Stepping Down Page 7

  “Nope.”

  “No?”

  Mark repeated, “Nope.”

  “What are you doing tonight?”

  The timer went off. “First thing I’m gonna do is eat this here food you got me. I sure do ‘preciate it, Mamasita.” He grabbed a spoon from the drawer and sank himself into the couch with the food on his lap.

  Sharla followed him to the living room. “So what was today all about? Another power struggle between you and Kit? Or Jackson?”

  He rarely talked church business with Sharla anymore because, quite frankly, she didn’t seem to care much about New Vision. She only seemed to get angrier when he told her about forthcoming initiatives.

  Now Mark jumped at the chance to reason with her and invite her to pray with him on this matter. “It wasn’t a power struggle between me and them. It was between Kit and God, I’m guessing. Of course, Kit lost.”

  “Okay, you have to admit, though—you went old school today,” Sharla pointed out.

  “Honey, Kit’s older than me. He knows what happens when the Holy Spirit takes over. You go with Him.”

  “But Mark, if you plan on someday doing all the stuff you said they used to nag you about—going on television and all—you can’t just change the order of the program and do what you want to do.”

  She remembered. “It’s not what I want to do, it’s what God wants to do,” he corrected her. “Who am I to tell God what He can and cannot do in His own house?”

  “But God is not the father of chaos,” she quoted scripture.

  Mark missed those kinds of conversations with his wife. He took a bite of meat. “I know. I wouldn’t exactly call what happened chaos, though. Did you get a sense that things were…chaotic?”

  “No.”

  “What did you feel?”

  “I don’t know. I just praised God.”

  “Exactly,” he agreed. “Nothing wrong with that. People always come to church to get. How about giving sometimes?”

  Sharla slapped her hands on her thighs. “I’ll leave all this up to you and your people.” She took off toward their bedroom.

  “Wait. Can you bring me a glass of lemonade?” he asked.

  She doubled back to the kitchen. “Now, you knew you were going to need something to drink before you sat down, Mister.”

  She was right. But he liked it better when she got the drink for him. “Thank you, Ma’am.”

  “Mmm hmm.”

  She set the drink on the end table closest to him, buffering with a coaster. “Please don’t fall asleep with this television on.” Snoozing in front of live screens was one of Sharla’s pet peeves.

  “I can’t promise you anything.”

  “Mmm hmm,” she said, rolling her eyes.

  “Babe. For real, though,” he said, seizing her arm gently. “I need you. I need your opinion about things at New Vision.”

  Her lips puckered. “You don’t want to know what I think.”

  “I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”

  “I think you ought to slow this whole thing down,” she reiterated for the umpteenth time.

  “We wouldn’t be able to move into the dream house,” he stated.

  “Yes we could. I could get a job as soon as Amani graduates.”

  “Four years from now?”

  “Just keep everything at the status quo until you are able to better balance your church life and your home life. How hard is that?” she contended, her chin jutting forward.

  Times like these, Mark was completely baffled. Sharla claimed she wanted a husband who gave the minimum at work but got the maximum benefit from work, so she could move into a mini-mansion. She also wanted a husband who was a great father, who attended to her needs all at the same time—if he was interpreting her correctly.

  He snapped the top half of his carryout container on top of the bottom, sat up straight and patted the seat next to him. Now that she seemed rational, he could have a long-overdue conversation with her.

  Sharla followed his directive, sitting with one leg crossed over the other.

  Mark faced her head-on. “Sharla, I’ve got two questions for you. I’m not obligating myself to do what you say, but I want to know the truth. Got me?”

  She nodded.

  “Number one, do you still support me and the ministry of New Vision?”

  Her top leg bounced nervously as she sighed heavily. “Mark, I support you. But I don’t like what the church has done to our family.”

  “That’s fair,” he gave her. “Number two, how, exactly, do you feel I’m lacking as a husband to you and a father to Amani?”

