Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Conflict with Church Staff’ Category

Why Attack Pastors?

Posted in Church Conflict, Conflict with Church Board, Conflict with Church Staff, Conflict with the Pastor, Pastoral Termination, Please Comment! on August 3, 2011| 4 Comments »

I’ve been reading a book by Gary Pinion called Crushed: The Perilous Side of Ministry.  A pastor for 30 years, Gary knows the dark side of the church firsthand.

He tells the story of a pastor who moved to a church in the South hoping to stay for a lifetime.  The pastor received a 96% affirmative vote from the congregation.  The church had a competent staff, a large bank account, and claimed that all they needed was “a good leader.”

After a short while, the church expanded from one to two services, and the church appeared successful.  But several of the governing leaders began engaging in “guerilla warfare” behind the scenes.

After 21 months, the pastor was shaking hands at the end of the second service when he was asked to go immediately to his office.  When the pastor arrived, he was shocked to see 21 men there who asked for his resignation by 5 pm that evening.

The pastor called aside a man in the group – someone he thought was his friend – and asked, “Why?”  His friend could not give any reason and seemed to be embarrassed to be part of the lynch mob.

Why?  Why do some people attack their pastor?  Why do they verbally crucify him to others?  Why do they start a whispering campaign against him?  Why do they meet in secret, exaggerate charges against him, fail to speak with him directly, and then covertly attempt to force him to resign?  Why?

For starters, some people are angry with God.  They view the pastor as God’s leader and messenger in their church.  They aren’t comfortable verbally attacking God – after all, He’s invisible and inaudible – so they pursue God’s visible and audible servant instead.  My guess is that they aren’t conscious of what they’re doing, but they do it anyway.

When King Herod Antipas arrested, imprisoned, and then executed John the Baptist, the real culprit behind the execution was his new wife, Herodias.  Because John had been telling Herod that “it is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife,” we’re told that Herodias “nursed a grudge against John and wanted to kill him” (Mark 6:18-19).  But John wasn’t the source of the Jewish law: God was.  John was merely God’s messenger.  Some people attack godly leaders – including pastors – because they are angry with God about something.

Second, some people are angry with their father.  Paul told several churches that he was their spiritual father (1 Cor. 4:15; 1 Thess. 2:11) and that they were his spiritual children.  That’s a great metaphor if you sensed that your father loved you when you were a child.  But if your relationship with your dad involved pain, it’s easy to transfer that pain to another father-like figure: the pastor.

When I was a pastor, I didn’t mind if some people viewed me as a father figure.  If a person was raised by an abusive or cruel father, I tried to show them by example that a man can be loving and kind.  But I can think of several situations where I had to say something tough to someone – even though I said it gently – and they reacted with anger against me.  When I thought about it later on, I realized that I may have sounded like their father.  While I don’t think people are conscious of doing this, the pastor usually isn’t aware of the dynamics, either.

Third, some people feel their pastor has slighted them.  In my first pastorate, we had a service every Sunday evening.  One night, there were 25 people present, and I got a brainstorm: let’s go around the room and offer words of encouragement to each person present.  Everyone thought it was a great idea.

The people loved saying kind things about each other and hearing others say positive things about them.  It was only later that I discovered, to my horror, that we had missed Norman completely.  I wish someone had pointed it out, and I didn’t do it on purpose, but the damage was done.  (To his credit, Norman didn’t attack me – but he and his wife slowly vanished from church life.)

This is why I was always careful as a pastor about complimenting individuals in public.  If I thanked the music director for a great song but not his vocalists, they would be upset.  If I thanked a staff member for an achievement but didn’t thank the other staff, they would be upset.  When it comes to hurts, some people are turtles while others are skunks.  When hurt, the turtles – like Norman – pull into their shell.  The skunks – and I could give you a whole list of names! – spray a foul odor on anyone they meet.  The lesson is clear: never slight a skunk!

