Latest / The Church Renewal Podcast / Transitions: Trust, Anxiety & the Waiting Place

Transcript

Transitions: Trust, Anxiety & the Waiting Place · The Church Renewal Podcast

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Church Renewal Podcast.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_03: I'm Matt.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_03: I'm Jeremy.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Leadership transitions are always anxious moments for congregations, but they also reveal the deeper systemic health of the church.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: In this episode, Jeremy, Matt, and special guest Dr.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Ken Quick unpack how transitions expose unresolved issues of trust, communication, and power dynamics.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: Using family system theory, they explore how boards can either react with defensiveness or step forward with separating presence of honesty and courage.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: The conversation highlights how unacknowledged experience shape current distance, why repentance and responsibility are necessary, and how the gospel reframes leadership in times of difficulty.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Together, they remind leaders that the waiting place of transition is not wasted.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: It is the very moment when God calls his people to clarity, humility, and renewal.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_03: We're already recording.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_03: But we have the the Oh, wait, there's more.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_03: There is.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: If you buy that, Dr.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_03: Quick is with us again and is joining us for this conversation, not specifically as an interview, but we're we're blessed to have and thrilled to have you with us again, Dr.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: Quick.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you very much.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_03: Good to be here.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_03: We are going to talk today about uh specifically, we're gonna dive down a little bit deeper.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_03: Um, we try with the podcast here to both give the theoretical high-level view, but also to get down to some of some of the nitty-gritty and direct application.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_03: Again, process not content, but content is important.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_03: Today, Matt, we're talking of specifically about the transition period.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_03: And this isn't necessarily just the pastoral search, but that that time in a church's life when there has to be, for whatever reason, good or bad, a passing of the baton from one pastor to another, one leader to another.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_03: This is a time of high anxiety.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_03: Just by definition.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_03: What about this period that brings anxiety out in a church?
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_03: And let's go from there to talk about uh how we can both proactively prepare churches for a time that will come and some of the things to uh some of the do's and don'ts, if you will, for how to walk through this in a way that sets your church up for success.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, so so just remind the listeners what anxiety is.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_04: So uh the easiest way for me, at least to think about anxiety experienced in a group, is to think about a school of fish, and that when one fish uh reacts to something and they flinch, that the whole school flinches.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_04: And so the first fish that flinches is uh you understand that as anxious in the system, but anxiety for the one fish flinches instead of um dealing with his anxiety or her anxiety, then the whole system flinches and anxiety radiates throughout the system.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so that's a reminder of a definition.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_04: So why uh why are transitions anxious times?
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_04: Because everything is up for grabs, and many times the board has not done a good job with communication.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_04: Many times they don't have a plan.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_04: Um, sometimes the leadership board has lost the trust of the congregation, and that's anxious because if the pastor's gone, which he is, and the board's lost trust, that is those are anxious times.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_02: You've never seen this before, have you, Dr.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_02: Quick?
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's uh you know, and the nature of trust is that do I believe that these guys who have authority or power over me uh or power to make decisions that affect me, do I believe they have my best interest in mind?
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_02: And if I don't believe they do, then yes, anxiety is the impact of that.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's interesting because I think that many times when we're talking about churches, and like, how do we get trust back?
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_04: You know, and and we talk about primarily we talk about care and communication, and that communication is a form of caring.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_04: That if you walk towards the sheep and say, We want to hear you, um, if you try and help board members, shepherds, elders think of themselves with their arms on the fence of the pen looking in at anxious sheep and trying to figure out how would you help them be less anxious?
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_04: Well, you would you would walk towards them, you would talk to them, sheep, hear my voice and follow me, right?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_04: So you're you're trying to help them hear the voice of Jesus through you.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_04: That that's that's the way this is supposed to work, is that people experience Jesus through the way that we shepherd.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but that's not a lot of times the way that that particularly when we call it a board, that a board thinks about sadly their role.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_05: Right.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_04: That they think about their role as um, we're here to and and it and there is a role setting direction, setting goals, um, having vision.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_04: And I I sound dismissive, but we teach churches how to do that.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not dismissive.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_04: It's just that it's it's secondary because if you don't have sheep to go with you, all of that is pointless, right?
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_04: You know, you're just taking a walk in the woods by yourself at that point, you're not really leading.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_04: So, how do you, you know, how how would you say that quick, how how how does a board regain that trust in transition?
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_04: How have you tried to help boards do that?
