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Because we will be starting a series in January on the 5 topics of leadership (and rhythms of Oasis) we continue our study of Unity. We are sure of our gospel-identity and desire to function from a place of gospel intentionality, therefore we disciple our leaders;
Leaders are readers (of the Bible) and James 3:1 is an apt verse for all leadership of Oasis. Therefore we assemble having read (the Bible) and praying (for those we have been given to shepherd) for our time.
Topics of our study are:
1. I Timothy, II Timothy, Titus, Romans 5-8
-On Church Leadership (Mark Driscoll)
2. Eldership (deacons too) by Alexander Strauch
3. Peacemaking Pastor – Ken Sande
4. Why Christians Cannot Trust Psychology – Ed Buckley
5. A Call of Discernment – by Jay Adams
6. Priorities – Tetagramon view of the Daily Christian Life
Guarding the Gate
It’s too late to try to build unity after we’ve allowed a contentious or divisive person on the board. The damage has been done. I’ve found there is only one cure. We have to “guard the gate.”
In the front of the room stood an old blackboard filled with names, each a potential nominee for the deacon board. There must have been twenty-five on the list, more than enough to fill the eight slots open. Then, just as the meeting was about to close, someone suggested a name. Dutifully, the chairman put it on the board.
Immediately, one of the other staff pastors leaned over to me and whispered, “They’ve got to be kidding!”
I nodded. All of us on the staff knew what his election would mean: Trouble!
He was a man of great personal charisma, an expert at “God talk.” But behind the scenes he was contentious and critical. To make matters worse, he was a disciple and personal friend of one of the most rigid Bible teachers in the nation. Always quick to notice an interpretation or practice that differed from his favorite scholar’s, he was apt to see a conspiracy behind any decision he didn’t like.
We waited for the senior pastor, the chairman of the board, or someone to speak up, but no one did. Apparently, they figured it wasn’t worth the risk of further alienating him and his friends. Besides that, his name was at the bottom of the list, too far down to have a serious chance of making the final ballot.
But one month later, there the man was, one of the final nominees presented at our annual congregational meeting. His name had worked its way up the list when many of those ahead of him had been unwilling or unable to run for office. Sure enough, he was elected to a three-year term, during which he became a major source of division. Fortunately, his term ended early when he left the church in a huff over a decision he didn’t like.
Similar scenarios are played out every year in churches across the land. Each time, the unity of the board, and often of the entire church, suffers. While we usually direct our frustration at the person who causes the problem, the real culprit is actually quite different: a careless selection process.
Three Key Questions
I’ve found there is only one cure. We have to “guard the gate.” It’s too late to try to build unity after we’ve allowed a contentious or divisive person on the board. The damage has been done. At that point, the best we can hope for is damage control, not unity.
But, “guarding the gate” is delicate and dangerous. To pull it off effectively, some key questions need to be answered before we begin:
1. What is the board’s primary purpose?
2. What are our minimum qualifications?
3. Who should guard the gate?
Representation or Leadership?
Is the primary purpose of a church board representation or leadership? Our answer has a significant impact on our potential for unity.
Many, if not most, churches, have opted for the representative model. It fits well with our American democratic principles, as well as one of our most cherished doctrines, the priesthood of believers. It insures that everyone has a chance to be heard, not just those who are powerful or well connected. And it is one way to guarantee the board stays in touch with the needs and desires of the congregation.
But a board of representatives also has its negatives. To begin with, the emphasis on representing the various interest groups in the body makes it difficult to justify keeping anyone off the board. From a representative perspective, any church member, no matter how divisive, has a right to be part of the leadership.
Second, it’s harder to come to a consensus when faced with controversial issue. By definition, a representative board seeks to protect minority opinions; this often results in a stalemate rather than a solution.
Third, members of a representative board also can start to see themselves as lobbyists representing a specific constituency. Jack may become the champion of traditional worship, while John defends the youth. Meanwhile, Susan fights for the rights of the Sunday school. Forgotten in the fray can be the most important thing, finding and carrying out God’s will.
For these reasons, and more, I’ve become a strong advocate of a leadership-oriented board. Compared to representative boards, leadership boards have a completely different agenda. Rather than figure out what everybody wants them to do, the members of a leadership board have only one focus: finding the best course of action and following it. They are more concerned with leading than responding to every whim of the congregation. When faced with a difficult decision, they ask first, not “How will people react?” but “What does God want us to do?”
This is not to say that a leadership board is unresponsive to the needs and concerns of the body. On the contrary, good leaders are always in touch with their people. But a good undershepherd never forgets he works for the Chief Shepherd, not the sheep.
Leadership boards have an easier time guarding the gate because they don’t assume that every crusader who wants to radically change the direction of ministry has a right to lead. From their perspective, when it comes time to select board members, it doesn’t matter whether a person represents a significant portion of the body. What matters is whether that person can help the board fulfill its primary objective: knowing and implementing God’s will.
Someone like the contentious nominee I described earlier would have no place in a leadership board. Despite his popularity, his record of taking every issue to the mat and castigating all who disagreed with him as heretics, would be enough reason to exclude him.
Leadership boards also have an easier time coming to a consensus when faced with a difficult issue. The reason? They have a common goal—discovering the will of the Lord—rather than conflicting individual goals of defending the rights of special interest groups.
When I came to North Coast, our board leaned heavily to the representative side of the scale. As a result, whenever we dealt with a controversial issue, the first thing most board members wanted to know was, “What will they think?” They represented a nebulous group of people who might complain if changes were made. No one knew who they were, and they seldom actually complained. But they were powerful; we spent a great deal of time every meeting seeking to keep them happy.
Now that we lean more heavily to the leadership side of the scale, instead of first asking what they would want us to do, we ask first what God would want us to do. Not only is this a better question; it’s a tremendous unity builder. It undercuts any tendency to see ourselves as lobbyists, defending the rights of the young or the old, charismatic’s or non-charismatic, or any other group in the church.
I envision our board members as lobbyists for God. I often remind them that their job is to discern and carry out God’s will, not the congregation’s. Yet, ironically, the more we’ve moved in this direction, the greater our congregational unity and support have become.
For instance, when we changed our worship style, a number of folks objected. But since our leadership team was convinced that God wanted us to make the change and it was best for the church as a whole, we kept on moving. If we’d had a representative board, we’d probably still be debating the relative merits of contemporary and traditional music. As it was, once we made the decision, a few people who felt strongly left, but the vast majority went along with the change, particularly once they saw that our leadership team was united. It was enough to convince me that most people prefer to follow a loving and united group of leaders rather than bickering representatives—even when the decisions aren’t always what they would choose.
What Are We Looking For?
Even if we’re convinced that board members should serve as leaders rather than representatives, there is still another important question that needs to be answered before we can effectively guard the gate. What are our minimum qualifications going to be?
In many churches the primary qualification seems to be a willing heart. Anyone who faithfully supports the church and works hard eventually finds himself or herself rewarded with a seat on the board. While I know of no church that claims this as their method of selection, I know of plenty where it is, in fact, the way things are done.
Passages such as Acts 6, 1 Timothy 3, Titus 1, and 1 Peter 5 make it clear that a willing heart is not enough. There are spiritual qualifications, and they don’t stop at being born again. They go way beyond to issues of character. While not everyone will agree on the exact interpretation and application of each passage, one thing is certain: the New Testament Church considered spiritual maturity to be a minimum qualification for leadership.
By spiritual maturity, I mean a life that consistently exhibits the character of Jesus Christ. That’s not so much a matter of what a person knows as who he is. You’ll notice that all of these passages deal more with character than giftedness, Bible knowledge, or zeal. We shouldn’t be surprised, since some of the most self-centered and divisive people in the church are highly gifted, know the Bible inside out, and exhibit a zeal that puts most people to shame. And when they get on your board, watch out!