  Again, she hesitated before answering. “I’ll be the first to admit that I am a high-maintenance person. You know my family background is crazy. And you know when we went through that marriage class that my love language is affection and spending time together. Those things can’t be done without physically being with me.”

  He remembered those classes. In fact, he recalled the sense of dread that overcame him when he realized that he and Sharla were nowhere near each other when it came to what they desired from a mate. He wanted domestic support—cooking and cleaning—and sex. She wanted smooching and a whole bunch of talking. How they’d managed to get married in the first place had to be the work of the Lord Himself.

  “As for Amani,” she answered the second part of his question, “I don’t know exactly what a man’s supposed to do with his son, but whatever it is, I can’t do it.”

  Really, Mark didn’t know what “it” was, either. His own father had provided—albeit intermittently and illegally—for their family, which led Carter II to count jail as his second address. But other than a few lectures on how to avoid the cops and cheat con artists at their own game, Mark’s father hadn’t done much by way of training him to be a man.

  Mark knew full well that if it hadn’t been for the Lord keeping him, he would have continued in the tradition of the two Mark Wayne Carters before him, living a life of perpetual hustling and womanizing.

  Mark watched his wife’s backside twitch off to their bedroom, again thankful that she was in the final phase of her mood swing. If he played his cards right, he’d have a certain meeting of his own with her later that night.

  Chapter 12

  Rev. Marshall’s text was more of an FYI than a request to meet at six Monday evening. Mark knew that he couldn’t put it off forever, so he agreed.

  After a full day of prayer, Bible study, reviewing the church’s numbers, responding to email messages, and giving the main address at the Brothers-for-Books inaugural gathering at a local bookstore, Mark barely had enough time to prepare his mind for the meeting with his advisors.

  On his drive back to the church, he decided it was probably just as well that he hadn’t prepared himself. He wanted to be fresh, hear them out without having already practiced his rebuttals. After all, Mark was the founding pastor of New Vision. He was, ultimately, accountable to God for what happened there.

  No one was late for that meeting. In fact, they were all in place ten minutes ahead of time, so Mark convened with prayer accordingly. He’d barely uttered the “Amen” when Rev. Jackson took the floor.

  “I think I speak for all of us when I say you’d be a fool to pull that crap you pulled Sunday ever again,” he spat out the words as though he’d been chewing the nasty bits all day. “We’re all trying to build an empire here, a legacy. Stick with the program.”

  “I second his thoughts,” Kit added.

  Mark could almost see steam forming on Kit’s glasses. The fact that he was still angry even after a 24-hour cooling off period was even more proof that he’d messed up royally after Mark left the church.

  “Pastor-I-I…” Jonathan stumbled through, “I guess we’re all wondering why you left.”

  “I ain’t wonderin’,” Marshall piped up, “he left because he didn’t want us telling him what to do.” He laid his eyes on Mark. “If that’s how you feel about the advisors’ board, then all you gotta do
is say the word. We’ll be out of your way and you can run this church your doggone self.”

  “Gentlemen. Brothers,” Mark slipped into charismatic mode, “there’s no need for us to argue—”

  “Cut it, Carter,” Kit jumped in again. “If you want to run some kind of new age spiritual mumbo jumbo church or even an old holiness fallin’-out-on-the-floor church, that’s fine. Just let us know so we can make a move.”

  Mark had had enough of Kit making tacit reference to the offer he’d supposedly received from Fresh Start. And the fact that Kit had just called him ‘Carter’ instead of Pastor didn’t escape notice. “If you need to bounce, bounce. Don’t let me stop you from doing whatever it is you think you gotta do.”

  Kit took a deep breath, obviously holding back words that weren’t appropriate for the house of God.

  Mark held his breath, too, hoping Kit wouldn’t walk out. He had been with Mark from day one of New Vision. Mark couldn’t imagine continuing without Kit’s help. But by the same token, Mark’s gut instincts wouldn’t dare let Kit have the upper hand.

  Rev. Jackson laced his fingers together, held them behind his head, and leaned back in his chair. He stared at Mark. “What’s really going on with you, brother-in-Christ to brother-in-Christ?”

