Leadership and Leaders
They walked in as a group—the entire trustee board. They did so after the congregational meeting had begun. They intended to make a point: “We are in charge. We don’t like what is happening. We are going to let our disagreement be known.” That was the opening salvo in one of the more difficult experiences of my interim pastoral career. Leadership usurping power, demanding control, insisting on their rights. It was ugly, and it got uglier.
Over the years, I’ve reflected on those kinds of experiences and have wondered what it would take to ensure they don’t happen again. Tea Party-style rallies and tactics—which achieve nothing but the creation of hard feelings—are nothing new in Christian circles. Fundamentalism is part of American religious culture, and there’s a reason they are called “The Fighting Fundys.” Some churches develop a pattern of this behavior; it becomes their normal routine. People like me tend to flee places like that.
It boils down to spiritual formation. If leaders aren’t shaped, molded, and well on their way to becoming Christ-like at every level of their lives, conflict is inevitable when something arises that they don’t like. This kind of demonstration of power can take many different forms. It might be attempts at a coup, or the entire board (or a single board member) resigning in protest over a decision they don’t support.
We’re not talking about fundamental doctrines such as the deity of Christ or the virgin birth, or other core theological issues. Rather, we’re referring to more difficult church decisions—making cuts to staffing, discontinuing the use of a certain musical instrument, changing the appearance of something, or leading and governing in a way that allows the Great Commission to move forward.
More often than not, the backlash stems from a lack of discipleship at the leadership level. When stakeholders, typically leaders, truly seek the greater good of the congregation, these issues would be resolved. But frequently, they don’t, and the resulting disruption can be devastating. Over the past 12 months, we have witnessed several such situations in churches we’ve worked with.
Our parent organization, Novo, used to say, “It all rises and falls on leadership. As goes the leaders, so goes the church.” More often than not, this is true. It reminds us, as VitalChurch Ministry staff, to invest heavily in training and equipping leaders in our local churches—not only in practical skills but in their spiritual formation.
Recently, one of our interim pastors and I took a class called Emotionally Healthy Leadership. This course addresses the spiritual formation issues often missing in a leader’s life. It was so impactful that we eventually offered it to our entire VitalChurch team and helped cover the cost. The emotional aspect of discipleship is often lacking in the churches we lead. Addressing that piece in our own lives is the essential first step toward being able to effectively address it in others.
