“Confronted with this kind of violent reaction when they seek to mold their congregations into instruments of evangelism and social healing, pastors gradually settle down and lose interest in being change agents in the church. An unconscious conspiracy arises between their flesh and that of their congregations. It becomes tacitly understood that the laity will give pastors special honor in the exercise of their gifts, if the pastors will agree to leave their congregations’ pre-Christian lifestyles undisturbed and do not call for the mobilization of lay gifts for the work of the kingdom. Pastors are permitted to become ministerial superstars. Their pride is fed as their congregations are permitted to remain herds of sheep in which each has cheerfully turned to his own way.”
—Richard F. Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual Life: An Evangelical Theology of Renewal (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1979), 207. Quoted in Collin Hansen, Timothy Keller: His Spiritual and Intellectual Formation (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2023), 97.
S.W.F. Knecht 