Toxic lay leaders in the church

After yesterday's post on the dangers of toxic pastors to the church I had some ask about writing a similar post about toxic lay leaders. Actually, I have written several posts over the years about such leaders. Some of my books also contain sections that address toxic lay leaders. I usually refer to such people as controllers, and they are extremely damaging to a church. One reason they are so damaging is that no one wants to stand up to them so they are allowed to continue their bad behavior.

Controllers, or toxic lay leaders, care nothing about the church. They care only for their own position in the church. They seek to control the pastor, the finances and everything else that goes on in the church. They will attack anything that seems to be a threat to their power or position with no concern about who it might hurt or how it might harm the church. As I've written elsewhere, these people are cancers to the church. They are unhealthy cells attacking the healthy cells in the body of Christ, and if they are not stopped they will kill a church.

You can't stop a cancer in the body by pretending it doesn't exist or by covering it with a band-aid. It often requires aggressive action to stop a cancer from spreading, and often the treatment is difficult, but unless the cancer is treated properly it will kill the body.

Too often, the church is not willing to challenge a controller. They make excuses for the bad behavior of their toxic leaders. They allow controllers to run off pastor after pastor and member after member because of their refusal to take action against the controller. They stand there and watch their church grow smaller and more unhealthy each year and do nothing. As one departing pastor told me once, "We have too many nice people in our church who won't stand up to the ones who aren't so nice." This good pastor grew weary of fighting the small thinking of a handful of controllers and left after a very successful ministry in that church. Years later, that church has not recovered from his leaving.

When I was serving in a judicatory role a church board contacted me about an ongoing problem they were having. They struggled keeping pastors, and while new members joined their church, they often left within a few months. The board pointed to two families who were mostly responsible for the turmoil and loss of new people. I asked the board what they were going to do about it, and they said there wasn't anything they could do. I looked at them and said, "Then learn to live with it," and started to leave. They asked, "What can we do?" I explained that as leaders of that church they were the ones to decide who stays and who goes. If you have two families who are causing dissension in the church and driving people away you need to address their bad behavior and explain that it will not be tolerated. Within a few weeks the board did address the problem, and both of the toxic families left the church. They called a new pastor who has been there for several years now and the church has more than doubled in size.

When a church has someone causing dissension in the church, constantly creating problems and preventing the church from moving forward the lay leaders must address the problem. The pastor cannot do this by himself or herself. The offending individual needs to be addressed by the entire group of lay leaders, the offensive behavior pointed out, and it needs to be made clear that future behavior of that type will not be tolerated. When confronted by the group the offender knows the church means business. At this point, the next step is up to the offender. He or she can either adjust their behavior or leave the church. If the person decides to do neither the church will need to take appropriate action.

Is any of this easy? No, but it's no more difficult that watching good people leave the church because of the bad behavior of a toxic lay leader.

When you're only against something

The fitness center where I work out has eight televisions lined up in front of the treadmills. You can plug ear phones into any of them if you want to listen, but I take an I-Pod to catch up on listening to my podcasts. However, I do occasionally look to see what's on each of the stations they have playing. Yesterday morning the entire hour I was at the fitness center CNN ran nothing but stories that focused on what they perceived to be the negatives of the Trump administration.

There were other news stations besides CNN on the TVs, and they ran various stories during my exercise routine, but CNN was only focused on trying to discredit the President and his administration. It's very difficult for me to imagine those responsible for selecting what news to report can find nothing worth reporting except their issues with President Trump. I do not normally watch CNN, and I understand that puts me in the majority of viewers. If this hour is any indication of their journalism it's not hard to understand why their ratings are low.

This post is not really about CNN and its issues with the President, but it is a good illustration of what happens when you become solely focused on what you are against that you forget what your real purpose should be. Unfortunately, many churches and pastors fall into that trap as well. We get focused on some behavior and we become better known for what we are against than what we are for.

For instance, many churches get caught up railing against the "sin of the month." These churches jump from one sin to another based on what the culture is doing at that particular time. I'm not saying we should not preach against sin and even name the sins, but if that is our only focus we are doing our congregations a disservice. Our primary focus should be on Jesus Christ and His grace. If we can introduce people to Christ, He can work to clean up the sins in their lives. I certainly don't mind challenging people about the wrong choices they are making in their lives, but I also do not intend to beat them up over those choices. Instead, I want to help them connect to the One Who can offer them forgiveness and help them make better life choices. If you want to drive people away from the church, spend all your time telling them what you are against. If you want to attract people to the church, tell them about the hope they can find in Jesus Christ.