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, again, there uh just uh family systems teach us that history has an awful lot to do with why things are happening in the present.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: And um I think the scripture teaches that as well.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: So that uh the sins of Jeroboam are cat, you know, the the the congregation of Israel, Northern Kingdom is responsible for the sins of Jeroboam.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_02: Every leader that steps onto the stage is responsible for the sins of Jeroboam, and nobody's ever taking responsibility for the sins of Jeroboam.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so the fact that the board has not does not have the trust of the congregation goes back to an event.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_02: It was lost at some point, it was lost at some point, and I've got to know what that event was.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_02: Did we violate the constitution?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_02: Did we promise something we didn't follow through on?
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: Did we uh did one of our members uh abscond with funds?
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_02: Did one of our members uh commit adultery and wasn't disciplined?
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: So something, something broke trust.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_03: Is it as is it as simple as where did we either act when we should not have or fail to act when we should have?
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_02: Certainly that can can be uh would that capture all of them?
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_02: I think about it, but it might.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it might, it might.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_03: That's interesting.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_03: So as you were talking, man, I'm thinking about Eric Erickson, and I'm thinking about as he talks about the stages of development, the first stage is he describes this conflict that children go through at a very young age between trust and mistrust.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_03: And the way that you know my uh simple description of this is when a child cries, the child is implicitly asking, Are you going to care for me?
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_03: Are you gonna come to me and take care of me?
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_03: Which is what we talked about earlier.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_03: It's a bit at some point as a parent, I remember going from hearing that cry as a request for help to a statement of failure on my part.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_03: And when that happened, my response to that cry went from one of compassion to one of anger.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_03: Because the meaning was different.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_03: I the I assumed the meaning was different.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_03: Right, right, right.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_03: You took it differently.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_03: Right, right.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_03: You took it differently.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_03: And all of a sudden, I started answering the question that was being asked of me in a way that gave an answer that I did not intend to give.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_03: So I I'm thinking about your head.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_03: Because we we we look at the lack of communication, okay, as an example.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_03: And we get angry, but you know, the the congregation gets angry and they start talking about the fact that the the elders are it's all smoke and mirrors, it's all behind closed doors, we don't know what's going on, bad things have happened, we they hand things down from on high like they're giving us the ten commandments or something.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_03: And it's very easy for me as a father to hear that kind of criticism from someone who is subordinate to me, my children, my wife, yeah, you failed, yeah, and say, You're being rebellious, you're dishonoring my authority, you're blah blah blah blah blah, me.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_03: Right, protect me in my position.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_03: Instead of hearing that and hearing you feel scared, you feel unprotected, and you're asking me, Hey, are you do you see me?
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_03: Are you gonna protect me?
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_03: I had this with my wife just the other day.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_03: I invited my oldest son to watch a movie.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_03: My wife and I had talked about some movies a few weeks earlier.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_03: I had said, Hey, what about this movie?
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_03: And she's like, No, definitely not.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_03: That's where we left it.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_03: So all she knows is she's going to bed, and my son comes up and says, I guess I'm gonna watch a movie with Papa now.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_03: And she has no idea what it is.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_03: But last thing she knows is it was a movie she did not sign off on.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_04: Uh huh.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_03: And now she doesn't know.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_03: Am I just moving ahead?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_03: And we're talking the next morning.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_03: I was like, hey, I saw you called my phone last night.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_03: My phone was already upstairs.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_03: What was up?
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_03: She's like, it's the movie.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't know what it was, and I had to go to bed thinking, is he just gonna, hey, my wife's in bed and I'll do whatever I want.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_03: And I could hear this an accusation.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_03: And a part of me did.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_03: A bigger part of me had to be honest with myself and say, no, I have I've given you a legitimate grounds to ask that question.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_03: And now I can feel this as an accusation, I can feel this as a mistrust, or I can hear this as a question.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_03: It's a bid, as uh John and Julie say.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_03: And I can answer that bid, I can lean in towards that and say, I get that you would feel that way, but I wouldn't do that.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_03: That's all I said.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_03: I wouldn't do that to you.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm not gonna do that.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_03: And that that was sufficient in that moment to answer that question so that we could then move on to bigger and harder things.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_03: But it it it required that uh acknowledgement, a twofold thing on my part.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_03: One, the acknowledgement, I have given a basis for you to mistrust me.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_03: And B, you're asking the question, Are you gonna care about me right now?
