Several years ago, a church member I couldn’t please was on the phone. “I want you to know,” he said, “I have no problem with what you are trying to do, but … “
His criticism wasn’t any worse than usual—the Sunday evening service “was dull”—but it hit me at a bad time. Earlier that week I had waded through a 15-page epistle correcting my view of baptism. The previous Sunday, tension had crackled over approval of the church budget.
I was tired of it. I came home defeated, telling God and my wife, “I have to do something else with my life!” The next day I took my first mental-health day. I went to the library and researched a doctor of ministry program in marriage-and-family counseling. In short order, I enrolled with the intention of changing careers.
I was through with the pastorate.
As part of the requirements for the program, I had to reflect on relationship patterns in my family of origin and in my marriage. I discovered I was a “conflict avoider.” Around angry people, I felt fearful, lost objectivity, and lacked honesty in my communication. I would do anything to stop their anger—take the blame, play the martyr, or make jokes. That part of my life was built on sand.
It also played into the weaknesses of the church. Twenty-two years before, our church had experienced a devastating split. For years we had felt its repercussions. After the split, the church had learned to avoid public conflict.
I wondered if in a strange way the church and I had been drawn to each other. I functioned as their shock absorber. That had slowly driven me to the brink.
But that was also a first step toward helping our church confront its past and heal its wounded spirit.
The new Ken
I continued the D.Min. program while pastoring, but I wondered if I could really change the way I handled conflict. Two events told me I could.
I hung up the phone after what felt like Round 15 in a heavyweight prizefight. The board chairman and I had gone toe-to-toe again. The punches were scripted: he mildly criticizes the youth pastor; I become fearful and defensive, and rationalize his criticism; he turns up the heat; my stomach churns and I declare, “It is not reasonable to do what you expect.”
This time the bout ended differently. I said, “This way of discussing things isn’t working for either of us. For some reason, I am not able to hear what you are saying. Would you mind if we sit together and let me see if I can hear you clearly?”
As soon as he felt I had listened to and understood his concerns, his need to criticize diminished.
The most concrete evidence of my growth came at a board retreat when our leaders were evaluating our church’s ministry. On walls around the room was newsprint filled with observations. On the one labeled Changes, they had listed changes during my tenure. They had written: KQ1—KQ2 (my initials).
“We have watched you evolve,” one said. Another said, “It hasn’t always been easy, but we believe your changing has been a healthy thing.” My growth had been noticed.
Church therapy
The changes in our church atmosphere became a topic at board meetings. I encouraged them to see the church as a larger form of family, which might benefit from a process of historical review similar to our board retreat. I proposed a retreat. They were hesitant but game.
I thought with one retreat we could rehearse and evaluate the history of the church. It took three, a retreat for each of the church’s three pastorates.
“How was the church born?” was our first question.
“It started 40 years ago,” someone said, “as a church plant in the suburbs of Toronto.” Some old-timers provided first-hand accounts. “I remember when there were 10 adults and 25 kids,” said one. We revisited the purpose for which the church was planted, the first pastor and his ministry, the major events of his time, both positive and negative.
Covering those first 17 years, I heard marvelous things I hadn’t heard before, though I had been in the church for eight years. In its early days, our church had a reputation as a training ground for evangelism. Pastors came from across the country for training. Scores of people were introduced to Christ. Hundreds of children were reached through our Sunday school. Yet I seldom had heard these stories. Why?
Cut off from a legacy
The reason became clear as we explored the end of the first pastor’s tenure, the time of the horrific split. A few of our leaders had lived through the trauma, and they wept as they remembered the pain.
“He was wonderfully strong as a leader,” one of the elders remarked. “He built this ministry from nothing. But he used to say with pride, ‘I work my board members so hard that they are glad to get off after three years.’ “
Another said, “His strength became a weakness when it was time to share control with the others. He had trouble letting go.”
Someone added, “He felt the church and its ministry were his—like he owned them.”
The story came out. Covert opposition began to increase. Rumors began about the pastor’s counseling ministry. The opposition had its headquarters in the choir.
One of our leaders recalled, “One person sang a special number as a part of the worship, and, when finished, walked down the aisle and out of the church! He would not stay to listen to the pastor.”
New elders were elected in the summer of 1976. The music director was elected chairman.
At the first meeting of that board, the pastor asked each elder, “Do you give the pastor a vote of confidence on his ministry to date?” Of eight elders present, seven voted, “No confidence.”
That Sunday, the pastor stood and read a letter of resignation: “After 17 years of pastoring this church, from its infancy to its present stature, it is with the greatest reluctance and the deepest regret that I submit my resignation. I do not believe my work here is finished. Neither do I believe God is leading me out under the conditions in which I am compelled to go. … It is impossible for me to discharge my ministry with a board of elders that has no confidence in me. … The congregation will consider this resignation at a special meeting. At that time you will have the opportunity either to accept or reject it.”
The church was instantly divided. The business meeting he announced invited war. The salvos began immediately.
Pro-pastor forces circulated letters. The chairman of the board fired back the next Sunday, giving the worst insult a Canadian can give to anyone: he accused the pro-pastor group of “mounting an American-style political campaign.”
At the business meeting, amid shouting, fist-waving, and red-faced anger, the church voted 54-45 in favor of the pastor. He was heard to say on his way out of the meeting, “You want me, and I’m back!”
He was back, but the whole board resigned. In the course of a month, half of 500 people left the church, about 125 one Sunday alone.
The survivors at our retreat spoke of hating to come to church because they didn’t know who among their friends would become the next casualty. Voices broke, and tears flowed as they opened the wound before my eyes.
