep the customers happy, how to lure customers away from competitors down the street, how to package the goods so that the customers will lay out more money.”
When I was writing The Discipleship Opportunity, there was one chapter in particular that was both the easiest to write and the most convicting for me personally. It was the one where I addressed this spirit of consumerism in the church.
On the one hand, it was the easiest chapter to write because I’ve seen and experienced how the spirit of consumerism has infected and afflicted the church, first-hand. From the way people judge and evaluate our ministries and programs, to how critical people can be about coffee, to how some people can be more focused on our song selection and volume levels than on Jesus, and to the positive, negative, and passive aggressive emails that I get about my sermons, as a pastor it’s so easy to slip into the culturally expected role of being a “shopkeeper.”
On the other hand, writing this chapter was the most convicting because God helped me realize that as much as our congregation may act as “customers” and thereby try to force me into becoming a “shopkeeper” (which I am actually pretty good at doing because I have a lot of previous work experience doing just that), this is incredibly dangerous because it is pastoral malpractice. Our congregations aren’t customers—they are sheep. And as pastors, we aren’t shopkeepers—we are shepherds.
If you view your congregation as customers, it’s easy to either adopt a philosophy where you act like Disney or the Ritz-Carlton, striving to meet their consumeristic needs at all costs, OR act like the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld and say—perhaps too often—”No soup for you!”
But the fact of the matter is that our congregation aren’t customers. They are sheep! And sometimes sheep bite.
Early on, when I got my first scar bite from a fellow sheep (and this wasn’t when I was a pastor), my natural inclination was to get away from others and try to follow Jesus alone. But as it’s so clearly outlined throughout the Scriptures, we can’t actually follow Christ alone. And we can’t actually experience God’s love as he intends for us to unless we learn to love others. “Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.” (1 John 4:11 CSB)
And as a pastor, as I have nursed and bandaged the many scar bites that I’ve received from the sheep that God has entrusted me to shepherd, I have many times wanted to throw and kick those sheep to the curb, yelling “No soup for you!!” In fact, that’s why I wanted to originally title the chapter “Screw the Consumers.” (In the end, my publisher won the discussion, and I went with their suggestion, “Challenging the Consumers.”)
But as I’ve reflected on our calling as Christians, and my calling as a pastor, I have realized that, as much as sheep might bite, we are called to shepherd and challenge the sheep who are in our care. To remind them of who they are in Christ. To remind them of our holy calling in Christ. And to remember that:
So, friends, let’s remember that our congregation aren’t consumers. They are sheep. And sometimes sheep bite. And thanks be to God that we have a great and good shepherd who promises to be with us as we lead the flocks that he has entrusted to our care (Psalm 23).
To dig deeper into this content, see chapter 6 of my book, The Discipleship Opportunity: Leading a Great-Commission Church in a Post-Everything World.
(This is a talk that I gave to our staff at Beulah Alliance Church, elaborating on our Healthy leadership virtue)
For most of us, unforgiveness is perceived as a black-and-white issue. You’ve either forgiven someone or you haven’t. You’ve either said, “I forgive you,” or perhaps, in not so many words, “Screw you.”
But unforgiveness is much more nuanced than saying a few words.
Consider how The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines unforgiving,
And here’s how The Oxford Dictionary defines unforgiving,
Those definitions are insightful because I think all of us have—at some point in our lives—said words that we really didn’t mean. Like when someone asks you, “How are you doing?” How many of you have ever said, “Fine or okay,” but you really weren’t doing fine or okay?
I know I have.
And it wasn’t because I wanted to lie…it’s just because I really didn’t want to get into it at that point…or with that person.
Or, regarding the Florida Panthers beating the Edmonton Oilers, I wonder how many Oilers fans said the nice Canadian thing to speak to someone else, “There’s always next year!” Or, “It’s just hockey.”
When in fact, deep down inside, you were thinking, “I HATE THE PANTHERS. Why in the world does a place like Florida have, not just one hockey team, but two?! I wish Bobrovsky would just get sick or retire!”
“Yes, I forgive you…but I NEVER WANT TO SEE YOUR UGLY FACE AGAIN.”
“Yes, I forgive you…But YOU WILL NEVER GET ANOTHER CHANCE.”
“Yes, I forgive you…But I WILL NEVER PRAY FOR YOU AGAIN.”
Anyone?
I know I have.
But forgiving someone else isn’t just saying the words; it’s actually when your feelings toward them shift from anger to an emotion that feels more neutral. From criticism and contempt to graciously giving them the benefit of the doubt when they make a mistake.
This is why Jesus said, “But I say to you who listen: Love your enemies, do what is good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If anyone hits you on the cheek, offer the other also. And if anyone takes away your coat, don’t hold back your shirt either.” (Luke 6:27-29 CSB)
As disciples of Jesus, we aren’t called to forgive only once, nor seven times, but seventy-seven times or seventy times seven times (Matthew 18:22).
Now the reason isn’t just so that we can be known as friendly people…or because of the importance of unity for our witness, or because unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
No, Jesus actually gives us a deeper reason for forgiveness after he finishes teaching his disciples the Lord’s prayer, where he instructs us to pray, “forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors”:
🫳🏼🎤 (that’s a mic drop emoji if you didn’t pick up on it) 😂😁
At Beulah Alliance Church, here’s how our Healthy leadership virtue is expressed: “We pray for and with one another, give each other the benefit of the doubt, and refuse to hold grudges because as spiritually, emotionally, and relationally healthy Christ followers, we are together on mission.”
Team, we can’t expect to be on mission with one another if we are still holding grudges against people we have supposedly “forgiven” with our words.
We can’t expect to be on mission together if we aren’t willing to give one another the benefit of the doubt.
And we can’t expect to be on mission together if we aren’t willing to pray for one another (Because if you’ve ever prayed for someone who hurt you, you know how hard that is).
Let’s start our small group time together in silent prayer around those three areas. Then I’ll let you know when we can begin discussing these questions together.
Discussion Questions:
That’s right—12 years after graduating with my M.A. in Global Leadership—I’m starting my doctorate! I just got accepted into the Doctor of Ministry program at Western Theological Seminary. So, beginning this summer, I’ll be layering schoolwork on top of my existing and ongoing role and responsibilities as the Lead Pastor of Beulah Alliance Church. And what’s awesome is that I don’t need to relocate to Michigan to do the program. I can do it right from Edmonton.
This interdisciplinary program combining spiritual formation and brain science is the first of its kind, and I’m thrilled to dive deep into how the two areas integrate and learn from the cohort mentors, Dr. Geoff Holsclaw and Cyd Holsclaw.
But this isn’t purely an academic pursuit. Rather, the primary questions that are driving the pursuit of this doctorate for me are the following:
In this post-pandemic, post-truth, post-modern, post-Christian, and post-everything world, how can we lead our churches to effectively disciple people toward Christ-likeness? To lead our people to know Christ, be known by Christ, and to make him known?
Yes, our responsibility is primarily to sow and water seeds, while God is ultimately responsible for making them grow (1 Corinthians 3). And yes, when we sow seeds, they will all fall on different types of ground (Matthew 13), but how can we do our part even more effectively, faithfully, and fruitfully in light of the science behind attachment theory? In light of contemporary research in relational neuroscience? And in light of ancient Christian spiritual practices?
So for the next three years, I’ll be diving deep into:
So that’s it! That’s the announcement.
And I’m thrilled to see how everything I learn will not only integrate into our vision at Beulah to awaken Greater Edmonton to King Jesus, but to also see the people of Alberta, Canada, and the world experience genuine, lasting transformation in and through Jesus Christ.