When our kids were little, they often fought in the back seat of the car. If our family was just going to the store, they could refrain from harassing each other, but if we took a trip of any length, I’d constantly hear, “Get over on your side!” or “Mom, tell him to stop it!” or “Dad, she hit me – and it hurts!” After a while, knowing in advance what would happen, my wife and I took proactive steps to minimize the noise coming from the middle of the car – like gags. (Just kidding!)
Conflict in a local church is often unavoidable, especially when so many people with varying ways of doing things inhabit the same spaces. But when we know up-front that conflict is likely to surface, we can take proactive steps to minimize its damaging effects.
Last time, I mentioned five predictable times for trouble in a church’s life as taken from Speed Leas’ chapter in the book Mastering Conflict and Controversy. (While the outline comes from Leas, all comments are mine.) Here are times ten through six again:
Number 10: Increase in church membership (or attendance)
Number 9: Loss of church membership (or attendance)
Number 8: The completion of a new building
Number 7: Introduction of baby boomers in the church (or any new generation)
Number 6: Changes in the pastor’s family
Let’s now count down numbers 5 through 1:
Number 5: The pastor’s vacation. Why? Because those who don’t like the pastor can plot against him without his awareness.
Like Uncle Albert in Mary Poppins, I love to laugh. And one of the characters who makes me laugh the most is Brother Biddle, a fictitious pastor who appeared for years in comic strips by Christian cartoonist Rob Suggs. One time, Biddle’s family asked him if they could miss just one Sunday to go away on vacation, so Biddle asked Joe “Crazy Collar” Mazzoli to preach for him. (As the Biddles left for the airport, the whole church turned out to say goodbye with signs like “Let us know if you need more time,” causing his son to comment, “Heck, there’s more people here than for your whole last sermon series combined!”)
Anyway, while the Biddles were away in Europe, Mazzoli was having phenomenal success. He made plans to build a gym and founded a cable TV ministry. While his family was in Salzburg, two goatherders tried to kill Brother Biddle, but while Biddle’s wife didn’t recognize them, Biddle did. They were deacons Hardwick and Howell … from Biddle’s church! Biddle concluded, “I knew I shouldn’t miss a Sunday! Mazzoli must be stopped! We’re going home!”
Like Brother Biddle, pastors sometimes have nightmares about what might happen if they miss too many Sundays in a row, and although board members usually aren’t sent on “search and destroy” missions against their shepherd, a lot of mischief can occur when he’s away. For example, if the governing board or a group of dissidents in the church wants to remove the pastor from office, those plans will be acclerated when the pastor is away. But the opposite can also occur: the entire church can be paralyzed while the pastor is gone, especially if he makes most of the decisions. Careful planning can reduce most conflicts in this category.
Number 4: Change in leadership style. Why? Because people in a church become accustomed to one pastor’s way of leading a ministry and have a tough time adjusting to the next pastor’s style.
I once followed a pastor who was personally authoritative and rather elitist in decision-making. Every major decision was made by the same handful of people. When I became pastor, I laid out the overall direction for the church but used a more participative style. While many people appreciated the way I did things, a few were so used to the previous pastor’s style that they could not adjust to mine. This issue occurs in every church and organization, so it’s predictable – but it takes some people a long time to make the necessary adjustments.
Number 3: Addition of new staff. Why? Because every time a new person joins a church staff, the dynamics of the entire staff change.
A church I pastored once hired a full-time staff member who wasn’t a team player. For example, he held a meeting week after week at the church facility on the same night but continually left the room a mess for the next group. I tried and tried to get him to leave the room clean but he couldn’t understand what the problem was. If we had an event on the church campus after worship on Sunday, the entire staff would stay, serve, and help clean up, but he’d slip off the campus at the first opportunity. The rest of the staff resented his attitude because he seemed aloof from them. And, of course, every time I had to talk with him about these issues, he resented me more and more as well.
For a church to prosper, it needs new staff members, but every time one is hired, not only does the church need to adjust to that person, but so does the pastor and the rest of the staff – and that always causes conflict.
Number 2: Stewardship campaigns/budget time. Why? Because everyone in a church puts a different value on money.
When I left my last church, I moved 35 boxes of files. While watching football yesterday, I made my way through five of those boxes, and I was truly amazed at how many files had to do with money. (My guess is that 75% of the files touched on finances.) If a church’s income is increasing, the governing board may debate whether to hire a new staff member, save money for facility repairs, or put more money into missions. If a church’s revenues are shrinking, the board will be forced to debate what should be cut and by how much. Either scenario can lead to the expression of strong opinions and hurt feelings. Then when that same board presents the budget for the following year to the church, some people go ballistic about unfunded areas while others come unglued about overfunded ones.
If I had to pastor again, I’d prefer to fast forward from September right to December every year and skip the financial planning headaches of October and November (even though they’re my two personal favorite months of the year).
Number 1: Easter. Why? Because Easter is usually the busiest time of the year in a church, especially if it celebrates Good Friday as well.
As a pastor, I always loved Easter Sunday. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the most joyful, uplifting, inspiring, and moving topic in the world. But … preparing for Easter Sunday can be riddled with conflict because everyone wants to look good on Easter.
Think about it: the church needs to be thoroughly cleaned; the refreshments need to be creatively displayed; marketing materials must look perfect; the decorations must be properly festive; the worship team wants to play and sound fantastic; and the pastor wants to preach his best message. While the effort is always worth it, the build-up to Easter is fraught with pitfalls that need to be carefully negotiated. The first Easter had far less conflict than the average Easter in the average church.
May you internalize these predictable times for trouble so that, should conflict emerge, you’ll be able to say, “This isn’t abnormal; this is very, very normal.” May God grant you peace as you live for and serve Him!