In attempting to apply these biblical standards to real situations, we need to strike a balance between two extremes. The first is to interpret these passages so no one can match up. I recall a pastor telling me that in his church of more than five hundred people, no one except he and another ordained minister were qualified to lead. It didn’t dawn on him that this could be an indictment against his six years of ministry there.
The other danger is redefining or watering down the qualifications. I’ve found that in many churches, when someone fails to match up, many folks prefer to look the other way. Take, for instance, a board member whose family is falling apart. He’ll receive sympathy and support, and maybe gossip, but he’ll seldom be asked to step down. This despite passages that teach that a good home life is a necessary qualification for church leadership (1 Tim. 3:4–5, 12, and Titus 1:6). And how often have we seen board members who were contentious, self-willed, materialistic, or hotheaded, despite clear biblical warnings to not allow such people to lead?
What if there aren’t enough qualified people willing or able to serve on the board? In that case, I recommend taking the best people available, and as the church grows and matures, slowly raising the standards.
As important as spiritual maturity is, to build a harmonious and effective leadership team there are other qualifications to look for as well. We’ve learned to ask two more questions:
1. Is this person in basic agreement with our current philosophy of ministry?
2. Will this person fit the leadership team we’ve already assembled?
If the answer to either is no, we’ve found it is a mistake to add the person to the board, no matter how spiritually mature he might be.
There is no guarantee that spiritually mature people will work well together. While they will usually share the same goals, there is no assurance they’ll agree on the best way to get there. And when their convictions are strongly held and mutually exclusive (as were Paul and Barnabas’ plans for dealing with John Mark), terrible things can happen. That’s why it’s important to have philosophical and relational qualifications as well as spiritual ones.
That doesn’t mean every potential board member has to be in total agreement with everything we’ve previously decided or done. It does mean he has to be in agreement with the basic thrust of our ministry. Otherwise, conflict is inevitable.
As you can imagine, I met strong resistance when I first began to say this. Some folks couldn’t understand why we would ever want to keep a spiritually mature person off the board simply because he disagreed with our current direction of ministry.
Frankly, I was amazed by their inconsistent thinking. Executives, who would have decried a mixture of divergent business philosophies on their company’s board of directors, championed pluralism and a lack of homogeneity on the church’s leadership board. Somehow they felt that church leaders could work well under conditions that would splinter any other group.
Imagine a pulpit committee deciding that the only qualifications necessary in a pastor were spiritual maturity and pastoral gifts. If they failed to consider the importance of a good fit as well, they’d be asking for trouble. It seldom works to bring a blue-collar pastor into a white-collar congregation. And a social activist (no matter how spiritual he may be) has little chance of succeeding in a church with a long history of bus ministries and prophecy conferences. Any wise pulpit committee, wanting to see a long and successful ministry, would obviously take these things into consideration. Is a good fit any less important when it comes to selecting lay leaders?
Determining a good fit can be time consuming, but it’s vital. The more carefully our qualifications are thought out, and the more strictly they’re held, the greater will be our chances of experiencing a harmonious and healthy board.
Who Should Guard the Gate?
There is one more question to answer before we’re prepared to guard the gate: “Whom do we want to guard it?”
Make no mistake: the question is not, “Should someone guard the gate?” for someone already is. The questions are, “Are they doing a good job?” and “Are these the people we want to stand guard?”
Every church has gatekeepers. They are the folks who have the power to appoint or nominate; most often they are members of a nominating committee. Unfortunately, many churches underestimate their influence. Even churches that are very careful when it comes to choosing a governing board can be casual when it comes to deciding who will control the initial selection.
I was in one church when an announcement was made asking anyone who wanted to serve on the nominating committee to show up the next Tuesday night in the fellowship hall. If you came, you served. Other churches throw open the process to anyone willing to come to an all-church business meeting a month before the election. The method guarantees ineffective gate watching, because no matter how out of line a nomination may be, hardly anyone will be willing to speak out against it in a public meeting. I’ve also been in churches that figured the best selection committee was a cross section of the congregation—a housewife, career woman, businessman, senior citizen, and young person. The only qualification for service appeared to be matching the needed demographics.
Selecting leaders is too important to be treated casually. It demands the best people we’ve got. The nominating committee may be the most important committee in our church, because it serves like the headwaters of a river. If there’s pollution upstream, it will eventually defile everything downstream. Frankly, if I could choose just one group in our church to be vested with the wisdom of Solomon, it wouldn’t be our governing board, as much as they need God’s wisdom. It would be our nominating committee.
One person, I believe, should always be involved in the process: the senior pastor. I realize that in some polities the pastor isn’t allowed to take an official role in the nominating process, but even in those situations, a pastor can exercise a great deal of informal influence. By definition, a healthy and effective leadership team demands a good working relationship between the pastor and the board. It seems foolish to knowingly put someone on the board with whom the pastor is at personal or philosophical odds. Like saddling a coach with a general manager or assistant coaches who differ in philosophy, it’s a ready-made recipe for failure.
I’m not suggesting the pastor hand-pick board members. But I am suggesting the pastor be given the opportunity to speak out against the nomination of someone who will cause nothing but conflict. Yet that opportunity will do us no good if we lack the courage to use it. The situation described at the beginning of this chapter would never have taken place if the senior pastor had spoken his mind. But he figured it wasn’t his role to lead or dominate the committee, so he sat by quietly, hoping and praying that someone else would speak up and nix the nomination.
I’ve talked to many pastors who have served as an ex-officio member of the nominating committee but felt it was inappropriate to offer input. The way I look at it, if I’m not willing to speak up, why be there? And if I’m there and stay silent, I’m not sure I have a right to complain later about the people I have to work with. The nomination committee is like a wedding party: speak now or forever hold my peace.
One more thing I’ve discovered is that if the committee is going to be candid, I’ll have to lead the way. No one wants to be accused of judging, and most folks are terrified that word of their veto might leak out. I remember the first time I vetoed a nomination. A godly man, with a totally different philosophy of leadership than the board’s, had been put forward by numerous members of the congregation. When our nominating committee came to his name, there was an uncomfortable silence. He was a godly man who had faithfully served the church in the past, yet everyone knew he wouldn’t fit the leadership team. The problems would be philosophical, not spiritual, but problems nonetheless. After what seemed like an eternity, I swallowed hard and spoke up, “I don’t think we should have him run; we’ll end up spending all our meetings going around in circles.”
Once that was on the table, a couple of others were quick to agree. After a brief discussion we came to a unanimous consensus to nominate someone else. It was obvious that others felt as strongly as I did, but no one had said a word until I broke the ice. Our consensus, a wise one, would have remained unspoken and unacted upon.
Since then, others have begun to speak out. No longer am I the only one, or even the first, because a standard of candor has been set.
Obviously, my decision to get involved in the process holds some risk. As one friend keeps asking, “How can you do that without being killed?” Actually, it’s never created a problem. The reason? We keep strict confidentiality. Since our nominating committee is made up of top-quality people, the members don’t have a problem remembering, “What is said here should remain here.” And in case they forget, I remind them before every meeting!
But I’ll admit that choosing to get involved in the selection process can be risky for a pastor. Secrets are hard to keep, and a pastoral veto has the potential for creating hurt. So I’m always very careful with what I say and how I say it. I hope things I say won’t be repeated, but I make sure I can live with them if they are.
My decision to become an outspoken member of the nominating committee didn’t come easily. It went against the advice of some of my most trusted mentors. But, after prayerful and careful consideration, I figured I had little to lose. I’d witnessed the results of silence too many times.
How One Church Does It
Many of you are probably wondering how these principles work in real life. For that reason, I’ll briefly describe our selection process. Your polity and circumstances will dictate which parts of this process fit. The process is offered not as a prescription, but as a description of how one church has taken seriously the need for guarding the gate.