Frankly, I did not always feel this way. I went through a period several years ago where my sermons had become quite harsh. I was beating up my people on Sunday. One day I was reviewing the past few sermons I had preached and became overwhelmed with conviction. That was not what God had called me to do. My job was to preach Christ. The next Sunday I confessed to our congregation what I had done and asked for their forgiveness. As always, they were very gracious, and I made sure that from then on my sermons offered the hope found in Jesus Christ and not the condemnation that would come from the Pharisees.

Change is another thing in a church that some people will always oppose. It doesn't really matter what the change is, some people will be against it simply because it's new and seems threatening. Again, these churches can develop a reputation for being against change which can scare away potential new members and pastors.

If there are people in your church who are always opposed to anything new, and never in favor of any change, you have to find a way to deal with them. You either have to try to get them on your side and include them in the initial discussions of any proposed change, or you have to find a way to work around them. Neither option is likely to be easy, but you cannot allow people who are only known for what they are against to set your agenda.

President Trump is far from a perfect individual, and he and his administration have made some mistakes. But, everything they've done hasn't been wrong, and for supposed news organizations to focus only on the mistakes isn't journalism.

We in church leadership are also not perfect, and there will be times when we are wrong. But, we're not always wrong, and people who only focus on our mistakes are not interested in seeing the church move forward. Don't be a church that is known only for what you are against. Such churches will never have a positive impact on people's lives.

Dealing with toxic people

Our community has a minimum security women's prison. Many of these prisoners are allowed to work outside in the community cleaning the roadsides, mowing grass, working at the animal shelter, and doing other work. Of course, they have a guard with them to ensure they don't walk off, but it's worked well for our city and I would imagine the women enjoy being able to leave the prison to do outside work.

I often pass these work details and wonder how these women became incarcerated. Specially, I wonder how many of these women got into trouble because they began to run with the wrong crowd? On a couple of occasions I've heard some of these women share their testimony, and this seems to be a common theme. They developed a relationship, often with a guy, that became toxic and they ended up committing a crime that landed them in prison.

Fortunately, most toxic relationships do not end in prison sentences, but they do have a negative impact on our lives. Toxic people cannot stand for anyone to enjoy any measure of success in their lives. Toxic people are often very sad individuals, and they want others to share in their sadness. They are very negative people, often perpetual victims in their own minds, who blames others for all their problems. They use people for their own purposes and think nothing of throwing them away when those purposes are finished. They always look for ways to pull others down to their level. They are often very needy individuals who look to others to validate their existence or to care for them. Toxic people are very skilled at hooking others with guilt. In the end, they will suck the very life out of other people if allowed to do so.

We all encounter toxic people in our lives. Sometimes a relationship doesn't become toxic at first but develops into one later. I recently ended a Facebook friendship with a couple of people. For much of that friendship we shared common interests and ideas with one another. After the recent election, their posts became very negative as they continually whined about how their candidate lost. I could understand their frustration for a few days after the election, but their negativity continued day after day. People were responding to their posts and the discussions were becoming more heated. Finally, I decided to pull the plug and end the relationship.

Of course, that's much easier to do on social media than in real life. On social media you can end the relationship with a couple of mouse clicks. It's messier in real life, but if you are in a relationship with a toxic person it needs to be done. A person will never get ahead if there are people holding you back.

We need people who encourage us in our lives, and we need to be such people for others. We need people who will cheer us on and believe in us. We need people who will love us unconditionally, and yet be willing to point out areas where we come up short.

In the few passages we read about Barnabas we find him being a source of encouragement. When Paul was converted and wanted to join the disciples in Jerusalem those disciples were fearful of him. Barnabas stood up for Paul and convinced the disciples they could trust him. Without that early trust Paul's later ministry may have looked much different.

At the same time, when Paul refused to let John Mark go on a second missionary journey Barnabas supported John Mark. He and Paul got into a heated discussion over the issue and eventually took John Mark on a missionary journey while Paul took Silas and went another direction. What an encouragement that must have been to John Mark, and yet we do not sense a breakdown in the relationship between Paul and Barnabas. They simply went in different directions, and later, towards the end of his life, Paul sent for John Mark as "he is useful to me for ministry."

In our personal lives we must avoid letting toxic relationships infect us. If we find ourselves in such a relationship, and it does not appear that it will become healthy, it's best to walk away. Life is too short to allow a steady stream of negativity to impact our lives. While walking away from such relationships is often not pleasant, it must be done if we want to be able to enjoy our own lives to the fullest and accomplish the things God wants to do in and through our lives.