  Mark decided to do the best he could to explain what was happening inside his heart. These men deserved to know. “God’s changing me. And I think he’s changing the vision for New Vision.”

  “Changing it to what?” Marshall demanded.

  “Changing it from a focus on programs, this so-called empire and even me—back to Jesus.”

  “You don’t think Jesus is a part of what we already do?” Rev. Jackson quizzed.

  Mark laughed slightly. “That’s the problem. He’s a part of what we do, but He’s not the center. He’s like…a sidebar. A footnote.”

  Kit reached into his back pocket and threw a small scrap of paper to the center of the conference table. “Read this.”

  Mark reached his hand forward. Rev. Marshall helped by passing the paper the last few feet. He read the note aloud, “We didn’t come here to get beat down about sin. Keep that in mind.”

  Slightly confused, Mark asked, “What’s this?”

  “A note that was paper-clipped to a hundred dollar bill in the offering plate.”

  “And?” Mark said.

  “And if what you’re preaching is scattering the sheep rather than reeling them in, you have to ask yourself if you’re being a good shepherd,” Kit filled in the blanks.

  “Kit, I’m giving everything I have to this church. I’m ten seconds from losing my family behind this church. Don’t tell me I’m not a good shepherd,” Mark defended himself.

  “You’re missing the point,” Rev. Marshall voiced calmly.

  Taken together with Rev. Jackson’s demeanor, Mark shelved the near-personal beef with Kit long enough to hear the other two out.

  Marshall continued, “Maybe you need to focus on what the research tells us about church growth, solid programs that have been proven to work in today’s busy, ever-changing world. People need stability. Inspiration. They need to be able to relate to what you’re preaching and apply it in a practical way. That’s how we got to where we are now.”

  Mark listened.

  “That’s all we’re trying to say,” Rev. Jackson reasoned. “We’ve come this far by doing what works. Plus, it’s not just about you, Mark. It’s about the souls at stake.”

  The thought of people of New Vision dying and going to hell on his watch scared Mark. Was he preaching over the heads of most of the people in the congregation? Did he make them feel alienated? Was he trying to feed the congregation meat when they were only capable of digesting milk?

  Rev. Jackson and Rev. Marshall had made their points well. “Jonathan, do you have anything to add?”

  Noticeably caught off guard, Jonathan straightened up his glasses and coughed a few times. “Um…yes, I’ve done a lot of reading on church growth in the new millennium. The group of…um…twenty and thirty-year-olds today are called screenagers. They…I guess we…grew up in front of screens, sir. We have low attention spans and we need a lot of interaction in order to stay focused.”

  Mark and the older gentlemen exchanged puzzled glances.

  Jonathan pressed forward “In fact, I was thinking maybe we should put your main points up on the screen in a PowerPoint presentation. It might help people follow along better.”

  Kit pointed at Jonathan. “That’s the kind of stuff I’m talking about. Relate to the people. Meet them where they are. Otherwise, all this talk about sin and death and hell and…whatever else turns people off is going to turn them away. That’s the last thing churches need to do.”

  “What about Jesus?” Mark asked.

  “Nobody’s saying leave Jesus out,” a much calmer Kit explained. “We’re saying find a better way to bring Him in.”

  As eloquent as Kit’s words sounded to the ear, they repelled Mark immediately. He shook his head. “You know, three weeks ago, I might have agreed with you, Kit. But not today. I have to do what God is calling me to do. Maybe we need to do something else. How about if I preach first and third Sundays, and somebody else preaches whatever else you all feel led to preach on second and fourth?”

  Jonathan sharply turned his head. “Sir, that would be…difficult. From a financial perspective.”

  Rev. Jackson nodded. “He’s right. The offering is sometimes down by a third when you don’t preach.”

  “Maybe we could put a stop to letting anyone know who’s preaching,” Marshall recommended. “At least first service wouldn’t know ahead of time.”