When Paul wrote Romans 16, he greeted several dozen people by name at the church in Rome.  I wonder if he missed anybody?  If I had one chance to be immortalized in the pages of Scripture, and found out I was slighted … you get the picture.

I’ll share four more reasons people attack their pastors next time.  Can you think of any more?

Read Full Post »

Why Do Staff Flip on Their Pastor?

Posted in Church Conflict, Conflict with Church Staff, Conflict with the Pastor, tagged , , , , on June 29, 2011| 6 Comments »

In my last post, I discussed a problem that seems to be increasingly prevalent in our day: staff members forming alliances with board members or other staff against their pastor.

This kind of behavior is one of the reasons why pastors are being forced to resign from their positions at the rate of 1,300 every month.

Of course, we can find an example of this inside Jesus’ inner circle when Judas collaborated with the Jewish authorities to tell them where Jesus was hiding out the night before He died.

Betraying an innocent man is an evil action, whether it’s Judas flipping on the Messiah or a staff member turning on his pastor.

Theologians have wrestled for centuries about Judas’ motives for turning in Jesus.  Was it purely for the thirty pieces of silver he received?  Was it because Jesus disappointed Judas in some fashion, like not being the political leader he wanted Him to be?  Was it because of Satan’s gradual influence in Judas’ life?

We may never know for sure this side of heaven.  However, let me share with you four reasons why staff members – most often, associate pastors – flip on their supervisor, the senior pastor – and I’m assuming here that the senior pastor is innocent of any major wrongdoing.

First, the associate pastor wants to be a lead pastor.  I wanted to be a pastor when I was nineteen years old, but I knew I’d have to finish college, complete seminary, and be ordained before that would happen.  I was a youth pastor in three churches before ordination, and because none of those churches had associates, I was the top staff member in the church behind the pastor in each situation.  While it was no secret that I wanted to become a pastor, I knew that I had to undergo a process before that would ever occur – and I had a lot to learn.  There was no way I could hurry the process along.  Since I believed that God had called me to preach, it was a matter of waiting for God’s timing.

It never occurred to me to conspire with some board members to “take out” the pastor so that I could become the senior pastor – and no one ever suggested it to me.

However, this scenario is happening more and more in churches, and when it does, my guess is that most people never discover what really happened.  All they know is that the lead pastor resigned and that the board announced that the associate would assume the pastor’s duties – either as an interim or as a pastoral candidate.  Most people never discover that the associate and some board members engineered the whole thing.

A variation on this is that the staff member resigns and starts a new church a short distance away from his former church.  The core group for the new church is almost exclusively composed of friends from the ministry he just left.  This kind of church plant creates pain for all parties that lasts for years.

Second, the associate chooses to rebel against the lead pastor.  Senior pastors all have different management styles.  Of the five I served under, only one was directive, while the others let me run my own ministry.  The only pastor who really gave me direct orders was the first one – and I did my best to do what he said.

As a pastor, I tried to hire staff members who were self-starters and who could do their job better than I could.  While I gave them general direction, I rarely gave them orders – and when I did, they usually didn’t like it.

Here’s my theory: when a pastor hires a staff member, he often does a “sales job” to convince that person to come aboard.  Sometimes the sales job continues for a few months as the pastor acclimates the associate to the ministry.

But when the pastor has to correct the associate for any reason, he becomes upset and thinks that the lead pastor has turned on him.  Looking back over my ministry, I have found that this was often the key moment in our relationship.  In my mind, I was just trying to make their ministry better, but in their mind, I was criticizing them needlessly.

When I was in eighth grade, I had a math teacher named Mr. Heymers.  Even though he was young in age and short in stature, he started the year using a firm tone and letting us know in precise terms what he expected from us.  Most of us were scared of Mr. Heymers at first, but as the year progressed, he loosened up a lot.  He became the best math teacher I ever had.

When I supervised staff, I may have started a bit too loose, so when I eventually had to get firm about something, some staff members couldn’t handle it – and they went in search of allies.

