Many variations of “How to Ride a Dead Horse" exist, especially on the Internet. The original author is unknown.  We’ve rewritten and adapted this concept to characterize the mindset of many within the Institutionalized Church with regard to its structure, formality and traditions.  In many cases, churches have held to old forms long after their effectiveness has diminished or ceased entirely.

Institutionalized Church leaders, however, have found a whole range of far more advanced horseback riding strategies to justify riding their Institutionalized dead horse, such as:

1.     Buying a stronger whip.

2.     Declaring, “God told us to ride this horse.”

3.     Threatening the horse with termination / excommunication.

4.     Proclaiming, “This is the way we’ve always ridden this horse.”

5.     Reminding themselves that other churches ride this same kind of horse.

6.     Determining that riders who don’t stay on dead horses are lazy, lack drive, carnal and trouble makers.

7.  Lowering the standards so that dead horses can be included.

8.  Harnessing several dead horses together to increase their speed and call that a "fellowship".

9.  Confessing boldly, “Praise God! This horse is not dead, but alive!” or "This horse is not going down!"

10.  Get their horse a Web site.

11.  Killing all the other horses so the dead one doesn’t stand out.

12.  Taking a positive outlook – pronouncing that the dead horse doesn’t have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead, and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the church’s budget than do some other horses.

13.  Rewriting the expected requirements for all horses.

14.  Stating that other horses are compromisers and apostates, and are not from God.

15.  Remembering all the good times you had while riding that horse.

And one more freebie: When it becomes apparent that the horse is rotting and falling apart and people begin to hop off of it, speak firmly to the remaining riders and quote one of your former leaders by saying: "This horse is not falling apart, it is just shaking lose some dead hairs."

The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians—passed on from generation to generation—says that when you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is simply to dismount. To that we say a  big AMEN!