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_04: And I think in transition, many times I think the sheep are looking to the under shepherds and s and they're they're making bids, they're speaking their fears.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, they feel anxious, but sometimes the way they express that, because a transition represents a change and change is loss, and loss puts people into grief.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_04: The way that people respond to their grief that's an overflow of change, varies.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_04: And I think that for leaders, we're trying to help them in transition to keep their heads to to do functionally what you did with Hannah, but to do it with their own with the sheep in their congregation is to go.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_04: There's a reason that you would feel mistrustful in this moment.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_04: Um so I'm gonna walk towards you.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_04: I'm gonna hear the cries of the sheep, but I'm not gonna take it as as I'm being insulted.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not gonna take it as though you're questioning my integrity.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not gonna take it as though somehow that I failed.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_04: I'm just gonna take it as this is an opportunity to walk towards you.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_04: It's interesting, this potential client that I talked to today, uh, the elder who's my contact with this, with this client, um, he was saying, I'm kind of guessing there's gonna be some things for us as an elder board to own and to and to repent of.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm like, if you're like most of the churches we've worked with, yes.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_04: And to me, that's actually hopeful.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_04: It is.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, it's it's it's an this is an it's gonna be an anxious system.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_04: Um the last pastor left after a series of shocks, is the way that I would put it.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_04: Things that happened in the congregation, decisions, some new directions, kinds of things.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_04: And and um the senior pastor looked for another opportunity and took it, and they thought maybe the associate pastor would take over from the senior pastor, and he's gonna go and plant church somewhere else.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_04: And so they're they've experienced this series of shocks, and they're trying to figure it that's it's it's unstable.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_04: I think that one of the big things for for elderboards in transition is will you listen to the cries of the sheep?
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_04: Will you listen to their to their pain and treat it not as an assault on your honor or your position, but as bid as as request from the sheep for attention.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_04: And I think that that's that it's interesting.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_04: I know that probably maybe sounds very simplistic to listeners, but it's understandable that there's anxiety in transition.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_04: It's not horribly difficult to react well to that anxiety, but it absolutely requires moving towards the sheep.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_04: And that's unfamiliar.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_04: And it's too bad that it's unfamiliar.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_04: But it is.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_04: Does that strike you right, Dr.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: Q?
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: That that's yeah.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I I recall, I think sometimes pastors don't reflect on what they're seeing.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, uh we know there's something wrong, but we don't really reflect on what could possibly be causing this.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_02: You know, what's at the heart of it?
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_02: I remember our church, um, you'll laugh at this, but uh we had our business meetings on Sunday mornings after our service when we had had communion.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_02: And the thinking of the leadership was that if our church had a kind had a chance to be spiritual, it was after communion, it would be after communion.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm sure your audience is laughing at that too.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_02: But uh so so we had a business meeting to try and pass a budget.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_02: And oh, the rancor that immediately arose as they tried to get this budget passed, and uh we knew after about an hour and a half of wrangling that if we called a vote, it would not pass and and we'd be stuck.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: So they stopped the meeting and said, We will meet next Sunday and discuss this further.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_02: But what I saw was suspicion.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_02: What I saw was uh, you know, what I heard were accusations, uh, and what really manifested itself was a total lack of trust in the leadership.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_02: They're up to something, they're up to something, yeah.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: They're trying to pull something on us, and you know, and I knew these guys.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, they these were godly men I had on my board, they were they were good guys.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_02: So the second meeting, I didn't tell my board I was gonna do this.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_02: I wrote a letter to the church and I presented it.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, I said, before we get started on this, I just have something I would like to say.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: So I called my board members out by name and had them stand.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I said to the congregation, which one of these men don't you trust?
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_02: Point them out.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_02: Tell us who it is that you don't trust on the board, and we'll remove them.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_02: Because what you're saying by the way you're reacting is that that this board has done something that has obviously destroyed your trust in them, their ability to do that.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_02: What I didn't understand at that point, because I had not had my eyes opened and and heart kind of open to understand the dynamics, is that it wasn't about those individual board members.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_02: They they would have agreed that they they were all good and godly men.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_02: It was the board.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_02: It was when they stepped into that role as a board member, they didn't trust anyone in that role.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_02: Anyone?