By the way, I believe that if a staff member is given a direct order by the senior pastor (provided he’s not asking him or her to sin), and the staff member refuses to carry out the senior pastor’s directive, the staff member is guilty of insubordination and subject to dismissal.  While I never fired a staff member for this reason, in several cases, maybe I should have.

Third, the associate has an immature spouse.  Which of the following associate pastors has the best chance for success?

Associate A is married to a woman who never wanted to be a pastor’s wife.  She has a high opinion of her husband and an even higher opinion of herself.  She constantly tells her husband things like, “You’re a better preacher than the lead pastor.  You’re a better leader.  You work harder than he does.  You should receive more recognition.  You should be paid more.”  And when her husband comes home and says he had a disagreement with the senior pastor, she becomes angry and complains about the pastor to family and friends – most of whom take her side.

Associate B is married to a woman who believes she was called to be a pastor’s wife.  While she believes her husband is a gifted man, she constantly encourages him to work with the senior pastor in collaboration, not competition.  She tells him often, “Our pastor is a good preacher, and I thank God for him.  You’re a good preacher too, although you’re both different.  You’re a wonderful leader as well, although you still have some issues to work on.  While I wish you made more money, our day will come.”  And when her husband tells her about a disagreement that he had with the lead pastor, she tries to get him to see his supervisor’s viewpoint as well as understanding his.

The first associate is far more susceptible to flipping on the senior pastor because of an entitlement mentality.  The second associate can look forward to a long career in ministry because he’s waiting for God to elevate him.

Fourth, the associate starts collaborating with a board or staff member.  If an associate has problems with the senior pastor – and I’ve been in this position myself – he has four options: (a) prayerfully submit to the pastor’s wishes, (b) discuss the situation directly with the pastor, (c) seek counsel from someone outside the church (like a counselor, a pastoral colleague, or a seminary professor), or (d) leave that ministry.  If the associate doesn’t feel he can speak directly with the pastor (or has tried but become frustrated), he may look around the church for sympathetic ears and “triangle” someone into their situation.  This is where division starts.

Once the associate finds this person, then (a) he stops working on his relationship with the senior pastor, and (b) his new collaborator carries his burden for him.  In fact, the collaborator may very well pass on the associate’s complaints to other board or staff members – and over time, a consensus may form: the senior pastor has to go.

The lead pastor’s offense?  “He hurt and upset the associate pastor – whom many of us love very much.”

Let me share two possible solutions for this perennial problem:

First, if the associate cannot support the senior pastor anymore, he should resign as soon as possible.  Don’t stay in the church and undermine the pastor, forcing him to leave – the associate should leave quietly.  It is not up to the senior pastor to adjust to the staff – it is up to the staff to adjust to the senior pastor.

Second, the associate pastor may choose to admit his mistakes to both God and the senior pastor and renegotiate their relationship.  This is possible only if the associate hasn’t already complained to others inside the church about the lead pastor.  A humble, teachable spirit works wonders.

What are your thoughts on this issue?

Read Full Post »

Anatomy of a Church Staff Betrayal

Posted in Church Conflict, Conflict with Church Staff, Jim's Ten Favorite Articles, tagged , , , , , on June 27, 2011| Leave a Comment »

There is a problem in Christian churches that I keep hearing about.  It’s not an issue that most of us think about very often, if at all, but it’s one that demands attention if the kingdom of God is to advance in our day.

How loyal should staff members be to the senior/lead pastor?

Throughout my more than three decades in church ministry, I’ve viewed this issue from both sides.

As a staff member, I did not always agree with the senior pastor, and I served under five of them.  Sometimes I didn’t like what he said from the pulpit.  Other times I disagreed with his private assessment of the direction the church needed to go.  One pastor I worked with worked way too hard.  Another hardly worked at all.

Being the Number Two Man in each of these churches placed me in a position of trust.  I saw and heard things that few other people knew about.

But that was the whole point.  I was hired for those positions because the lead pastor felt he could trust me, and I always believed it was my job to reciprocate that trust.

