In America, we are fascinated with celebrities: what they wear, who they’re dating, what they’re eating. We buy their clothes, their make-up, and their perfumes. We see their movies and we buy gossip magazines just to get the latest news on them.

 

Unfortunately, this fascination with celebrities has crossed over into the church world. We love magazines that expose which preacher has fallen from grace and which of their children have been arrested. We love gossip in the church just as much as the world does.

 

It’s funny to me, as both a pastor and a pastor’s wife, when someone that I’m talking with glamorizes the “big name preacher.” I once met a young man while living in Las Vegas and he shared with me that Creflo Dollar was his pastor.  I chuckled to myself and thought, “You live two thousand miles away, how is Creflo Dollar your pastor?! Do you tithe to his church? What do you do at this church to support the work of the ministry? When you need counsel, can you call him and make an appointment?”

 

When we throw out big names like that, we enjoy the emotion it evokes in the listener. It means something if I go to a mega-church. If my pastor is known all over the world, I must be something! I wonder how many people actually attend Bishop T.D. Jakes’ church because that’s where God called them? Or is it because they love to tell people that’s the church they attend? I know believers who love Joyce Meyer and Joel Osteen.  They buy their books and they financially support their ministries.  They take no issue with the houses that they live in or the cars that they drive.  However, if a local pastor gets a new bow tie, we want to know where the money came from to buy it. We have a double standard.  Ministers who we deem “celebrities” should look the part, but our local ministers – those we don’t deem as “celebrities” – we keep them poor as if that keeps them humble.

 

Now, don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against a large ministry. The Bible tells us that we can only receive what has been given to us from heaven. Many large ministries are doing great things for the Kingdom and wonderful things in their communities. My point is to expose our celebrity-obsessed culture within the church so that we may recognize it and be free from it. All of God’s workmen and workwomen are of equal value and importance to Him.

 

We can all have our favorite celebrity preachers and ministries that we like to visit for conferences. But our job as believers is to be connected with the family that God has called us to – whether that is Pastor Paula White or Pastor Local U.S.A. A pastor should not have to make us feel important, and we shouldn’t feel more elevated because our pastor is well known. We should not attend a certain church because that’s the popular thing to do. We are to be where God says we should be. We are the Body of Christ; each joint supports the other. We have gifts that, when connected with others, we are able to use to do great things for the Kingdom. 

 

Find your church, find your pastor, and get plugged in.