I found a Methodist preacher who takes sides all the time. So far he has told us we can’t post pro life signs on the church lawn because we may offend parishoners, we shouldn’t ever mention God to non believers, we may offend them. And we shouldn’t do any type of mission work because too many people are donating to the mission work, and the preacher wants the church to have a new sound system and a projection screen on the altar. He also took a stand and told me I was not welcome after I told him and his wife that Jesus would have driven them out of the temple with a whip. We had a vibrant youth group and now we don’t have any youth, and its because we were too offensive and don’t have a movie screen he says. The average parishoner age is senior citizen, thanks to him. And I could go on with so much more...
Basically what same thing happened to me. We had not been going to church for while because of moving and my wife had some folks at the Methodist invite us. For 2 years it was good, the pastor was conservative, the people were engaged and great small town folks, and the church vibrant and Book following. The pastor was not an outgoing man but well spoken and educated and preached from the Book every Sunday. Knowing nothing about Methodists (I am a Southern Baptist) I started researching church structure and financial stuff. How the national convention spent money was disturbing. I would discuss these disappointing discoveries with my pastor and he agreed and kept referring to an upcoming battle in the church for power. It was about that time he left to go to an area where his bishops wanted him to revive a church in crisis (pastor had an affair in church family) and he felt it was his calling. The new pastor came and immediately we saw a difference. The hymns we sang, the message content became bland, even the youth group changed. I would bring up topics I had discussed with the previous pastor and was basically told that I was behind the times and the church needed to change. Same stuff, we needed fancy electronics to draw in young people and needed to not be so “in your face” with pushing Jesus. I argued and said, no we need the Word, and he said nobody really wanted to hear fire and brimstone anymore.
Needless to say over the next year the church went from having an average of 80-100 seats filled a Sunday to about 15-20. Youth group went to about 4-5 kids a meeting. After a few months of hearing this guys milk water sermons and discussing with some very dear elderly members who say the hand writing on the wall we left and went back to a baptist church 20 minutes further drive in the next town. Last I heard average age on a Sunday was 65+, mainly elderly that have been and loved that church that won’t leave it. Amazing how fast it can happen.
It sounds as though Jesus Christ would have been unwelcome in his charge.