This was especially a problem when someone from the church tried to “triangle” me into a problem that they had with the pastor.

In one church, a man approached me and made a threat against the pastor.  I was uncertain if he wanted me to join his cause or pass the message on to the pastor himself.  When our conversation was finished, he knew that I would not join his cause.

How could I ever do that?  In all five churches, the pastor chose me to serve alongside him, and I chose to serve with him as well.  In my mind, we were a team – as long as I kept doing my job.

In each situation, I worked for the pastor, and the pastor worked for the board.  I did not work for the board, and the pastor did not work for me.

While I privately had reservations about some of the things my pastors did and said, I kept those to myself.  He needed to know that if everyone in the church turned on him, he’d have at least one person standing by his side.

So when I became a pastor myself, I was able to see the pastor-staff relationship from both sides.  But the staff members – none of whom had ever been a pastor themselves – were only able to see the relationship from their side.

And some of them made choices that eventually demonstrated their disloyalty.

Let me give you an example of the kind of problems that pastors are having today with staff members – especially associate pastors.

Jack has been the pastor of a church for three years.  At first, he was able to juggle all the leadership, administrative, teaching, counseling, and pastoral duties, but the church gradually grew to the point he couldn’t handle things anymore.  Both Jack and the governing board agreed that they should hire an associate pastor as soon as possible.

So the board appointed a search team, and since there weren’t any suitable prospects inside the church, the team eventually recommended several candidates from the outside to Jack, who settled on one in particular.  Since the top choice had some concerns about coming to the church, Jack engaged in a sales job that proved successful.

While still in sales mode, Jack welcomed the associate to the church and spoke glowingly of the church’s future and the way the associate could make a difference with his gifts.  And at first, that’s exactly what happened.

But just a couple months after the associate’s arrival, Jack began to notice some things that bothered him.  For starters, the associate had a habit of showing up late on Sundays – and then he’d leave as soon as the last service was done.  Jack believed it was important for all staff members to mingle with the congregation on Sundays, but the associate just wasn’t doing it.

So Jack spoke to him about it.  The associate promised to change, but a couple weeks later, he was doing the same thing.

In addition, the associate left a mess everywhere he went.  If he used a room for a meeting, the next person to use the room would complain that they had to spend 15 minutes cleaning up before they could arrange the room the way they wanted.

Once again, Jack spoke to the associate directly and swiftly, and the associate promised he would change, but a few weeks later, he reverted to his previous behavior.

Now every staff member has their flaws.  Some are messy with rooms but incredibly effective with people.  Others hang out at the church all day but never get anything done.

The wise pastor – conscious of his own failings – has to decide which issues he’s going to press and which he’s going to let go.  He has to both model and set the boundaries.

And he has to treat all staff members with fairness.  If he requires all staff members to show up at 8:15 am on Sundays, then the associate needs to show up at 8:15 as well – because if he shows up at 8:50 instead, the pastor will hear about it from the other staff members – guaranteed.

As the months went by, the pastor spent a lot of time with the associate pastor, discussing the church’s future and trying to plug holes in the ministry.  It appeared as if the two of them had negotiated their differences and were working well together.

But after the pastor returned from a vacation, he discovered that the associate had allowed people to do things that the senior pastor expressly forbade.  So the senior pastor sat down with the associate to discuss what happened.  During their time together, the associate demonstrated insubordination and defiantly said that his decisions were correct and should not have been questioned.

The senior pastor was shaken.  While the associate deserved to be fired, the pastor realized that he’d need board support to take that action.  If the board backed him up, the senior pastor knew that some people would leave the church and that momentum would grind to a halt – at least for a few months.  But if the board didn’t back up the pastor, wouldn’t that just empower the associate all the more?

So for the time being, the lead pastor did nothing but pray and seek counsel from colleagues outside the church.

But while the senior pastor waited for divine wisdom, the associate went on the offensive.