Restoring Kingdom Builders 
A View from the Pew
Posted in Change and Conflict in Church, Current Church Issues, Personal Stories, Please Comment! on May 16, 2011| 2 Comments »
Over the past sixteen months, my wife and I have been visiting various churches in the greater Phoenix area. For ten of those months, we’ve been attending CCV – Christ’s Church of the Valley – a mega church in the northern Peoria area. CCV knows what they’re doing and does it all extremely well. We love everything about the church and try not to compare it to other churches that we visit from time-to-time – but sometimes, it’s hard not to do so.
Since all of my pastoring has been done in small and medium-sized churches, I understand them very well and have a good idea of what they need to do to reach the next level. As Rick Warren is fond of saying, it’s harder for a church to go from 100 to 300 in attendance than it is for that same church to go from 1,000 to 3,000.
Let me share with you five ways that a smaller or medium-sized church can make some simple improvements that will help them reach more people for Jesus. This is not intended as an exhaustive list but just some things I’ve been noticing recently:
First, station greeters outside from the parking area into the worship center. Kim and I visited a medium-sized church yesterday and no one said anything to us until a woman gave us our bulletin at the door. Then after we sat down, the pastor’s wife came and said hi to us. But we would have felt much more comfortable with a greeting and a handshake before we got to the door. Even though I’ve been a pastor for eons, I still feel nervous walking up to a new church for the first time. Strategically-placed greeters help alleviate that anxiety more quickly, and a host of good things happen with guests once they relax. CCV does this expertly. We’re greeted by five or six people before we even get to the lobby.
However, these greeters need to just say “hi” or “it’s a great day” or “welcome to our church” rather than do any prying. Whenever people ask our names, they love to say, “Oh, Jim and Kim! That rhymes!” A staff member at a church recently went on-and-on asking Kim about herself and he was practically hyper-ventilating in the process. “It’s SO GOOD to have you today. We hope you’ll come back and see us again SOON!” We couldn’t leave that guy fast enough.
Second, do whatever it takes to have outstanding music. If I were starting a church, the first person I would hire would be a worship director who could attract people who could sing and play well. We live in the American Idol age where everybody expects great music and everybody thinks like a critic. If the music isn’t good, people cringe. If it is, they relax and might sing. From what I’ve been noticing, the better the music is, the more the people in the congregation sing.
I realize that there will be days when the music director is gone and the quality of the music will suffer. But this just argues for the importance of having a deep bench. At CCV, they rotate the worship leaders, the band members, and the vocalists and spread them all over the stage – but they always have at least two guitars. Kim and I recently visited a church where the band used a keyboard, drums, and a bass guitar but didn’t have any guitars – and I cringed all through the worship time.
Third, the service can run between 60 and 75 minutes but not too much longer. If a church is trying to reach Christians, then a service can go on for hours. But if you’re trying to reach unbelievers, 60 minutes is best, and 75 minutes is as long as you can go if the service is good.
The last two churches that we visited had services that both went 90 minutes. Again, that’s fine for the people who go there, but if a church wants to grow, it needs to tighten up the service, especially the transitions. At CCV, every service lasts exactly one hour and you’re left wanting more.
Fourth, avoid mentioning the denomination during the service. We live in a post-denominational age where people care much more about the quality of the local church they attend and far less about the affiliations that church has with headquarters. At a service we recently attended, several of the announcements specifically mentioned denominational doings. Because we aren’t a part of that denomination, the references made us feel like outsiders.
I have a theory: the better a church is doing, the less it mentions its demonination, and the worse its doing, the more it mentions it. (Or the worse a denomination is doing, the more it asks its constituent churches to promote it.) Think about it.
Finally, tell us what the Bible means. Decades ago, I learned this little truth: there is one accurate interpretation of a biblical passage, but scores of personal applications. One interpretation, many applications. When the Holy Spirit inspired the authors of Scripture, He did so with a single intent in mind. John 3:16 doesn’t mean whatever you want it to mean. It means whatever John – as inspired by the Spirit – meant it to mean. When I study a passage, it’s not my job to impose my own views on it (called eisegesis) but to take out of the passage what is actually there (called exegesis).
Let me give you an example. In Revelation 3:20, Jesus spoke these familiar words: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” Who is Jesus talking to in context? Many people believe that Jesus is encouraging unbelievers to open the door of their lives and let Him be their Lord and Savior. But Jesus is speaking to “those whom I love” and those whom “I rebuke and discipline” (verse 19) instead. In other words, Jesus is talking here to believers, not unbelievers – and specificially to believers who have shut Him out of their lives.
We can’t twist Scripture into saying what we want it to say. It’s our job to discern and discover what the Spirit meant by a passage and only then to apply it to our lives.
Why bring this up? Because we’re living in a day where too many preachers are coming up with their own thoughts and then scouring the Bible for support. And in the process, we’re getting borderline heresies and novel teachings that make the teacher famous but cause God’s people to starve spiritually.
The first four ideas above are just my ideas. Feel free to disagree with them. Better yet, prove me wrong. But the last idea is non-negotiable. Surrender that idea and we’re going to have syncretistic Christianity – and we’re already headed in that direction because many pastors only preach what’s culturally acceptable so they can stay popular.
That’s why Jeremiah is my favorite prophet. He told the Lord, “Ah, Sovereign Lord, I do not know how to speak. I am only a child.” The Lord replied, “Do not say, ‘I am only a child.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you.” After touching Jeremiah’s mouth, the Lord told him, “Now, I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.”
Talk about an impossible assignment! It’s far easier to build and to plant than it is to uproot and tear down. But Jeremiah was faithful, and he got a book in the Bible for his trouble.
And that’s where I’m headed right now – to Jeremiah 32. This is “A View from the Pew” signing off.
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