When Your Church Staff Disagrees on Immigration

In this episode of the Healthy Church Staff podcast, Todd Rhoades discusses how church leaders can navigate tensions arising from staff disagreements on cultural issues, such as immigration, communicated through social media. Todd outlines common traps, like pretending issues do not exist or enforcing false unity, and suggests a more constructive approach: acknowledging tensions without shaming, setting a collaborative tone, differentiating core mission from political opinions, and focusing on building trust within the team. • Staff disagreements on cultural issues can cause tension. • Avoid ignoring the issue or enforcing false unity. • Acknowledge tension without shaming. • Separate mission from political opinions. • Focus on building trust rather than political alignment.

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Transcript

Instagram Sparks Staff Tension

SPEAKER_00 0:08

Your worship pastor posts something on Instagram about, oh I don't know, immigration. Your youth pastor sees it, doesn't say anything, but you can feel it. And the staff meeting rolls around and everybody's polite and professional and yet distant. And you bring up the mission trip to Mexico, and the room goes incredibly quiet. And somebody makes a comment, somebody else tenses up, nobody knows exactly what everybody else is thinking, but the tension is absolutely screaming. And it all came from an Instagram post that your worship pastor posted about immigration. And now we're talking about something that has an immigration element to it. So things get complicated really quickly on church staffs and in church staff meetings. So we're going to talk about that today here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. My name's Todd Rhodes, one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffing.com. Now, here is what most church leaders do when staff members disagree on cultural hot buttons. Things like immigration. And there are certain traps here that a lot of leaders

Two Leadership Traps To Avoid

SPEAKER_00 1:19

fall into. And if this if you've not had this happen, it will happen. Believe me, it will happen. It's just a matter of time. Here are some of the traps that we fall into, though, I think. Trap number one is just you just pretend it doesn't exist. You avoid it. You keep all those meetings surface level. You talk about worship sets and budget line items. And at the same time that you're keeping it real and surface-y, your team is building up these invisible walls. They're not just disagreeing, they're starting to question each other's character. And this boy in politics and social hot button issues, this happens, it happens both slowly and quickly at the same time. It happens over time, but it also happens in an instant. And you're hoping it's all gonna blow over, but let me tell you, it just won't. So the first thing you can do is you can just pretend it doesn't exist and ignore it. The other thing that you can do, and this trap number two, is you can force false unity. You call a staff meeting and say, hey, we're all on the same page here. You quote scripture about unity, you talk about focusing on the gospel, and you know what, you're right, but you're also shutting down the actual human beings that are sitting around the table right in front of you. Forced peace isn't real peace, it's just quiet resentment. So your staff doesn't need a path, a pep talk, your staff actually needs a pathway. So here is what I think actually

Name It Without Shaming It

SPEAKER_00 2:47

work. And it's the leadership move that a lot of leaders just miss. Here's what it looks like. First, you actually name it without shaming it. All right, name it, don't shame it. You don't have to pick a side to acknowledge that there's tension there. Try something like this. Hey, I know we're all processing really hard things happening in our country right now. Some of us see it differently, and that's okay. You just gave your permission, permission your team, permission to be human. So that's the first thing you do. And then secondly, you set the tone. Hey, we can disagree and still be on mission here together as a staff and as a church. But here's that's where a lot of leaders just stop. Don't stop here. Now you need to separate the conviction from the mission.

Separate Conviction From Mission

SPEAKER_00 3:39

Okay? Your staff does not have to agree on immigration policy to agree on your church's mission. They do have to agree on how you treat people. They do have to agree on the authority of scripture. They do have to agree that Jesus calls us to love our neighbors. So draw a circle around that. Around that, not the political argument. Patrick Lencioni calls this disagree and commit. Okay, I love that. Disagree and commit. You don't need consensus on everything. You just need clarity on what matters most. And you know what? Here's probably the part that nobody really talks about. This really, in this instance that we're using today, this really isn't about immigration.

It Is Really About Trust

SPEAKER_00 4:30

It's about trust. When your staff can't navigate hard topics, it reveals whether they actually trust each other. Do they assume the best? Or are they silently starting to write each other off? Can they sit in discomfort without fracturing? If not, this won't be the last thing that divides them. The next election, the next headline, the next crisis, the next ice story on your Instagram or on the network news. Your job is not as a church leader. Your job is not to solve everything. Your job is not to solve immigration. But let me tell you what your job is. Your job is to build a team that can hold tension without losing respect. Now I'm not saying ignore theology or duck hard conversations. What I'm saying is don't let cable news categories become your staff's relational fault lines. Jesus had a tax collector and a zealot on his team for crying out loud. And that's the first century version of left and right in the same room. He did not avoid it. He recentered them around a bigger vision. So here's your bottom line

Bottom Line And Practical Charge

SPEAKER_00 5:45

for today. Your staff doesn't need to agree on everything, but they do need to trust each other enough to disagree and still stay on mission. You're not building political alignment. That's not the purpose of the church. You're building trust, and trust is what holds a team, holds a team together when the world and current hot button social issues try to tear it apart.

Share It And Email Us

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Thanks for listening. If this helped, share it with another church leader, maybe somebody else on your team, maybe somebody who's navigating the same thing. We're all in this together. If there's any way that I can help you, any kind of feedback you want to give me, even on today's episode or just the podcast in general, reach out to me at podcast at chemistry staffing is the email. Podcast at chemistry staffing.com. All right, that's it for today. We'll be right back here tomorrow on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Thanks so much. Have a great day!