Knowing that the senior pastor would have to go to the board to dismiss him, the associate contacted several board members that he sensed were on his side and told them he was having trouble with the lead pastor.  He told these men that he couldn’t sleep, that his wife was barely functioning, that his kids were feeling the stress, and that he was thinking about leaving the church because of the senior pastor.

This is the point at which the entire future of the church is at stake.

If the board members take the side of the associate pastor, the senior pastor’s future in that church is in serious jeopardy.

If the board members take the side of the senior pastor, the associate pastor’s fate is probably sealed as well.

The best decision for the church is for the board members to support the senior pastor.  If they do, the associate won’t have many options left.  He can either apologize to the senior pastor and vow to fully support him or make plans to leave the church.

The worst decision for the church is for the board members to support the associate pastor.  If they do, then they have betrayed their senior pastor and their decision will eventually manifest itself.  If the senior pastor comes to a board meeting to discuss his problems with the associate, the board members who met with the associate will either fail to support their pastor or veto any recommendation for dismissal.

Protestant churches are designed for the lead pastor to work closely with the church’s governing board.  In most cases, staff members – including the associate pastor – work directly for the senior pastor and do not attend board meetings.

The senior pastor is the key to everything.  He must get along with both the board and the staff.

But if staff members form covert alliances with other staff or board members against the senior pastor – that church, and its entire leadership structure – is in serious trouble, and ripe for a satanic invasion.

I do not pretend to offer easy answers for these situations.  Sometimes if the key players pull back and look at matters more objectively, they can work things out.

But these situations are usually about one thing, and one thing only: who is in charge of the church?

I’ll write more about this issue in my next article.

Read Full Post »

Following a Successful Leader

Posted in Church Conflict, Conflict with Church Staff, Conflict with the Pastor, Personal Stories on May 18, 2011| 2 Comments »

“Never follow someone successful.”

That advice was given to me and seven of my classmates when I took a class on managing church conflict in seminary.  Our instructor was a retired army colonel who seemed to know what he was talking about.

I learned this the hard way at the last church where I was a youth pastor.

The previous youth pastor (let’s call him Bob) was a friend of mine who was moving to another state to complete seminary.  We had known each other off and on for quite a while.  As I recall, he had a hand in recommending me to be his successor.

I had many friends in that church already.  The search team was very positive toward me.  It seemed like a good fit.

But after Bob left, I was unaware of the affection that the adult leaders and the young people had for him.  Some of them practically worshiped him.  One girl told me, “I feel sorry for you.”  An adult leader told me, “You’re just so … different” – implying that there was something wrong with me.  There were even signs of rebellion among the ranks.

Since I had never been through this experience before, I began to feel tinges of jealousy toward Bob.  I didn’t really know why he was viewed as being godlike and why I was held in contempt by certain people.

One Christmas, Bob came home from school and was scheduled to speak on a Sunday morning.  You would have thought that Jesus was appearing live on stage.  There was a buzz throughout the campus that day that I didn’t know how to handle.

Years later, Bob and I got together for a meal, and I told him about his near-saint status inside the church and what a challenge that was for me.  We both had a good laugh about it.

But I wasn’t laughing at the time.

However, I learned some valuable lessons through that experience that I couldn’t have learned any other way.  How can a Christian leader stay sane when following someone successful?

First, realize some people grieve the loss of a spiritual leader for a long time.  I had a youth pastor that I greatly admired when I was at Biola.  Since he was in seminary, sometimes we’d ride back to the church together after school.  I could talk to him for hours.  He was smart, human, and funny – and he knew his Bible well.  I picked his brain about everything.  (One time, we tossed a Frisbee down the center aisle of the church while talking.  Then I went up to the balcony and tried to throw the Frisbee into the baptistry.  We called our game BapFrisbee.)

My youth pastor meant the world to me.  When he graduated from seminary and took a church in Colorado, it hurt – a lot.  He was my spiritual mentor, my go-to guy when I got stuck in life.

Darrell, I will never, ever forget you.  Without you, I would probably still be flipping burgers at McDonald’s.