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_02: Anyone interesting.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_02: And it was because of things that had happened 15, 20 years before that.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_03: That's got to be content.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_03: That's definitely in process.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_04: It's there's there's a church that we're um we have a transitional pastor at right now.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_04: Let's see if I can leave this flat enough so that it's the the the guilty are left out.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_04: Um where um as it's been described to us, this is a newer client, so we're we're only a couple months into an engagement with this with this church.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but the the pastor had been there for a number of years.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_04: Um, evidently it was a pastor-dominated church, right?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_04: Typically, power can rest in three places in a congregation.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_04: It can rest in the congregation, it can rest um in the elder board, or it can rest usually in the pastor, one of those three places, typically, right?
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and at least healthy church, uh, we would describe from flourish's perspective, it should be in a plural eldership, right?
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_04: And whether that's expressed in a congregational form of government or presiderian form of government or whatever, but uh healthy plural eldership is what we see in the New Testament.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_04: And so it's been interesting because this church, which had a pastor-dominated model and recently came into a Presbyterian denomination, um, is now really struggling because it doesn't, it's anxious and it doesn't know how to react because a transitional pastor is not a pastor-dominated model, right?
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_04: It's it's there for the health of the elder board.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_04: But is it going to be uh, you know, because the contr the congregation was um, you know, in a pastor-dominated model, both the board and the congregation are dismissed, right?
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_04: They're they're dealt with dismissively.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_04: So you you expect people to sort of come up in arms, if you will.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_04: And that's exactly what's happened.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_04: And so, how do you help?
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_04: We're in the situation of how do you help them get not to a different distortion, right?
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_04: But to something that's healthy and healthy and good.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and it's that it's that history, but it's it's incredibly anxious.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_04: There's charges against elders, it's it's it's nightmarish.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_04: But but when you I was just talking to the transitional pastor in the situation and uh uh last Saturday, and I was like, take take a step back.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_04: Why does this church react this way in this kind of moment?
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_04: So that we're not reacting to individual sort of particularities, right?
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_04: Sure, you have to deal with charges and all that, but that's not your main role is to try and help them.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_04: How does this church end up in a healthier place on the other side of this?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_04: Right?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_04: How do we help that uh elder board become um healthy so that they're trusted and they can lead and that the next pastor who comes in, that that's what he inherits, right?
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_04: That's the healing the heart of your church, right?
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_04: And so there's something in the heart of this church that is that's broken, and all of this is just a symptom of that, right?
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_04: And of course, you have to deal with particularities, and we're just seeing it writ large in the in the anxiety in this church.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_04: Um, transitions, I think one of the reasons, and this is why this analogy is good.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_04: One of the reasons why transitions are anxious for churches is because um the power dynamic is upset, right?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_04: There was a stable power dynamic, might have been healthy, might have been unhealthy, but there was a stable power dynamic when there was a lead pastor in charge of the church, and now that's up for grabs.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_04: So, Jaron Dr.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_04: Q, you guys have seen a lot of churches, you've had a lot of experiences.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_04: What what in that power vacuum?
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_04: What have you seen happen in churches?
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_04: Kind of have you seen good and have you seen bad?
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_04: I'm assuming you've seen both.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: Well, uh again, kind of goes back to things that we were discussing uh earlier that that churches knee-jerk uh their responses.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_02: And uh most times uh an anxious knee-jerk response is um not going to work.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um may work in the short term.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_02: Uh a lot of churches are anxious until they get somebody that you know in the pulpit as their pastor, then they relax, thinking that that's all we needed.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: And they don't understand that no, there are a set of dynamics that are uh uh you know underlying this uh situation, maybe cause the last pastor to leave, that if they are not addressed, then it is only a delaying operation that you've you've executed here.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_02: So I think uh churches tend to the at least congregations tend to think that just getting somebody in the position will solve, you know, 95% of whatever the problems they perceive are.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_02: But if there's deeper issues, if there's something in the heart of the church, it's it's not gonna work.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's not gonna be dealt with.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_04: It's interesting.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_04: One of the things that we see is the churches that actually have the humility to engage a thoughtful transition process, right?
