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Top 10 Predictable Times for Conflict in the Church
Orginally published on Monday, January 29, 2007 at 7:02 AM
by Todd Rhoades
Dale Huff shares the 10 most predictable times for conflict to arise in the church. Would it help if we anticipated these times and prepared for conflict? Take a look at Dale's list (available at LifeWay.com) and see what you think...
1. During the Easter Season
2. During a Stewardship Campaign or Budget Preparation
3. When Adding Staff
4. When the Basic Leadership Style/Approach Changes
5. During the Pastors Absence
6. Following a Change in the Pastor’s Family
7. When there is a Significant Generational Change in the Focus of the Church.
8. Upon the Completion of a New Building
9. Rapid Loss or Rapid Increase of Church Membership
10. During the Time Between Pastors
For Discussion: What do you think? Are there others you would add to your list? Have you found this list to be pretty accurate (have most of your conflicts come out of these specific times?
You can read the whole article here at LifeWay.com...
Tags: Church leadership, Church Conflict
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Hi... I'm Todd Rhoades. I'm a Christ-follower, husband, father and I love to connect leaders with other leaders. Hopefully you'll find something here at MMI you like and will return often. If you want, you can find out more about me or follow my every step on Twitter.
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Post Your Comments:Maybe I’m missing something, but number 1 seems illogical. All the others I understand and would definitely place in the top ten, but why Easter season? Is it because we always make a big outreach push to build up to it? I guess I’ll have to read the article.
1) Conflict at Easter season. I guess I can see it, but neve have experienced it. Christmas season, however, yes.
2) Stewardship/Budget time - Always. I have rarely seen this process go through without some conflict.
3) When adding staff. Usually same reasons as budget time that conflicts arise.
4) When the Basic Leadership Style changes - Always.
5) During the pastors absence. This one bothers me, though true. It seems to happen because the one’s who cause the conflict don’t have the confidence to approach or confront the pastor one-on-one.
6) Following a change in pastor family. Again, always. There always seem to be a couple of folks that want the new pastor to do things
their way and seem to always take advantage of the newness and this transition to try to implement their agenda.
7) Significant Generational Focus Change - Not always necessarily true. While we have folks that seem to fight change at every corner, they do seem to have a built in philosophy of doing things for the future of the church and future generations.
8) Upon completion of a new building - No need to say more. Very true.
9) Rapid loss or increase in membership - I’d rather have the “increase” conflict. The conflict arising from “loss” is much more difficult and ugly to deal with.
10) During the time between pastors. This doesn’t happen in the Methodist church as the period is usually less than a week. I guess this is one area our denomination is fortunate.
Conflict is always not comfortable, but it keeps us from getting complacent in our ways. We just need to learn how to deal with it properly and biblically. Good points. Will help us keep our heads up and prepare for conflict in many of these common situation.
Why just “adding” staff? The primary time that I’ve seen conflict is when a church removes a pastor or support staff person that is well-liked, however incapable. I’d say any staff transition could be a big source of conflict.
How about #11 when adding or removing a Board Member
Or, #12 when asking/telling a church member to leave or cease certain harmful activities. This is after addressing privately, counseling, etc. We had an issue with a member who was formerly the Board chair. She no longer held an office or had any official responsibility. However, she was getting into church files, membership records, calling members who had not been there in some time and telling them they needed to take themselves off the role, etc. Just a busy body that felt she could do whatever she wanted. My pastor had to finally meet with her and draw a line in the sand; either quit doing these things or leave. Well, obviously she couldn’t keep it to herself and many started taking sides wtihout knowing what was going on. The pastor kept it private and civil. The member did not and only shared parts of the story she wanted heard and no the whole truth. Very difficult conflict.
Only a week between pastor changes in the United Methodist Church?! Humph You must not be in southern Indiana. The Methodist DS has about 3 or 4 churches that have been waiting more than a week for a new pastor.
re: United Methodist Church moves.
While I am in general agreement that our UMC process minimizes conflict at change of Pastors, it doesn’t eliminate conflict. And while the “one week” period may not see much change conflict, often the following year or two does see conflict, especially in changes where “long time pastor” is moved, retires etc.
Every change of pastor should be preceeded and followed by caring analysis of what may be needed to minimize destructive conflict and maximize the positive benefits of change. Resources from the Alban Institute helped me and my churches on this.
I have no qualms about this list, but the reality is this: the church is full of people. Imperfect, self-absorbed sheep who only want what makes them comfortable. While I realize this is the top 10 only, we could go on ad nauseum!
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