In our case, our elder board serves as the final nominating committee. While there are obviously some potential problems with a standing board functioning as its own nominating committee, these are the best people we’ve got, so we use them.
Each week during the month preceding our nominations, the bulletin contains a nomination form. We ask all regular attendees to fill out one and drop it in the offering plate or mail it into the office. Our newsletter and pulpit announcements reinforce the importance of picking people who are qualified spiritually and philosophically.
At the end of the month, our elder board goes over the congregational nominations, as well as those from each pastor and elder. We go through the combined list and eliminate anyone who obviously doesn’t fit: in our case, nonmembers, people who have been in the church less than a year, and any person with a glaring spiritual or emotional problem. We then go over the remaining names asking everyone to give a candid response. Character flaws aren’t always obvious; often, only one or two of us will be aware of a shaky marriage, a hot temper, or a lack of discretion. We also ask ourselves how well these people fit our philosophy of ministry and leadership team. (Frankly, few people fail this test. Most of those who would have long since left the church.)
A second part of the process is deciding how many openings we have, which depends on how many current board members plan to continue and whether we need to increase the size of the board. One advantage we have is that our constitution calls only for a minimum of five elders. While that’s too few in our situation, it gives us freedom to increase or decrease the size of the board based on our needs, rather than an arbitrary number of slots.
Next, we list our choices in order of priority. We ask the first person on the list if he’d be willing to serve. If not, we go down the list to the next person, and on to the end of the list of qualified nominees. If all those on the list said no, something that has never happened, we wouldn’t add anyone that year. Under no circumstances would we knowingly add someone who was unqualified simply because we had an opening to fill.
Finally, we present our nominees to the congregation at our annual meeting. Each nominee is voted on—yes or no—individually. So far, we’ve chosen not to have two people run for the same position. I find the main reason churches run two people against each other is to give the congregation a choice. They don’t want people to feel that their leaders are being forced on them. But as long as we give people the opportunity to vote yes or no on each candidate, they don’t seem to mind.
In fact, a commitment to always run more than one person for each position can undo a careful selection process. Most churches don’t have enough top-notch people to run two candidates for every opening. As a result, nominating committees put unqualified people on the ballot and pray the congregation won’t elect them. We prefer to put forward our top choices without apology and let the congregation confirm or reject them.
Running two candidates for every office also tends to keep some excellent people off the board. Only those who serve in highly visible positions or who have good name recognition end up being elected, particularly in larger churches in which there is no way for the members to know everyone. Despite all I’ve said, however, I’m not against running two people for an office if there are enough qualified people so that it doesn’t matter who wins. But in the real world, that is seldom the case.
Anyway, that’s the process we use. It works for us. While we are committed to the principles, we have no great commitment to the methodology. We’ll change or adapt it anytime we find a better way to insure quality control in our selection process.
The bottom line is to do whatever is necessary to get our best people on the board. Winning teams need winning players. Even Knute Rockne couldn’t win with the wrong material. Neither can our church board.
Larry W. Osborne, vol. 20, The Unity Factor : Getting Your Church Leaders Working Together, The leadership library (Carol Stream, Ill.: CTI, 1989), 33–47.
In 1979, Yahweh sent one of His adopted children, Pastor James Honeycutt, to show me the way of salvation through Jesus Christ.[1] Exposing my sin and the need for a Savior, His Word, with the work of the Holy Spirit[2], drew me to Him. I was fearful of my future without Him. [3]
We have had an intense relationship ever since. Initially, He taught me of Him and His Ways primarily through preaching. [4] As I grew and learned more, He opened His Word to me.[5] Through the next decades, the Comforter[6] worked through the illumination of the Word and the encouragement of my adopted siblings. I stumbled after Him, trying to please Him, trying to be a good and faithful servant,[7] raising my four children in the way they should go. [8]
It was then that confusion and chaos hit my family with a wallop. That powerful blow stunned me totally, as I thought I was protected by Yahweh from such things. My faith was replaced with anger towards Him, as I felt betrayed and abandoned. I continued talking with Him, but I was not listening for anything other than the answer to the “Why?” that consumed me. Since I wasn’t listening to Him, I entertained many unsound doctrines that do not satisfy.[9]
Time after time, I tried to resolve the seemingly impossible situation I experienced. If I was His child, then He protected me and my loved ones. If He protected us, then how could this horrible wallop have hit dead on? The depths of the wounds were devastating and surely a loving Father would protect His children, right? I kept hoping I could resolve this, but an answer was elusive. In Proverbs 13:12a it says: “Hope deferred maketh the heart sick:” Indeed, my heart was sick. I gave up hope of finding the answer and took control of my life. I still talked to Yahweh, but the conversation was either filled with anger because of what happened or whining that I missed Him. Even so, on I went. For years.
In His mercy,[10] He sent messages through my adopted siblings. My sister in Christ and friend for decades kept telling me that suffering was part of life with Him. It is part of His plan. I rejected that, saying, “I would never allow my children to go through such a horrible thing if I had the power to prevent it. So either He is an unloving parent or not a powerful God.” Neither my anger nor my foolishness could separate me from Him. [11] Thank God!
He sent a brother in Christ to me. Through this brother and those discipling him, I came to understand that my Father never promised to protect my children and myself from harm. In fact, He promised that we would suffer![12] In addition, He promised that our suffering would bring glory. Once I was able to see this, I was incredibly relieved because I knew God had not lied to me, He had not abandoned or betrayed me. The failure in the relationship was mine. He loved me still and brought me back to Him.
He has recently begun showing me glimpses of His great love for me. It is a mystery to me how He can love someone who is as full of darkness as I, but my lack of understanding does not deter Him. I am truly thankful for His love.
Since He patiently allowed me to let go of my misplaced anger, many other things have been eliminated from my life. Some of those things, I thought I needed. In reality, those were the very things standing in my way. My life is in Him. How that plays out, I don’t know exactly, but He isn’t done with me yet. Thank God.
Theresa is a currently going through new members class, has 3 dogs, and has been seen zipping through Charleston on her scooter.
[1] let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing before you well. Acts 4:10(ESV)
[2] The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, Romans 8:16(ESV)
[3] And have mercy on those who doubt; save others by snatching them out of the fire; to others show mercy with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh. Jude 1:22-23(ESV)
[4] How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” Romans 10:14-15(ESV)
[5] Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation— 1 Peter 2:2(ESV)
[6] And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, John 14:16(ESV)
[7] His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ Matthew 25:21(ESV)
[8] Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6(ESV)
[9] For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 2 Timothy 4:3(ESV)
[10] Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever! Psalm 118:1(ESV)
[11] Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:35-39(ESV)
[12] and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. Romans 8:17(ESV)
Our intentional discipleship of leaders contains the following elements;
Leaders are readers (of the Bible) and James 3:1 is an apt verse for all leadership of Oasis. Therefore we assemble having read (the Bible) and praying (for those we have been given to shepherd) for our time.
Topics of our study are:
1. I Timothy, II Timothy, Titus, Romans 5-8
-On Church Leadership (Mark Driscoll)
2. Eldership (deacons too) by Alexander Strauch
3. Peacemaking Pastor – Ken Sande
4. Why Christians Cannot Trust Psychology – Ed Buckley
5. A Call of Discernment – by Jay Adams
6. Priorities – Tetagramon view of the Daily Christian Life
Which is why unity is such a valuable asset. We continue with our study from the Unity Factor;
Removing the Roadblocks
I’ll never forget one of my first board meetings at North Coast. We had begun with prayer and devotions. But while Jim tried hard to minister to our spirits, hardly anyone listened. Most of the board members leafed through the financial statements. A few stared into space.
After a brief round of reports, we moved to the business at hand. I assumed we were in for a short meeting. The only items on the agenda were two purchases: a Communion tablecloth and tires for the church-owned pastor’s car.