Although I became the church’s youth pastor after Darrell left, I never felt any sense of competition toward him.  As far as I was concerned, he could do no wrong.

And that’s how many of the kids felt about Bob.  He had taught them God’s Word, played crazy games with them, led them to Christ, and listened to their problems.  He had earned the right to be greatly loved over time, while I had not.  I slowly began to understand why they felt the way they did about him.

Second, determine to be yourself.  Bob couldn’t be me, and I couldn’t be Bob.  We were completely different individuals.  But I think it was difficult for some people to see that.

After a while, Bob became predictable to the adult youth leaders and the kids.  They learned to understand his humor.  They could tell when he was upset.  They became accustomed to his teaching style.  And then all of a sudden, Bob was gone, and I was taking his place.  At first, I wasn’t predictable.  My personality, leadership style, and methodology weren’t better or worse than Bob’s – just different.  Some people were just off balance around me.  While that bothered me, I couldn’t be a Bob clone.

There were times during the first year after Bob left when I just wanted to quit.  But slowly, changes began to occur because …

Third, expect that as a new leader, you will gain new followers.  Some of Bob’s biggest supporters gradually dropped out, moved away, or left the church, so they weren’t around forever.  And some of the new Jr. High kids didn’t really know Bob at all, so I was their first youth pastor.  Then some new students came to the church, and I instantly became their youth leader as well.

There was a group of high school and college guys in that church that I really loved.  We played sports and went to ballgames together.  They meant so much to me.  Some of us became friends for life.

I learned that youth groups, like churches, never remain static.  They are constantly turning over, maybe 10-20% per year.  If a leader just hangs in there, most of his opposition will eventually leave – and most newcomers will become supportive.  The process just takes time.

Fourth, pave the way so someone can succeed you.  When I finally left my last youth pastorate after 3 1/2 years, I truly loved the adult leaders and the students.  My wife and I sensed a great outpouring of love as we prepared to move to Northern California, a response we couldn’t have envisioned just three years before when I was chasing a ghost.

Now someone had to follow me.

So on my last Sunday, I took a few minutes to encourage the congregation to love my successor the way they had loved me.  I didn’t want anyone to go through the hell that I had gone through.

I learned a lot about following someone successful, so much so that those lessons have stayed with me for the rest of my ministry.  And I especially learned this lesson:

If they loved your predecessor, most people will gradually come to love you.

Finally, remember John 3:30.  For a few months, John the Baptist was the biggest star in all of Israel.  His appearance became iconic.  His preaching drew crowds.  His message sparked debates.  Arising out of nowhere, John had become THE MAN in the land.

And then Jesus came along.

Suddenly, the crowds left John and began following Jesus.  It would have hurt a lesser man.

Someone told me recently about a man who succeeded a well-known Bible teacher as pastor.  This Bible teacher had his own unique speaking and writing style that endeared him to thousands.  I have many of his books and once subscribed to his messages on cassette.  He would have been a tough act for anyone to follow.  After a few years, his successor resigned and became very upset about the way he was treated.

I can understand why he might have felt that way.  It’s unfair to be compared to someone else when you’re just trying to be yourself.

But remarkably, John adopted an alternative viewpoint.

John knew his role.  It wasn’t to be the Messiah.  It was to pave the way for Israel’s Messiah.  When the crowds left John and followed Jesus, John didn’t become jealous because that was the plan all along.

In John 3:30, John said, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

Those are the best words I’ve ever run across for dealing with the whole predecessor-successor thing.  There’s a time for me to be in the spotlight followed by a time when the spotlight needs to shine on someone else.  Only a narcissist would insist that the spotlight shine on him forever.

But John was far from a narcissist.  He was truly humble in the best sense of the word.

In essence, John said, “Who gives a rip what people think about me?  I only care what people think about Jesus.”

I was once in a church where there was a little plaque fastened to the pulpit where only the preacher could see it.  It served as a reminder why we were all there in the first place.

The plaque said simply, “Sir, We Must See Jesus.”

I couldn’t say it any better myself.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts