In yesterday's post I stressed the importance of strong pastoral leadership in the church. However, it is possible for such leadership to become toxic and do great damage to a church.
The first church I worked with in its search for a new pastor was a small, rural church who had experienced a succession of toxic pastors. According to the congregation, when the previous pastor began his ministry he told some people they would no longer teach their Sunday school class and assigned a different teacher to teach those classes. He removed people from various boards and placed others in those positions. He ran the church as his personal fiefdom. By the time he left, the church was much smaller and those who remained were shell-shocked. Unfortunately, that was not the only church I found like that in my years of serving as a Resource Minister to our region.
Pastoral leadership must always be servant leadership. Some think that servant leadership cannot be strong leadership, but such people evidently never consider the ministry of Jesus. He was both a servant and a strong leader, and He should be the example every pastor should want to emulate.
Toxic leaders see themselves as CEOs of a church. They take a "My way or the highway" approach to every situation. No one dares question them. Their favorite Bible verse is "Touch not God's anointed." They tear into the congregation Sunday after Sunday and bully anyone who stands up against them. Too often churches allow them to get away with such behavior uncertain how to respond.
A church will never be healthy with toxic leadership. When a pastor exhibits some of the behavior described above the church leadership needs to address it immediately. The longer it continues the more damage it will cause. It's important that the leadership addresses it as a group. I watched as lay leaders one by one left a good church due to the unhealthy behavior of the pastor. Individually they would challenge him and then leave when he attacked them as troublemakers. I encouraged these leaders to talk to the pastor as a group, but they did not until a significant number of people had left the church. Only when the remaining leaders addressed the situation did the pastor leave. To date, the church has not recovered from the experience.
Sometimes a good pastor will allow some toxicity to enter his or her ministry. There are some signs a self-aware pastor can watch for to see if he or she is starting to become toxic. One is if the sermons begin to take on a hostile tone week after week. If all your sermons are doing is tearing people down, you cannot be building them up. A second sign is if the pastor begins to think that he or she is the only one in the church who can hear from God. A third sign is when the pastor must be right all the time. A healthy pastor will recognize that sometimes he or she is wrong. In such times the pastor must be willing to admit it and apologize if necessary. A fourth sign is when you find you are pushing your people rather than leading them. Some pastors feel they must force people to do what they want rather than lead them in the direction God wants to take them. A fifth sign is if the pastor begins to believe this is his or her church and the members exist to do the bidding of the pastor. We must never forget the church belongs to God. He has called us to shepherd His people, to serve them, to lead them and to love them.
Toxic pastors can be transformed into servant leaders if they are willing to address their problem. If they are unwilling, they will leave a trail of broken churches behind them until they are unable to find another church in which to minister. This is why it is so important that a church does its due diligence when seeking another pastor. Check as many references as possible including from previous churches in which the person ministered. A church can flourish with a strong servant leader, but it will suffer under the leadership of a toxic pastor.
1 comment:
"Amen"
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