But the tablecloth brought forth a long and petty discussion. The tires sparked a full-scale debate. For half an hour, two men squared off over new tires versus retreads. When we finally settled it with a vote, the new tires won on a split decision.
And I didn’t want or need the car in the first place.
What’s Causing the Problem?
Most pastors can relate similar stories. With them, I’ve wondered, What is it about board meetings that seems to bring out the worst in people? Why do so many church boards experience conflict?
I once thought the problem was sin and pride. The way I saw it, church boards were notorious for fighting because so many board members were carnal. The solution was simple: Get people right with God, and conflict will cease.
But I’ve come to realize that sin and pride aren’t always the key players. In fact, some of the most significant causes of conflict are sociological, not spiritual. For the most part, our board members were good and godly folks who sincerely wanted to know and do God’s will. The problem was, we had unwittingly structured ourselves for confrontation and division. Our systems and traditions were sabotaging our unity.
Once I saw how these structural roadblocks were hindering our effectiveness and unity, I began to identify and remove as many of them as possible. The results were dramatic. Posturing and infighting began to be replaced by a spirit of teamwork and cooperation. And a board that was once unable to agreeably purchase tablecloths and tires learned to tackle successfully the truly significant issues of ministry.
Four of these roadblocks to board unity stand out as particularly common and damaging to a board’s unity.
The Wrong Meeting Place
One of the most common and frequently overlooked roadblocks to unity is the location of our meetings. I’m convinced many church boards meet in the wrong place.
When I came to North Coast, we met for worship in a high-school cafeteria. We held our monthly board meetings in my office, a large refurbished garage. There, on the first Thursday of every month, I witnessed a mysterious transformation. What had earlier in the day been a place of study and prayer suddenly turned into a battleground of ideas and personalities. Members who had been warm and friendly on Sunday morning turned critical and petty on Thursday night. Folks who took copious notes of everything I said in a pulpit now questioned everything I said in a board meeting.
While the seating was uncomfortable, the lighting poor, and the room a little cold, I gave little thought to how our environment might be affecting these meetings. Then one day, in desperation after a particularly rough meeting, I suggested we hold our board meetings at my home. I figured the change in ambience couldn’t hurt, and it might help.
As soon as we began meeting in my home, everyone relaxed their body language, terminology, and even dress. When dealing with tough issues, we were noticeably more cordial. When meetings were over, people began to stay and talk.
Why the sudden change? Because our change in environment brought about a change in our behavioral expectations. When we meet in an office or board room environment, we are surrounded by symbols of the corporate world, where confrontation and competition are expected. But when we meet in a home, the behavioral expectations are warmth, cooperation, and friendship.
Not every board has the luxury of meeting in a home. Some boards are too large, and some may not have an adequate home available. But nearly every board can find ways to increase the warmth and informality of its meeting place. Too often, we’ve settled for rooms that are cramped, uncomfortable, and poorly lit, or oversized, sterile, and fluorescent-lit. I know of one board that sits in rigid rows, with most members staring at the back of another’s head. It comes as no surprise they seldom have a quality discussion.
There are times when a large conference table or traditional site works best—for example, when hammering out budget details, nominations, or long-range plans. But most church boards can greatly increase their harmony simply by meeting in the more intimate environment of a home. This switch paid the quickest dividends of any change we made.
Business at the Expense of Relationships
A second roadblock we had to overcome was our tendency to put business concerns above relational concerns. Like many lay leaders, most of our board members defined their role in terms of a task to be done. Building relationships was nice, but hardly necessary.
I opened one meeting with a series of get-acquainted questions. The next morning, over breakfast, our chairman informed me that elder meetings were not the proper time for such nonsense. “It’s just too inefficient,” he said. “We have plenty of other times and places for socializing.”
This outlook—that meetings exist for business and business only—is one of the main reasons why prayer and devotions are often viewed as preliminaries to the “real meeting,” and why few agendas include time for cultivating relationships.
I began to look for ways to emphasize relationships without making the board feel as if we were 
suddenly turning into an encounter group. The first step was scheduling an all-day retreat. We jammed into a van and headed south for an old resort hotel. As we traveled and ate meals, a new spirit of togetherness began to develop. We laughed as a die-hard union man and a top-level executive exchanged teasing barbs. We listened intently as one man explained the pressures he had been feeling at work. For most of us, it was the first time we had any idea he was considering a move. By the time we arrived home, we had experienced more laughter, kidding, and deep personal dialogue than in all our previous meetings combined.
We now get away at least twice a year. Along with building better relationships, these times produce our best brainstorming sessions and most insightful critiques of ministry, staff, and programs.
There are many other ways to emphasize relationships. Some boards eat together before each meeting. Others regularly schedule social events. A simple way to increase social interaction among board members is to schedule a refreshment break in the middle of meetings. Like many groups, we used to serve coffee and dessert at either the beginning or end of a meeting. But a few members always arrived just as the meetings began and left immediately after they were over. Rushing in and rushing out, they rarely shared in the casual conversations that cultivate friendship. Invariably, they were the very people who most needed to develop a closer rapport with the group. By placing our break in the middle of the meeting, I was able to insure that everyone participated in some face-to-face social time.
These are just some of the ways to overcome a roadblock that hinders the unity of many church boards: the tendency to focus on business and ignore relationships.
Infrequent Meetings
A third roadblock was our tendency to meet as infrequently as possible. The last thing most people want is another meeting. Our board members were no exception. Each summer, when vacation plans made it difficult for everyone to get together, someone would suggest skipping the next meeting. We were always quick to agree. As a result, we often met fewer than twelve times a year. While this may have been great for freeing up busy schedules, it played havoc with our board’s unity. We simply weren’t together often enough to develop into a cohesive leadership team.
Like most boards, we were, and are, a diverse group. To develop what Peter Drucker has called the “essential ingredient for teamwork: mutual respect,”1 we needed to know each other well enough to have confidence in each other’s ability to perform. This wasn’t likely to happen when our goal was to meet as briefly and as infrequently as possible.
Most boardroom conflicts spring out of our different ways of viewing life. A corporate executive, self-employed contractor, middle manager, and school administrator will always see things differently. Their educational and professional backgrounds give them radically different points of reference. For instance, the man who argued for retreads on our church car was a long-time blue-collar worker. He and his wife enjoyed garage sales. The man who wanted the new tires was a former mayor; he was used to overseeing the expenditure of millions. I don’t think he had bought anything secondhand in his life.
To help get such diverse people on the same page, I did something I never thought I would do: I scheduled an extra monthly board meeting. I did it to take advantage of a principle of group dynamics: Whenever a group of people increases the amount of their interaction with one another, there will be a corresponding increase in their regard and appreciation for one another.2 We called this extra meeting a “shepherding meeting.” I’ll discuss it in more detail in chapter 7, but for now it’s important to note that no votes or business decisions were allowed. We focused on prayer, team building, instruction in practical ministry, and seeking a common vision.
These meetings helped us to get on the same page. To keep them there, we made them a permanent fixture. Short-term meetings, seminars, or retreats can solidify a board, but the results of one-time events are usually short-lived, lasting at most until the makeup of the board changes. With regular shepherding meetings, the effects last, and we have an increasing backlog of shared experiences from which to draw.
The larger the board, the greater the benefit of these extra meetings. Larger boards, by nature, limit face-to-face encounters, which is one of the main reasons larger boards tend to experience more conflict. Yet in most cases, the larger a board gets, the more likely it is to schedule fewer (and longer) meetings in the hope of enabling everyone to attend. While this may cut down on absenteeism, it also undercuts unity. Unity depends on regular, close contact.
Constant Turnover
A final roadblock I’ll mention is, ironically, often legislated by a church’s constitution. It’s a rotating board.
In the typical setup, members serve a three-year term. The terms are staggered, so that each year one-third of the members rotates off the board to be replaced by a new group. When a person completes a three-year term, he usually must wait at least a year before becoming eligible to serve again.