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_04: Actually end up, and this is both what Dr.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_04: Quick has done through his ministry and what we do with Flourish, is um if churches are willing to have the humility to take a beat, to take some time, to reflect, to get some external facilitation through a transitional pastor or through a ministry like Flourish or Dr.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_04: Quick's ministry, that there's a better chance that the church will end up more healthy.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_04: I think that one of the things that's a challenge, I think, for churches is that uh Dr.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_04: Seuss.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_04: Um maybe our listeners will be surprised that I quote Dr.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_04: Seuss.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_04: One of the highest content here, Matt.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_04: Um publicly available image.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_04: There's um a two-page spread in Dr.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_04: Seuss's book, Oh the Places You'll Go.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_04: There's a two-page spread, uh rather famous, um, that's called The Waiting Place.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_04: It's incredibly wise.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_04: It's an it's an incredibly insightful two pages of Dr.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_04: Seuss.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_04: And I think that you're wise as an elder board to realize that when a church is without a pastor, they're in the waiting place.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_04: And that is a that is a it's an odd, disorienting, unpleasant kind of place to be.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_04: And if you as a shepherd can look with compassion, not judgment, on the sheep and to keep your head, and to be able to look and say, hmm, I'm interpreting what you're saying as it's hard to be in the waiting place.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_04: That's good.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_04: I think that's wise shepherding, right?
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_04: That's that's compassionate, loving.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_04: But volunteer boards, then they have their whole lives and they have jobs and families, and you know, they're they're in transition, they have to give a lot more of themselves.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_04: Sometimes it's easier to try and do something more simplistic, less costly.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and you know, I think uh one of the other dynamics is if dependencies have been created.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um talk about that a little bit.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, I think if uh the previous pastor uh has created dependencies, you know, wanted people to depend on him, that nobody else can preach but me.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, nobody can counsel but me, nobody can uh lead a meeting but me, or my wife, uh need the, you know, just creating uh a set of uh or creating a sense in the church that we can't operate, we can't be healthy, we can't know what God wants us to do if we don't have somebody that is telling us um that we have to have a voice telling us uh what to do.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think that that idea of creating dependencies is the cre you know, cutting off the the real responsibility of leadership, which is to help people to grow, help people to become disciples, uh to to need us less and less, yes, then to need us more and more.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_02: And uh so I think again that is a dynamic of what I would term healthy versus unhealthy leadership.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_02: I think God is left, I I really do see the the role of leadership uh as very simple.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_02: God gave two commands to Adam in the garden.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_02: He is to cultivate it and to keep it.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_02: And keep it, yeah.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_02: And so help it to grow and then protect it from the dangers that surround it.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_02: That's very simple, but good.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's super, super helpful.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_03: One of the things I've seen, Matt, is um in that in that time of uncertainty you see the reactivity that's happened, right?
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you see the regression to the mean.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_03: Or one of the things I I've I've observed is that during that time of transition, when that power vacuum opens up, all of a sudden you find out what people really want.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_03: Preferences start coming out.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_03: You start to see things change, like, hey, when did that change?
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_03: When did we and most of it at least from what I've observed generally looks pretty good.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_03: It can serve as sort of a deceptive mask for what's actually going on, that there's a flailing about.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_03: You talked about the humility that's necessary.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_03: What we haven't talked about in this episode is the repentance and the way that that gets walked out when there is a you know rightful charge is I've heard the cry and I'm coming towards it, and that cry is not just communicating, please come and change me because I'm dirty, it's also please come and change me now because I've been crying for 30 minutes, and you failed to answer my cry in a timely fashion.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_03: You I you've broken trust with me.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_03: When David is confronted by his sinner and when the prodigal son comes to his senses, their response is I have sinned.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: There is content here, but the content is I've sinned against God and you.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_03: Against you and you, Lord, have I sinned and done this evil in your sight, they both say.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_03: Recognizing that each of us is a leader in some realm.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_03: So each of us fill this spot.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_03: As a leader, the the way that I get to practice being a non-anxious presence is by acknowledging what is uh true.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_03: And if what's true is I have messed up and you're saying that, I'm not anxious by saying, Okay, you're you're right.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_03: I did fail there, and that failure was primarily first and foremost against God.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_03: He's the one who's gonna hold me accountable, he's the one I'm gonna run to.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_03: And the failures in nerve that uh Friedman talks about, the failures in leadership that I see most often happen when a leader is confronted by this kind of failure.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_03: And instead of running to the cross with that and acknowledging it to the savior and then accepting responsibility and repenting to the people whom they have harmed, they go on this you know, cover and evade.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: Self-protection.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_03: And it's death to churches, it's death to the soul because it's not the way that God designed us to live.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_03: He designed us to be in the garden, naked and unashamed.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_04: And and and this side of the cross, running to the cross all the time, repenting and believing every day, and not being surprised when we fail people and freely admit when we do.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_04: What's interesting, we talked about this in a previous episode.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_04: If a church is not centered on the gospel, if that's if gospel understanding is not the main feature in people's discipleship, right, then they they are very uncomfortable being unfinished.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_04: They're uncomfortable with their own failure instead of being intimately familiar with it and that it's going on all the time.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_04: So I that's one of the challenges, one of the reasons why in our church health assessment, we really look at gospel centrality because we think that if if leaders don't really own the truths of the gospel for themselves and find their identity in Christ, they can't lead in a healthy way because they're not they're not being formed in the right way as as disciples.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_04: It's interesting that leaders are sometimes surprised to think, oh, we've got dysfunction here that we need to work on.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_04: And I I think.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_04: Transitions reveal the systemic dysfunction that are going on in churches.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_04: They they kind of put the magnifying glass on them because they're they produce an instability, and people's reaction to that instability reveals the dysfunction that's there.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_04: That was pretty dense, but there you go.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_04: You get the idea.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_04: So the way that leaders react in transition is becomes then really important.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_04: Are they willing to walk towards the things that are dysfunctional, that are pain points?
