For the past few months and for the next 18 it will be very difficult to ignore politicians and campaigns. If you live in a battleground state like Florida or Ohio you get the joy of automated calls and direct mail. Candidates are already being accused of accommodating their stances to their specific audiences, often contradicting their earlier statements.
Politics is of course not limited to Washington D.C. and 24 hour news networks, it also permeates the local church.
Pastors who say they don’t play politics are lying, it is a reality. Leading people is political by nature. Convincing people to follow you and get on board is exactly what politicians do when trying to garner your vote. Hopefully church politics is without the controversy and ugliness, but they do exist.
Leadership (spiritual or otherwise) is political by nature.
However this doesn’t mean that you have to appease the people who have been there the longest or run every decision by the big givers.
A few months into ministry I recognized we had a scheduling problem. We needed to consolidate for the sake of my volunteer team and to keep momentum with the students. In order to do so I had to barbecue a sacred cow.
It was a Bible study in the home of a legendary leader who had led the study in his home longer than I had been alive. Parents were dropping kids off at the same program they went to. He knew everybody and everybody knew him. It wasn’t a church event but our church never scheduled a conflict.
By the time I got there however the program was a shell of what it had once been. Students didn’t want to go and parents felt awkward telling the respected leader the truth. It was no longer a viable activity and it was occurring in a prime time.
So I did something bold. I called him and told him that in a few months we were moving our program for the age to the same night he was (and always had) met. I asked him to change nights, but made it clear that even he choose not to I was making the change.
To the best of my knowledge he never undermined me behind my back, but there were supporters of his that did. Some of the critics carried some political power in the church and I got my fair share of sharp questions. Even though I had several hard conversations I was supported by the rest of the leadership and the scheduling change really did work.
I really knew it was a success when parents and students thanked me in private. I took some heat, but at least it was for a good decision.
In church playing politics is a necessity, but thankfully not one that is inherently about self-promotion.
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A friend just tweeted at me that I end up saying that playing politics in church is not about self promotion, but I promoted myself in the post.
After reading it again that is exactly what I just did.
Let me be clear that for every good decision in church leadership I have made countless more bad ones.
Taking this situation for example. The first conversation I had with the leader of this Bible Study I endorsed what he was doing and gave my support. Only to essentially kill it a few months later.
Mea Culpa.
Hey josh. I just typed a comment and it was erased….dangit! well, i have to disagree with you on this one. You said that pastors have to be involved in politics within the church. You were talking about how politics involved convincing people to follow you. And Josh, I DO think that most pastors do play politics. I am not trying to judge them (because i know ministry is one of the most difficult jobs in the world!), but i think this is part of the problem with our churches. You see, I don’t think pastors have to feed into the politics of the church. I realize that most churches have politics all of their own, even without the pastors. But I think that is just all the more reason for a pastor to say no, Im not going to involve myself in this…no matter what the outcome. I think if our leaders would listen more to the leading of the One who sent them instead of the voices of those around them, things would be much different in our churches. Politics wouldn’t be as much of an issue. You know why? Because those that want to play politics would walk out the door. I know…of course you are thinking….pie in the sky Janet..if we did that we would lose half the church. And to that, I say so what? You see, i think we as christians feel like it is OUR job to convince people to follow Jesus. And I think church leaders feel that pressure even more (mostly from the congregation). But thats not our job at all. All we need to do is follow God’s leading and live our lives as a living sacrifice as Christ asks us to. When people who are truly seeking Jesus see this, they will WANT to get on board with what God is doing within the church. I think if more christians (including myself) were brave enough to follow the leading of the Spirit as opposed to what people think should be happening in the church, our churches would be known more for being followers of Jesus rather than crummy politics.
Leadership in the local church is about getting people moving in the same direction, the direction that God is leading.
What I was trying to convey was some of the more redemptive aspects of church politics. They exist you might as well find ways to use them for something positive.
A decision may be the right one, but if executed poorly you run the risk of someone only seeing the poor execution and not the outcome thus stepping farther away from the right direction.