On the surface, this approach appears to have significant advantages. It guarantees a mix of new blood and experience. It cuts down on recruitment, since only one-third of the board has to be replaced each year. It assures continuity, since two thirds of the board have at least a year’s experience. It also makes it difficult for a clique to monopolize power. However, for many pastors, the greatest advantage of this system is that it offers a gracious way to remove an ineffective or divisive board member. Just wait three years, and the member will be gone.
Despite these benefits, a rotating board can do more harm than good. Imagine a corporation that changed one-third of its leaders every ten to fifteen meetings. The lack of continuity would give rise to constant jockeying for position. Little work would get done. Then, just about the time the group started to jell, it would be time for another changing of the guard. But that is exactly what happens in most churches. The high rate of turnover makes developing and maintaining a cohesive team extremely difficult.
While I believe some turnover is good and even necessary, in most cases, one-third is too much. It means that 33 percent of the board lacks a corporate memory, and it makes it hard to build on past decisions. Old battles are likely to be refought year after year. Faced with complex decisions, new members often want to go back to square one, unable or unwilling to build on past decisions and discussions in which they had no part.
(It’s important to note that some boards allow people to serve two terms in succession before asking them to take a sabbatical. That takes care of the high, 33-percent annual turnover rate.)
Although a rotating board can provide a painless way to remove painful people, let’s not forget it forces out the good ones as well. Once a term is up, there is no way to keep a person on the board, even if that person is desperately needed. One church had its two best lay leaders rotate off the board soon after losing a senior pastor. For twelve months the church had neither a senior pastor nor a regular interim. During that time, it needed the leadership and wisdom of these two men. But they were shut out of the system, unable to use their God-given gifts and wisdom until they had waited out a forced sabbatical that no one wanted in the first place.
There are other ways to remove painful people from the board besides rotating them out of the system. (Perhaps the best way is to keep them off the board in the first place, which we will discuss in the next chapter.) But assume the damage has been done, and the painful member already has a position on the board. At the risk of sounding simplistic, I’ve found the best solutions to be prayer and/or honest confrontation. Neither is painless or easy, but both are rather biblical.
Instead of legislating constant turnover, we’ve set it up so board members are elected to one-year terms that can be renewed indefinitely. To insure that we don’t become out of touch with, or unaccountable to, the congregation, the incumbents are treated just like new nominees. They have to be reelected individually each year. We use a simple yes/no ballot, and we ask everyone who casts a “no” vote for a nominee to write reasons for that vote next to the person’s name. So far, we’ve never had a candidate rejected by the congregation, and I expect we never will, because our candidates are carefully screened. But we take every “no” vote seriously and review it with the board member involved.
Allowing board members to serve indefinitely hasn’t resulted in an ingrown board. It’s resulted in a stable board. Changing schedules and family and work situations naturally create turnover—more than enough to give a healthy combination of new blood and experience.
This system allows us to enjoy the advantages of a rotating board without committing ourselves to wholesale changes each year. It’s given us the freedom to choose how many board members should be added or removed. And it’s enabled us to avoid one of the more common roadblocks to unity: constant turnover.
Removing these four roadblocks radically changed our board. One incident stands out in my mind whenever I reflect upon the contrast.
A young father and I sat talking in my office. A change in his wife’s work schedule and other commitments had made it impossible for him to serve on the board during the coming year.
As he told me his decision, his eyes began to fill with tears. I knew him well, but I had never seen him cry before. He wasn’t the type. When he finally spoke, he said simply, “I’m going to miss the guys.”
Though disappointed to lose him, I couldn’t help myself; as soon as he left my office I let out a shout, leaned back in my chair, and sat there with a silly grin.
It hadn’t been too long ago that board members looked forward to the day their term would be over. We had finally turned the corner. We’d come a long way from arguing over Communion cloths and retreads.
Larry W. Osborne, vol. 20, The Unity Factor : Getting Your Church Leaders Working Together, The leadership library (Carol Stream, Ill.: CTI, 1989), 23–31.
I have been in intense prayer and study regarding our officers as of late and wanted to share two GREAT resources that our officers have been discipled through.
Deacons: A great resource for deacons is by a friend of mine from Acts29, Bob Thune: Deacons: A Theological Study. I highly recommend it.
Elders: A great resource regarding Elders comes from MountZion, in which they make Alexander Strauch’s material on Biblical Eldership available in the form of an intensive study.
Elders & Deacons: A Book on Leadership that you will actually read
All that said, we continue with our study on Unity:
Defining Unity
Deciding to make unity a priority is one thing. Figuring out what that means in practical terms is another.
In talking with pastors, I’ve come to the conclusion that for many of us, unity is a vague term. While we easily recognize its presence or absence, few of us have spelled out carefully its essential elements. Yet that’s an all-important first step in developing a unified leadership team.
Before we can hit the target, we have to know what we’re aiming for.
When I realized that I had no idea what a unified board was supposed to look like, I began asking questions: Is there room for doctrinal disagreement? If so, how much? Can we have a split vote and still be unified, or does unity mean unanimity? How close are our relationships supposed to be? 
Eventually, I settled on three irreducible components, things we must have in order to become a unified leadership team:
1. Doctrinal purity
2. Sincere and warm friendships
3. Philosophical purity (basic agreement on our priorities and methods).
By doctrinal purity, I mean agreement with our church’s statement of faith, but I don’t mean theological uniformity. Our leadership team contains charismatics and noncharismatics, and those pre-trib and post-trib. And we certainly don’t all see eye to eye on the so-called lifestyle issues. Yet, we’ve been able to live and work together in harmony.
One reason our theological diversity has not destroyed our unity is that we’ve done more than just state what we believe; we’ve also made it clear what we won’t fight over. In nearly every doctrinal fight I’ve witnessed, the debate has not raged over an issue spelled out in the doctrinal statement but over a peripheral concern. That’s why, for the sake of unity, doctrinal purity needs to go beyond lockstep agreement with the statement of faith; it also needs to include agreement over what areas are nonessential, and therefore, allow for freedom of interpretation. Otherwise, sooner or later someone will try to add his favorite doctrine to the list of essentials, and when he does, he will wage war with those who disagree.
The second component, sincere and warm friendships, refers to a camaraderie built around genuine appreciation and respect for one another. It doesn’t mean everyone has to be best friends. But it does mean that we get along well enough to avoid the miscommunication, stereotyping, and personality conflicts that can so easily dominate the discussion of tough issues.
Yet I’ve found that in many board settings, the members might as well be strangers. We may know one another’s name and have a casual acquaintance, but that’s about it. When I arrived at North Coast, one board member was going through serious psychological difficulties, and another’s marriage was on the rocks. None of the rest of us knew about either problem. No wonder we found unity hard to come by.
Concentrating on friendship has paid rich dividends. It’s made serving on the board an enjoyable experience. We no longer have a hard time getting good people to serve; they want to serve. The personality clashes and picky arguments that used to waste time in our meetings have disappeared. We’ve become more creative and willing to try new things. Most important, our old “watchdog mentality” (making sure no one got by with anything) has been replaced by a new spirit of cooperation and teamwork.
But developing sincere and warm friendships doesn’t mean everyone hangs out together. Frankly, we don’t spend that much time together outside of board meetings and church activities. We are not a tight clique. We are co-workers who’ve developed a mutual respect by applying the strategies you’ll find in the following pages. In short, we’ve become friends.
The final component, philosophical purity, was by far the hardest to develop. In a volunteer organization like the church, it can take a long time to hammer out a consensus on priorities and ways of doing things. In our case, it was nearly four years before we were all headed the same direction.
Maintaining philosophical purity doesn’t mean we all think alike. It’s not a call for clones or even unanimity; there’s plenty of room for disagreement. But if we are going to work together effectively, we have to be playing off the same sheet of music. Otherwise, we’ll be like a small ensemble to which everyone brings his own favorite arrangement, and the resulting sounds will be chaos, not harmony.