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_04: And will they work towards healing the heart of their church?
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_04: What keeps people from being willing to do that?
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_04: And what do you think helps them sort of move towards that?
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_02: When we work with churches, we say the primary requirement is courage.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_02: Interesting.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_02: I would have picked humility, but that's interesting.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_02: It's courage.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_02: It's courage.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_02: Why?
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: Because they have to stand before Christ in the congregation and own the things that have maybe they weren't, you know, again, since Jeroboam, you get two or three generations down the line, people go, What did you do?
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_02: Why am I being held responsible for that?
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_02: So there's a there's that boundary that's got to be crossed.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_02: And then I think the second thing is to stand before God and own that because that's what God's expecting.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_02: That nobody's taking responsibility for this sin that I am having to continually discipline this church for.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_02: And it's not going to stop until you guys recognize what it is that is happening here and why it's happening.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_02: I I it's very common for us to have if a church is in pain and struggling to assume that Satan is behind these things that are going on.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: I thought that.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I went through my church and anointed every door with oil to try and drive the demonic spirits or satanic work, you know, to end it.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and I think that's a common, you know, we we're just looking for solutions anywhere we can find them.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_02: But the reality is that if the devil is at work in your church, you gotta recognize that Luke 22 comes into play where Simon Simon, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_02: But I have prayed for you that your faith will not fail.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_02: And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_02: Implications, Satan's demanded it to sift you like wheat, and we've granted that permission.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_02: So if a church is experiencing satanic temptations and workings and chaos and all the stuff that Satan can bring, it's because they've asked for permission, because nothing touches Jesus' church without his permission.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they gave they gave him space, they gave him a beach head to do what he does.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_02: And again, so he is here because the Lord of the church has granted him the right to be here.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_02: So who you have to deal with here is not the devil, yeah, but the Lord, and find out why the Lord would grant permission to do this.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_04: There's a word there uh early in the what Dr.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_04: Cook just said that God does discipline churches.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_04: He does, and I think that that is an underappreciated insight.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_04: So if you go through the book of Hebrews, because we're Western individualists, we tend to think about many things in the scriptures as though the you's that are there are you singulars, you, Dr.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_04: Quick, you, Jar, you, Matt.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_04: But the vast, vast majority of the you's in the New Testament are plurals.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, just let me underscore what you're saying because again, it's often lost, I think, on churches.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_02: Uh Revelation 3, the Church of Laodicea, Jesus says in Revelation 3, 19, those whom I love, plural, I reprove and discipline.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_02: Speaking to a church, yeah, those whom I love, I reprove and discipline.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_02: Be zealous, therefore, and repent.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: Again, at a corporate level, yeah, you are experiencing my reproof and my discipline because I love you.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_02: And it's not gonna stop until you repent.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_04: Because I love you, because I love you.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_04: And this doesn't the way that you're living this out, this this as a body, dishonors me.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm gonna discipline you until you until you get the point.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_04: And churches in transition, some of the time, they're being disciplined by the Lord, and it's at least worth reflection by the leadership, at least to ask the question.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_04: Is what we're experiencing is the Lord disciplining us.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, what would he say to us?
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, Dr.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_04: Quick's got a wonderful book that if you've not taken in the eighth letter, you absolutely should as a church leader.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_04: Because for your church to answer the question, what would Jesus say if you were here and wrote us a letter along the lines of Revelation 2 and 3?
