The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
We're all about helping create a healthy, positive, and spiritually positive environment for church staff members and leadership teams.
The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
Theology and Conflict Avoidance
We explore how church leaders sometimes misuse theology as a defense mechanism, particularly focusing on Romans 8:28 and how it can shut down necessary conversations instead of starting them.
• When we use scripture to end conversations rather than begin them, we're often avoiding uncomfortable feedback
• "Spiritual bypassing" occurs when we use spiritual language to avoid emotional pain, discomfort, or responsibility
• Quoting scripture instead of apologizing or addressing frustration shortcuts growth
• Real spiritual maturity confronts with grace, corrects with humility, and confesses with courage
• The most spiritually mature leaders listen, repent when needed, and change when necessary
• Pause before quoting scripture and ask if you're saying it to help or to escape
• Own your part before sharing scripture—don't spiritualize over your responsibility
• Be clear about decisions rather than hiding behind vague spiritual phrases
• Stay present and listen longer than you talk during difficult conversations
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Most church leaders absolutely love Romans 8.28. You know all things work together for good, but what happens when we use it to end conversations instead of starting them? Well, today we're going to be really honest. We're going to pull back the layers and explore how theology is sometimes misused as a defense mechanism. Yeah, it does. It is sometimes right, avoiding the very feedback and hard conversations that our teams really desperately need. If you've ever been in a meeting where conflict got spiritualized into silence or you've just been told to just trust God when you're really all you needed was some clarity, you're not alone. We're going to talk about it today. Hi there, my name is Todd Rhodes and I am one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom, and I'm your host right here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Well, have you ever ever had someone quote a Bible verse in a staff meeting to just kind of shut down a conversation? I mean, we used Romans 8.28. It's great theology. It's a great example, though, but if you're dropping it in a performance review to dodge hard feedback, we got a problem. Okay, so let's talk about this.
Speaker 1:The temptation that we have yes, even church staff people and church leaders the temptation that we have to over spiritualize conflict because, let's be honest, conflict is uncomfortable and in the church world I often say, if you've been a church leader longer than five minutes, you've probably experienced some kind of conflict. We've developed this kind of conflict. We've developed this kind of weird reflex. As church leaders, many of us instead of addressing issues directly, we sometimes kind of wrap them up in scripture and prayer and hope that they just kind of float away and go bye-bye. You know, let's just pray about it. You know God works all things together for good. You know, maybe this is just, maybe this is just a season of pruning, but when we do that, what we're really saying is I don't really want to deal with this. That's not spiritual maturity, it's avoidance dressed in holiness. So what do we do? What do we do when, for example, let's continue down with that Romans road, right With Romans 8.28,. God works all things together for good, that's true, but it's not a substitute for feedback.
Speaker 1:So when you use that verse after delivering hard news or instead of taking responsibility, it feels like spiritual gaslighting a little bit. It tells your team you know, don't feel bad, don't process, don't push back, just trust God's got this. That's not empowering, it's just kind of silencing. You need to have a little bit more conversation. So psychologists call this spiritual bypassing. Okay, it's when we use spiritual language to avoid emotional pain or discomfort or responsibility. We see this all the time when we talk with potential staff members for positions, when they tend to sometimes over-spiritualize and it's because they're trying to avoid either emotional pain or discomfort or responsibility and they just kind of put a spiritual verse or a spiritual jargon to it Not always, but sometimes, and we have pretty good sniffers so we sniff that out pretty quickly.
Speaker 1:But, yeah, the spiritual bypassing is a real thing and in churches this happens all the time. I mean, sometimes we quote scripture instead of apologizing. Yeah, sometimes we pray for someone instead of addressing their frustration. Yeah, sometimes we pray for someone instead of addressing their frustration. Sometimes we talk about God's plan instead of owning our own mistakes and, honestly, it feels safe. It feels safe, but it shortcuts growth. Okay, so let's take a look and I'll get you out on your way today with this last section on why real section, on what real spiritual maturity looks like. Okay, first of all, it doesn't dodge, it confronts, but it confronts with grace. It corrects, but it corrects with humility, and it confesses, and it confesses with courage.
Speaker 1:The most spiritually mature leaders that I know aren't the ones that are quoting verses in hard conversations. They're the ones who actually sit back, be quiet, listen, repent when they need to and change when it's necessary. And this doesn't mean perfection. Your team doesn't need perfect theology in a meeting, okay. They need real honesty and relational integrity. So how do you have those hard conversations without hiding behind God or scripture, because it's easy to spew those out. Man, we've been taught since a child. You know to internalize scripture. We just need to make sure that we're using it wisely.
Speaker 1:Here's how to avoid weaponizing your theology. First of all, just pause. Pause before you quote scripture, ask yourself am I saying this to help or am I saying this to escape? Before you share scripture, own your part. Don't spiritualize over your responsibility.
Speaker 1:And then be clear. Don't hide unclear decisions behind vague phrases like we're sensing a shift or God's just closing a door here. You have to stay present. You have to listen longer than you talk. And don't forget the prayer aspect of it either, not as a way out, but use it to reinforce connection, not to avoid discomfort.
Speaker 1:All right, so look, scripture's powerful, and I'm not saying that the Bible is not important. Don't hear me say that, because I'm not saying that. But sometimes and you know this, you know this to be true we use Scripture as a smokescreen. And when we use theology or Scripture to avoid hard conversations, we create confusion, we create resentment because we're shutting down communication and we create spiritual dissonance in our team. And God doesn't want your leadership to look spiritual. He wants you to be holy and humble and honest. But that doesn't mean that you have to look spiritual all the time. You need to stop and have the conversations. You know.
Speaker 1:If this kind of hit home, I'd love to hear your comments. Maybe you've got a story you'd like to tell me. I'd love to hear your stories. Maybe you want to push back and say, todd, I don't agree with you. That's fine. I'd love to hear from you too. You can reach me anytime. Podcast at chemistrystaffingcom Also had a great free resource that we offered last week on the podcast. It's called True North. It's an epistle written for a modern day, epistle written for church leaders. You can get that at chemistrystaffingcom. Slash true north absolutely free and again, reach out to me at podcast at chemistrystaffing and I will be here again tomorrow, right here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Thanks so much for joining me and I'll talk to you again tomorrow.