For example, my friend Paul remembers two board members at his previous church. Don was older, stoic, and a defender of tradition. Rumor had it he wore a three-piece suit to bed. Rick was younger, emotional, and eager to try new things. More than once he came to church decked out in a Hawaiian shirt. They seldom saw eye-to-eye on anything, and their fundamental differences often spilled over into the board meeting. Yet, ironically, no matter what the issue, each defended his position with the argument: “This is the best way to reach people for Christ.” Though they shared the same theology and the same bottom-line goals, they couldn’t have been further apart when it came time to choose methods.
Most church fights aren’t over theology or even ministry goals; they’re over priorities and methodology. When Dave and Pat argue over how to spend money (whether to set it aside for a new building or use it to hire a youth pastor), they’re arguing over priorities. When Kelly and Walt debate the merits of Bach and pipe organs versus guitars and drums, they’re arguing over methods. Both want to worship the Lord; they just disagree over the best way to go about it.
Developing and nourishing a shared philosophy of ministry, then, is one of the most important things a pastor and board can do to maintain unity.
Larry W. Osborne, vol. 20, The Unity Factor : Getting Your Church Leaders Working Together, The leadership library (Carol Stream, Ill.: CTI, 1989), 17–20.
Why Worry about Unity?
That lesson didn’t come naturally to me. When I arrived at the church, I was armed with books and ideas on growth, evangelism, and reaching the community. Unity was the last thing I was worried about. If you’d told me to slow down and focus on camaraderie and unity, I’d have chided you for your inward, even self-centered, approach to ministry. We had a world to conquer.
But it soon became painfully obvious that we never were going to change the world out there when we couldn’t get along in here. So I set aside my other goals, and for the next two and a half years I made the development of a cohesive leadership team my number-one priority. Today, maintaining that unity remains at the top of my list, far ahead of church growth, evangelism, and every other worthy goal.
Why the change?
First, I’ve learned that as the leadership board goes, so goes the rest of the church. If we’re at war in the board room, it doesn’t matter how well things are going in the church at large. If the fighting doesn’t stop, eventually there will be a coup d’etat or a resignation.
That’s what happened to my friend Andy. As far as everyone in the congregation was concerned, things were going great. After five years of decline, the church was once again growing; the young people were returning; giving was at an all-time high.
But there were three families he could never please, all of whom were represented on the deacon board. Close friends of the previous pastor, and still in monthly contact with him, they took as a personal affront every change Andy made. If anyone in the church had a complaint or was unhappy, these board members were sure to hear about it and bring it up at the next board meeting.
The difference between the board’s perspective of Andy’s ministry and the congregation’s perspective was amazing. Listening in on a board meeting, you’d have thought the church was on the edge of disaster. Sitting in a worship service, you’d have thought it was on the verge of explosive growth.
But no matter how much affirmation Andy received from the congregation, it was still the board to whom he reported. They set his salary, approved or vetoed his ideas, and controlled much of what he could and could not do. After a couple of years of battles with the board, Andy quit. The congregation was shocked, and the church nearly split.
Sadly, in conversations with fellow pastors, I’ve heard plenty of variations on Andy’s story: a supportive congregation and a divided board. But there is one story I’ve yet to hear: a pastor bemoaning a divided congregation while at the same time singing the praises of a supportive and united board. It doesn’t seem to happen. Why? Because as the board goes, so goes the rest of the church.
The second reason I’ve chosen to make unity a priority is that without it, it’s nearly impossible to sustain spiritual growth.
As a pastor, it’s my job to see that people are brought to spiritual maturity. I once thought that could be accomplished by putting together challenging sermons, 
forming discipleship groups, and helping people to identify and use their spiritual gifts. I still consider those important, but I now realize I was leaving out a vital first step: creating an environment conducive to spiritual growth. As a farmer needs to clear the land before planting his crop, I also need to clear out any conflict with the board before trying to plant and reap a spiritual harvest.
Jesus said strong things about forgiveness. When the board refuses to heed those words, we hardly can expect our church to be blessed with spiritual power. It’s been my experience that when the board fights—whether in a civil war or a cold war—our people are more likely to grow in cynicism than in faith.
The third reason developing board unity remains at the top of my list is that it’s fragile. Like love in a marriage, harmony in a board needs special attention or it will die.
I once took unity for granted. I assumed committed Christians who shared a common Lord and a common goal couldn’t help but get along. But I badly underestimated the powerful forces at work to pull us apart. We came from diverse backgrounds, and most of us assumed our way was the best way. Add in our selfish sin nature, and you can see why unity was in such short supply.
Sadly, in every town in which I’ve served, at least one church experienced booming growth only later to collapse like a house of cards. Each time the problem has been the same: a dynamic ministry, great programs, lots of excitement, but an unstable, disunified leadership base.
I don’t think it’s an accident that Jesus predicted church growth but prayed for unity. If left unattended, or taken for granted, unity can disappear. All it takes is a few wrong people on the board, a passionate disagreement over how to handle a tough issue, or even a series of minor annoyances left to fester. One was certain, the other tenuous. That’s why I’ve taken to heart Paul’s advice in Ephesians 4:3: “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”
Larry W. Osborne, vol. 20, The Unity Factor : Getting Your Church Leaders Working Together, The leadership library (Carol Stream, Ill.: CTI, 1989), 14–17.
Last night at missional community we discussed 1 Thes 5, Gospel-Centered Church ch 5, and sanctification through serving.
I wanted to provide a brief outline for those who may have forgotten what we discussed and for those who were not there so we could/can be all on the same page due to the importance of the foundations we are being reminded of.
Thanksgiving – Repentance
Four Goals of Missional Communities:
1. Progressive Sanctification – Sanctification refers to our practice before God. It is the ongoing process of battling sin and becoming more like Jesus.
2. Mutual Care – God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. (1Cor 12:24-26)
3. Fellowship – Fellowship means to participate together, or to communicate things we hold in common.
4. Ministry of the Holy Spirit -In this smaller and more personal context, each person can serve according to the gifting of the Holy Spirit. This is the fourth and final reason why missional communities exist.
The officers are going to complete a SITREP of what went well and what we can improve upon regarding the Conklin Roof Project. Know that we look forward to applying PAUSE regarding this assessment that is coming forth in the coming weeks.
What the Elders did want to discuss and remind us of, was gossip, slander, and conflict that occurred during the project as being symptomatic of our hearts before the project.
One of our core values, specifically, #4 states: Biblical peacemaking is a skill that is consistently, surgically, immediately, accountably, redemptively, restoratively, and humbly worked on in all of life (Matt. 5:23-24; 6:12; 7:12; 25:14-21; John 13:34-35; Eph. 4:1-3, 32; Phil. 2:3-4; Rom. 12:18; 1 Peter 2:19; 4:19.).
What is conflict? At Oasis we understand that conflict is a heart issue. It is forgetting of the gospel at it’s core. For a THOROUGH understanding of Getting to the Heart of Conflict, we agree with Peacemaker Ministries.
Our text in our discussion was:
Slaves and Masters
5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, 6 not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, 7 rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man, 8 knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free. 9 Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.
and
17 Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. 18 For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain,” and, “The laborer deserves his wages.” 19 Do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. 20 As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all, so that the rest may stand in fear. 21 In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging, doing nothing from partiality. 22 Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, nor take part in the sins of others; keep yourself pure. 23 (No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments.) 24 The sins of some men are conspicuous, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later. 25 So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not cannot remain hidden.
Further, we also realized that Accountability: (is) The Mark of a Wise and Protected Leader, and Derek walked through the Seven A’s of Confession regarding his failure to remember the gospel and asked Oasis for forgiveness and submitted himself to the fellowship for consequences. Forgiveness was granted and we reminded each other of the Four Promises of Forgiveness. We all agreed that we desire to be Peacemakers and that Peace Faking (escape responses) or Peace Breaking (attack responses) are prime candidates for Core Value #4 inclusion. To clarify, see The Slippery Slope.