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_04: Perhaps the most important thing that you could do as a leader in transition is to know what that letter would say and react well to it.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_04: And remember those letters are not just all doom and gloom.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_04: The letter to the Ephesians, it's got nine things that are commended and one that is critiqued.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_04: And so the letter to your church might be nine things commended, right?
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_04: But you sure ought to know what that one critique is that you can repent of it.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_02: Because he says he'll remove your lampstand if you don't take care of that one thing.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, which is I think that there's a lot of churches that we run into that are like, we got a lot of great things going for us.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_04: You know, yeah, nine commendations, one critique, but it's Jesus' church and he's got the right to critique it.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_04: And our response should be not that we're mostly good, but that we hear the critique and in transition that we're willing to repent and to turn from the things that we should, that our lampside might not go away.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_04: Um because those are not empty threats.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_03: So to bring this towards the landing, if I could do like a pop quiz, what would you say practically for both of you would be the top three things a church should be looking at to do as they're heading into a transition to set it up so that the next guy who comes in is coming into a situation that is healthy?
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_03: Top three things.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_02: Top three.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, well, uh the first question would be do we have pain that seems to be repeating uh in our church that we are seeing cycles of it?
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_02: Uh did our last pastor leave because of something related to that?
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh are we having staff leave because of something related to that?
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_02: So that would be the first question.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_02: Number two, do I understand what God's divine purpose would be for the pain that He's letting our body experience?
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: Do I know?
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_02: Could I answer that question?
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_02: Do I really understand what that pain is about?
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: And the third thing is, what do we need to do to deal with God about this so that the next person comes in and has a chance to lead without you know, something like this jumping up and biting him before he's here too long.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_02: So I would put those as my top three.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I like the analogy of the body, and Dr.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_04: Quicklight uses this, and I think it's good in terms of healing the body because I think that if we understand what's unhealthy in the body as leaders and we're walking towards it and beginning to solve those things, what we hopefully hand to the next pastor to lead is a a healthier congregation, uh a healthier eldership.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_04: And um if we've dealt with the pain in the body, if we've repented of things, then it begins to give us the opportunity for the next pastor to lead us out in mission.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_04: Because where there's pain, what do we do?
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_04: We turn inward, we take care of ourselves, we we wonder if we're gonna make it right.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_04: But if we've if we've healed the pain, if we've dealt with the issues, now our eyes can look back out where Jesus says the the harvest field is white, so it's white for the harvest.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_04: The problem is not the harvest, the problem is workers to go out to it.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_04: And so Jesus tells us to pray for workers, and so we're trying to heal things so the workers go out in the harvest, and that's the maybe the the the bigger picture.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_04: What are we trying to get to?
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_03: Right, not just health for health's sake, health for other people's sake.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, the point of leadership is to have a vision so that the community can go any direction that it should be going.
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_03: And transition is a key time that affords an opportunity to take stock, to reset, to rebuild, to strengthen, and to prepare.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_03: This is the, you know, your injured reserve for a couple weeks, or if it's the off-season, you don't just sit there and consider your old victories.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_03: That's good.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_03: Get ready for the next season.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_03: Dr.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_03: Quick, Mr.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_03: Bowling, ABD.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_03: This has been an enjoyable conversation.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you both for your time.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening to the Church Renewal podcast from Flourish Coaching.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_00: Flourish exists to set ministry leaders free to be effective wherever God has called them.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_00: We believe that there's only one fully sufficient reason that this day dawned.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus is still gathering his people and he's using his church to do it.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: When pastors or churches feel stuck, our team of coaches refresh their hope in the gospel and help them clarify their strategy.
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_00: If you have questions or a need, we'd love to hear from you.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: For more information, go to our website, flourishcoaching.org, or send an email to info at flourishcoaching.org.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: You can also connect with us on Facebook, X, and YouTube.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: We appreciate when you like, subscribe, rate, or review our show whenever you're listening.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_00: It can be hard for churches to ask for help, so when our clients tell us who referred them, we'll send a small gift to say thanks.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: A huge thank you to all our guests for making the time to share their stories with us.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_00: We are really blessed to have all these friends and partners.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_00: All music for this show has been licensed and was composed and created by artists.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_00: The Church Renewal Podcast was directed and produced by Jeremy Seferati in association with Flourish Coaching, with the goal of equipping and encouraging your church to flourish wherever God has called you.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_00: Bye for now.