  Mark raised his hands in the air. “Are you listening to this? People shouldn’t be coming to New Vision to hear me. They should be coming to hear from God, no matter whose mouth He uses.”

  “I know that and you know that, but obviously they don’t. It is what it is,” Rev. Jackson put an end to Mark’s argument. “The best thing is for you to keep doing what you’ve been doing. Stick with the plan. Everybody at this table wants to see New Vision rise to a higher level. Once we have our thousands and thousands of ducks in a row, perhaps we can ease the people into appreciating different preachers’ styles. Starting with the Wednesday night crowd.”

  Mark noted the simultaneous nods at the table signaled agreement with Jackson’s suggestion. It did sound reasonable.

  “We have to stick together if we ever want to be recognized with the Potter’s Houses and Lakewoods,” Marshall fired them up.

  Mark had to admit, the term “mega-church” did have a nice ring to it. Still, his chest thumped with unease. “I have to be true to what God is calling me to do,” he pressed.

  Jackson leaned forward now. “Do you honestly believe God would lead you to take off—”he swished one hand across the other, “in a direction that leaves a sizeable portion of your congregation behind to be devoured by the enemy?”

  Of all the things said in the meeting that night, these would be the words that chased Mark and held him down until he conceded that, maybe…just maybe he had misunderstood what God wanted him to do.

  Chapter 13

  Thursday morning nearly did Mark in. He sat for hours with the Humbert family, whose son was nearing the end of a nineteen-year battle with cerebral palsy. As friends and fellow church members filed in and out of the room, Mark listened to their awkward, bitter-sweet attempts to comfort the family.

  Mrs. Joyce Hubert, understandably, was taking it hardest. She’d given up her life when her son was born with special needs. Now, her own mother was trying to prepare her for the boy’s imminent death.

  “Baby, he’s tired,” the wise grandmother whispered into Joyce’s ear. “Let him go on.”

  Mark felt drained of all spiritual juice whatsoever. How on earth could he expect to get alone with God and get direction to finish preparing for Sunday? Let alone do a run-through. He wondered how hundreds of thousands of men of the cloth before him had managed to
make it all look so easy. How did they lead congregations, take care of their families, and keep their sanity? No wonder neither Jesus nor Apostle Paul recommended marriage for everyone.

  Still, Mark believed he needed to be grateful and not get caught up in grumbling and complaining. After watching the young Hubert boy hooked up to all those machines, Mark remembered how blessed he was to have a son who had always been able to breathe, sit up, talk and walk in his own power. Thank You, Lord.

  Mark swung by the high school and sat in the stands for half an hour watching Amani’s track practice. He’d been there ten minutes before Amani even saw him, and that was only because someone else pointed him out to Amani. Mark waved a big country wave. Amani barely moved his hand in response, but the joy painted all over his face gave Mark a rush that propelled him through the rest of the day’s tedious obligations.

  The impromptu trip to the track put Mark off schedule by about an hour, which meant he wouldn’t quite get an opportunity to round out the notes for Sunday’s sermon that night. He hoped he wouldn’t have to supplement again with Sermondepot.com.

  Then again, what did it matter? The people didn’t want to hear about Jesus. They didn’t want to hear what God had told him to say, obviously. They wanted to hear about practical things—things they could check off a checklist so God would, in turn, do His part because they had been faithful. A nice, neat system.

  Only problem was, sitting there with the Humberts was a testament to the fact that life doesn’t go by a formula. People needed to hear the truth, and the truth was Jesus. But if people didn’t want to hear about Christ just yet, what was he supposed to do—make them want to? Force the meat down their throats? That didn’t make sense, especially when Jesus Himself doesn’t force His way into people’s lives.

  Nothing made sense, especially not after the meeting Monday. Mark had prayed about this to God, but He seemed to be in talk-to-the-Hand mode.

  He had even tried to talk to Sharla, but she gave the same pat answers she always gave when it came to the church, “Do what you think is right.” Though she was no longer in her funky mood, she still had no interest in seriously discussing New Vision.