#5-6 in the Seven A’s of Confession, brought forth this fruit for us as a fellowship;
1. All participants & members of Oasis will read/listen to Sanctification Through Serving and turn into an Elder an
by January 01, 2010. If it is not turned in, discipline proceedings will commence.
2. God’s Story Audios & Reflective Reviews are due by January 01, 2010. If it is not turned in, discipline proceedings will commence. See our Commitment to Protecting Our Children. This will include obtaining a SLED check (we are currently completing the Charity Eligibility Reduced Fee Application, please talk with an Elder about this and Oasis will pay for these – $8).
3. All participants & members of Oasis will walk out #5-6 either Corporately at Missional Community or individually and there will be follow-up from an Elder.
We concluded (and moved onto 1 Thess 5, Gospel-Centered Church and other items) with these reminders;
1. We have all heard it (read it) and now are responsible for it.
2. Sanctification has NOT happened yet, because we have not applied it yet.
3. We are to Give Thanks… for Conflict?
4. Our Vision: We seek to build gospel-centered communities to reach people for Christ Jesus and invest in messy relationships.
Humbly, Thankfully, and acknowledging God’s Grace,
The Elders of Oasis
Greeting
1:1 Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy,
To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ:
Grace to you and peace.
The Thessalonians’ Faith and Example
2 We give thanks to God always for all of you, constantly mentioning you in our prayers, 3 remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. 4 For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, 5 because our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. You know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake. 6 And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with the joy of the Holy Spirit, 7 so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. 8 For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything. 9 For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.
The psychological industry has successfully concealed its ineffectiveness from the general public. Pastors, churches, and the laity have been brainwashed into believing that only psychologically trained professional counselors are competent to deal with serious problems. Christian colleges and seminaries have bought into this incredible deception and now enthusiastically encourage Christians to submit to the insights, methods, and findings of secular psychology.
Even when forced to admit the failure of psychology, Christian mental-health experts insist that professional counselors are surely more effective than untrained laypeople in helping to relieve psychic distress. The evidence, however, does not support their claim.
Psychologist Gary Collins reports an important study done by J.A. Durlack entitled “Comparative Effectiveness of Paraprofessional and Professional Helpers”:
[The research] reviewed forty-two studies that compared professional counselors with untrained helpers. The findings were “consistent and provocative. Paraprofessionals achieve clinical outcomes equal to or significantly better than those obtained by professionals.…The study, on the whole, lent no support to the major hypothesis that…the technical skills of professional psychotherapists produce measurably better therapeutic change.”8
Collins reluctantly admits, “Clearly there is evidence that for most problems, laypeople can counsel as well as or better than the professionals.” But he hastens to ask, “Is their success rate as good with the more serious problems?”9 Professional counselors, in an understandable defense of their livelihood, say that inexperienced or untrained counselors can easily be fooled by counselees, while trained professionals are more likely to detect and understand complex and abnormal behavior.
If so, one would rightly expect that their diagnoses of mental disorders would be consistently accurate and that they would readily perceive when someone is faking a mental illness. Dr. E. Fuller Torrey and Dr. Judi Striano, in separate books, describe an experiment at Stanford University that revealed just how inaccurate psychiatric diagnoses can be and how easily the experts can be fooled. A psychologist by the name of D.L. Rosenhan, a professor of psychology and law at Stanford University, had eight “perfectly sane people” (Rosenhan “himself, one graduate student, three psychologists, a pediatrician, a psychiatrist, and a woman who was a homemaker”)10 admitted to 12 different mental hospitals. The attending psychiatrists were told that these “patients” were hearing voices.
Otherwise, these normal people, mostly graduate students, gave completely truthful histories to the psychiatrists. They were all diagnosed as “schizophrenic,” except one who was diagnosed as “manic-depressive.” Once admitted, they acted perfectly normally; yet were held for 7 to 52 days (the average was 19) and were given over 2,100 pills total. The true patients on the wards often recognized them as pseudopatients but the staff never did. Once labeled, the staff’s perception of them was apparently so profoundly colored that normal behavior was seen as part of their psychosis.
In an even more damning postscript to the experiment, Rosenhan told one hospital what he had done. He then told them that he would try to gain admission for another pseudopatient there within the next 3 months. Ever watchful for the pseudopatient who was never sent, the staff labeled 41 of the next 193 admissions as suspected pseudopatients; over half of these were so labeled by a psychiatrist. The experimenter concluded: “Any diagnostic process that lends itself so readily to massive errors of this sort cannot be a very reliable one.”11
In his succeeding pages, Torrey cites several other experiments which underscore the low reliability of psychiatric diagnostic techniques.
8-Collins, Can You Trust?, p. 45.
9-Ibid., p. 46.
10-Judi Striano, How to Find a Good Psychotherapist, A Consumer Guide (Santa Barbara, CA: Professional Press, 1987), p. 79.
11-E. Fuller Torrey, The Death of Psychiatry (Radnor, PA: Chilton Book Company, 1974), p. 47.
Ed Bulkley, Why Christians Can’t Trust Psychology (Eugene, Or.: Harvest House, 1993).
A woman, age 31, complains of chronic depression and low self-esteem. She has been under psychiatric care since she was a teenager, but has not improved. A fed-up husband is ready to call off his marriage because of the perpetual expense of his wife’s psychiatric sessions, which are producing no positive results. A young woman has been diagnosed as schizophrenic and has been given strong psychoactive drugs which temporarily mask her symptoms.
The majority of experienced pastoral counselors have met many such clients of psychological counseling.
You might be tempted to ask, “Why would anyone submit to psychological counseling if it never helps anyone?” Few serious critics of psychology go so far as to say that no one is ever helped through psychological counseling. A better way to ask the question might be, With its claims of superiority over pastoral counseling and its high expense, why is psychological therapy so relatively ineffective?
One Christian psychologist lists five major reasons that psychology produces disappointing results: 1) unrealistic expectations by counselees, 2) inaccurate assumptions about the ability of psychology to explain human behavior, 3) wrong motivations for seeking counsel, 4) unfounded faith in psychological “experts,” and 5) undelivered promises by the “experts.”1
These causes of failure in psychology can apply to any counseling system, secular or Christian. People often enter counseling with the mistaken belief that the counselor will solve their problems. The truth is that counseling success in any system depends more upon the motivation of the counselee to change than on the insights of the counselor.
Psychopromises
Some psychologists, in an attempt to explain why therapies often fail, point out that patients often come with unrealistic expectations of being set free from all anxiety and achieving perpetual happiness. Ironically, psychiatric hospitals and psychological counseling services aggressively advertise their services on radio and television implying that such goals are possible…with their help.
A one-third-page newspaper advertisement for Adolescent Behavioral Health sponsored by a large hospital shows a teenage boy with his arm around his girlfriend. They are dressed in punk outfits. The ad says, “Young people frequently choose hairstyles and clothing to express healthy adolescent rebellion. But how is one to tell whether his teenager’s behavior is OK or self-destructive?”2 (emphasis added). The answer is obvious: “The professionals at the Behavioral Health System…are here to assist you in answering this crucial question.…We will help you.… Call someone you can trust.” The ad implies that parents are simply unable to understand their teenagers without the professional insights of mental health workers. And who better to trust than those who see some teenage rebellion as “healthy”?
With such glowing results promised by the mental health industry, it is no wonder that Americans have come to expect instant solutions for all their needs, desires, and problems. Our modern generation refuses to accept the fact that suffering is an inevitable part of human existence.
Ed Bulkley, Why Christians Can’t Trust Psychology (Eugene, Or.: Harvest House, 1993), 71–72.
