Week 10 – Church Fight

Adam Fike
Tuesday 3/24

Interviewed – Pastor Mark Deisler on 2/18

Pastor Mark was on the board during the time. There was a great debate over whether the church should build a new sanctuary or a multipurpose room. At that time, the church offered two different services, and the pastor wanted to move to one service. Many people thought they could serve the community better if they built a multipurpose room. There was a lot of heated debate over this issue, and many meetings were held concerning the issue. In the meetings, things often escalated beyond discussion into debate and conflict. People in support of the multipurpose room wanted to keep two services and remain in the current sanctuary. They did not want two sanctuaries when they could have a new multipurpose room that could house a variety of events like receptions, community events, and basketball games.

The senior pastor and key people in leadership already had their mind made up, and the debate became a matter of changing people’s minds. This made many people bitter. Nevertheless, the building plans passed with only about 70% of membership. The church borrowed over $800,000 for the new sanctuary, which was fairly large for a church that size.

A good number of good people left over the decision to build the sanctuary over the multipurpose room. Ministry speaking, the church does not have the facilities to do the types of things the church could do.

There are people to this day that do not agree and won’t give money to any building projects. In this county, there are so many Wesleyan churches that there is a lot of flip-flopping when conflict arises. If people do not get what they want at one church, it is easy to switch.

This could have been avoided if the influential people in leadership positions would have lent a listening ear to the other side. They were influential enough to bring most of the people in the middle to their side. This made the other side feel used and mistreated.