Questioning the Sufficency of Scripture – The No-book and Filtering Device Approaches
The No-book Approach
Another approach taught by integrationists might be called the no-book approach, which suggests that we can’t really be sure our understanding of the Bible is accurate because our interpretive efforts are always colored by our own perspectives. Bookman explains this approach in this way:
All human knowledge is flawed by definition. There is no reason to be any more suspicious of science than of theology (i.e., of the theories and facts derived by human investigation than of supposed truths derived from Scripture) simply because Scripture is no less liable to the limitations of human participation than is any other truth source.
Regardless of the authority and/or veracity of the truth source, human knowing of truth can only approach greater and greater levels of probability; certainty is propositionally unthinkable.7
While this viewpoint may seem incredulous to most Christians, it is likely to become the dominant view of so-called “Christian counseling” in the years ahead. This viewpoint already dominates post-critical hermeneutics and will most likely continue to filter down into the arena of pastoral and religious counseling.
The Filtering-device Approach
Some Christians who aren’t comfortable with either of the previously mentioned perspectives assert that the Bible should be used as a rule book or filtering device for identifying counseling truth. According to the advocates of this view,
All truth claims that are the result of human cogitations, investigations, and theorizing must be subjected to the Word of God that alone will be allowed to pass judgment on the veracity and applicability of those truth claims. The Bible and the Bible alone will be granted the role of falsification; that is, if a truth-claim is discerned to contradict or compromise a truth established in Scripture, that competing truth-claim is to be adjudged false.8
Truth derived from the study of any segment of general revelation, whether psychology or any other field, is not as trustworthy as the truth found in Scriptures. This is the reason that the integrationist will filter psychological truth through biblical truth and will accept only that which is not contradictory to God’s special revelation 9
This view is sometimes called “spoiling the Egyptians” – a phrase that comes from Exodus 12:36 and is used in reference to what the Israelites did when they were delivered from Egyptian captivity. This incident is used to illustrate and give some biblical warrant to the practice of accepting and benefiting from extrabiblical insights in the realm of counseling theory and practice. Those who promote this view say that because the Israelites didn’t reject the silver and gold that came from the ungodly Egyptians (in fact, they were commanded by God to take all of the silver and gold they could get – Exodus 3:21–22), we shouldn’t reject counseling theories and practices that are discovered and used by unbelievers.
While the proponents of these three major approaches to Christian counseling differ on some issues, they are all agreed on one major point: the traditional biblical resources for dealing with man’s problems are not enough; they simply are not adequate. We must make use of insights and ideas and techniques that are not taught nor found in God’s Word. Bookman and others have written excellent resources that expose the errors of such thinking, and I recommend their writings to you for further illumination and refutation.10
7-Doug Bookman, in Introduction to Biblical Counseling, p. 79.
8-ibid., p. 90.
9-English, Integrationist’s Critique, as cited in Introduction to Biblical Counseling, p. 229.
10-Important critiques related to integrationist attempts are found in Introduction to Biblical Counseling, pp. 63–97; Power Religion, ed. Michael S. Horton, see David Powlison, author of chapter 8, and Edward Welch, author of chapter 9 (Chicago: Moody Press, 1992) pp. 191–218, 219–43; David Powlison, Journal of Psychology and Theology 12, no. 4, (1984): 270–78; Jay Adams, Competent To Counsel (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1970); Jay Adams, A Theology of Christian Counseling (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1979); Jay Adams, Teaching to Observe (Woodruff, SC: Timeless Texts, 1995); Ed Bulkley, Why Christians Can’t Trust Psychology (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 1993); David F.Wells, No Place for Truth (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1993); John MacArthur, Jr., Our Sufficiency in Christ (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1991); John MacArthur, Jr. The Vanishing Conscience (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1994); John MacArthur, Reckless Faith (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1994); Noel Weeks, The Sufficiency of Scripture (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1988), pp. 3–46, 167–82; James Owen, Christian Psychology’s War on the Word (Santa Barbara, CA: East Gate Publishers, 1993).
Edward E. Hindson and Howard Eyrich, Totally Sufficient (Eugene, Or.: Harvest House Publishers, 1997), 34–36.
Bookman then proceeds to delineate several ways in which Christians who don’t believe in the Scripture’s sufficiency for counseling actually do regard and use God’s Word in counseling. One approach they use is called the two-book or the general versus special revelation approach. The argument that is often used to support this theory is that God reveals truth to us in two primary ways: through “non-propositional truth deposited by God in the created order of things” which “must be investigated and discovered by mankind” and through “the propositional truth recorded in Scripture.” The emphasis is that since all truth is God’s truth, it really doesn’t matter where that truth is found. Those who hold to this view believe that “the truth accurately derived from the consideration of the natural order of things (general revelation) is just as true as that derived from Scripture.” When applied to the area of counseling, the proponents of this approach affirm that “any defensible truth that is derived by means of psychological research into the order of mankind is truth derived from general revelation, thus truth derived from God, and thus truth as dependable and authoritative as truth exegeted from Scripture.”
A representative quote from Harold Ellens, a defender of this two-book view, clearly illustrates the thinking behind this position. Ellens asserts:
Theology and psychology are both sciences in their own right, stand legitimately on their own foundations, read carefully are the two books of God’s revelation…
Wherever truth is disclosed it is always God’s truth. Whether it is found in General Revelation or Special Revelation, it is truth which has equal warrant with all other truth. Some truth may have greater weight than other truth in a specific situation, but there is no difference in its warrant as truth.5
In another publication, Ellens gives additional information about the nature of and rationale for this two-book perspective. In keeping with this idea that general and special revelation are complementary, serving different purposes and being equally authoritative, he makes the following comments:
I believe the Bible to be an internally coherent testimony of the believing community throughout a 2,000 – to 3,000 – year period regarding the mighty acts of God’s redemption in the community’s experience. I believe that testimony is normative and authoritative for us in matters of faith and life because it is a warrantable testimony and is God’s universalized truth. This does not, however, force me to agree that the Bible is authoritative truth in matters which are not the focus and burden of that spirit-inspired, redemptive testimony of the historic believers. Moreover, because the Bible is a testimony incarnated in the human fabric of historical and cultural material, just as God’s testimony in the Son of God himself was incarnated in that same human stuff, it is imperative that its human limitations and historical anomalies be differentiated from its redemptively revelational material. Jesus, for example… spoke quite erroneously in terms of a three-storied universe, an imminent second coming, and the like. Humanness radically conditioned Him with cultural-historical limitations as regards issues that were not central to the single truth of God’s testimony in Him, that is, that God is for us, not against us. Why are those who insist on inerrancy as the only foundation for authority in Scripture afraid to have a Bible that is at least as culturally bound as was the incarnate Son of God himself…?
Sound psychological theory and practice genuinely enhance the patient’s personhood. God designed what that is. Christians perceive it to varying degrees. Full-orbed personhood may be achieved by patients to varying levels of functionality. Sound psychology, which brings the patient, for example, out of depression to emotional resilience and stability, is just as Christian at that level as at the level affording the final stages of maturity…. Even if that deliverance from depression is done by a secularist, it is a Kingdom act and a Christian enterprise….
What matters in the helping of professing Christians is less the imparting of biblical information or religious practices to the patient, and more the enhancement of healthy functionary of the human as person: in the direction of completeness in body, mind and spirit. That practice of the helping professions that is preoccupied with the final step of wholeness, spiritual maturity, will short-circuit the therapeutic process and put the religious dynamic of the patient or therapist straight into the religious person’s pathology. 6
5-J. Harold Ellens, Biblical Themes, as cited in Introduction to Biblical Counseling, p. 71.
6-J. Harold Ellens, Journal of Psychology and Theology, 9:4, 1981, p. 320.
Edward E. Hindson and Howard Eyrich, Totally Sufficient (Eugene, Or.: Harvest House Publishers, 1997), 32–34.