I then realized why the effective ministry of the first 17 years wasn’t broadcast. The pain caused by the split was still so great, no one who lived through it wanted to think or talk about what went on before, when their friends were part of church life. That the early memories were so positive made remembering them all the more painful. Our church had cut itself off from a wonderful legacy.
Those who stayed supported the pastor against the actions of the board. Since that time, a spirit of distrust of boards has pervaded the congregation. I had encountered this in business meetings but couldn’t explain it. At one point, we had to call business meetings on three consecutive Sundays in an attempt to pass a budget. People believed the board was “up to something” or “trying to pull a fast one.” The attitude was so blatant, even a conflict avoider like me had to confront it. I had each board member stand and then asked the congregation, “Which of these individuals don’t you trust?”
The distrust wasn’t about individuals; it was corporate.
Turning point
How do you face wounds and sins decades old? The retreats to uncover the pain of the past were only the first step. We felt we needed to do something publicly to begin the healing process.
The church’s 40th anniversary was our opportunity.
I preached a series from Deuteronomy on remembering and learning from Israel’s history—how God works in good times and bad. I weaved in stories about the split and the blessings that had preceded it. I started my first sermon by reading the minutes of that fateful board meeting.
“That is our history,” I said. “We can understand why Israel wanted to forget some of its history—its failures, grumbling, and rebellion. Yet over and over God reminded them of those times, to have the people learn from them. But for Israel, and for us as well, it wasn’t just bad times,” I continued. “There were awesome things to remember and celebrate, like God’s deliverance and provision. We are going to connect our story with theirs—bad and good—as the people of God.”
Some people, especially the old-timers, did not understand. “Why are you dredging up the past? There are so few here from that time.” Another quoted Paul: “We should ‘forget what lies behind and reach forward to what lies ahead.’ “
We decided to create a service on Good Friday to focus more intensely on the issue.
We did this based on one of the most painful “split stories,” always told with anger: “The Day the Choir Joined Another Church.”
What stuck in the craw of those who recounted the event was that the choir practiced on Wednesday night at our church and then performed on Sunday in another small church nearby, which had no choir previously.
I thought with one retreat we could rehearse and evaluate the history of the church. It took three.
Our music ministry was gutted, and many people felt the musicians had rubbed our noses in their leaving.
Now, many years later, as part of a regular prayer group, I had been meeting with the pastor of the church to which everyone had migrated. A trust had formed between us. I opened up the possibility of a reconciliation service with his church.
“I’m not sure our people would know what it is about,” he said. “Very few are left from that time, and it really wasn’t our issue. Our church has no ill feelings toward your church.”
“Then let’s not say anything publicly at the service itself,” I said. “I will just prepare our people for what they are to do.” I would speak, and he would lead Communion.
To my congregation, a week before the special service, I told the story about the choir’s exodus.
“Now, with the gracious permission of that church, and to heal the wound caused by that action,” I announced, “our present choir will sing there at the Good Friday Service. Our musicians will play, and our choir director will lead their church in singing. We are not saying, ‘Nyaah, nyaah,’ but we recognize that God has restored what we had lost. Now we can serve them musically, and we can minister together before the Lord.”
I encouraged everyone to submit our church’s painful memories to the Cross, to seek Christ’s forgiveness and healing, and to extend forgiveness to those who had hurt us.
On Good Friday, both congregations packed the other church. People sat on the floor under the coat racks in the foyer. The man playing their organ had left in the split, and the young man who played the piano was the son of the only choir member who stayed in our church. I spoke on “By his wounds, you were healed.”
“The wounds in us that his wounds heal are not always physical,” I said. “Nor are they only individual and personal. Sometimes they are corporate.”
I spoke about how wounds limit life, freedom, and service, how wounded people sometimes stop serving in the church or stop coming altogether.
I concluded with an invitation: “As you hold the bread today, enclose it in your hand as if crushing it, and let your woundedness be passed to his broken body. As you hold the cup, immerse your wounds in the blood of his wounding, and let them drown there.”
Only the Spirit of God could have produced so many tears. There was a sense of both sorrow and repentance followed by healing, unity, and joy. As I was leaving the service, one of our elderly couples who had survived the split hailed me. “We just wanted you to know that we talked to some people today,” the woman said. “It was so good!”
That couple had not spoken to those people in 22 years.
Happy days, here, again
The atmosphere changed at our church. We heard from former members who returned, “Wow! Something is different here.” Guest speakers offered unsolicited comments on the positive atmosphere. One said, “I have never seen a foyer filled with so many happy people.”
What changed? I can identify two things:
1. Security. Through this process we have become a safer, warmer, more open community. Reconciliation creates that. Some events caused me to chuckle.
One woman, bitter for years, asked me to forgive her for the rotten attitude she had held toward me. She confessed that to me before major surgery. When I visited her afterwards, she grabbed my hand and asked forgiveness again, so I would know her confession was genuine. At a prayer meeting several weeks after her apology, she said, “I want to thank God for the pastor’s message last Sunday. Is it my imagination, or has his preaching really improved?”
At our 40th-anniversary weekend celebration, we invited back the former pastor, the one at the time of the split. Some who had left in anger many years ago returned for the first time and greeted him.
A grandson of one returnee told me, “My grandmother went into a spiritual shell 22 years ago. She has not grown at all, not participated in church life. This is the first evidence of spiritual life I have seen in her.”
We’ve also had a surge in the number of people willing to commit to membership. Before we had three to five people join our church at a time; suddenly we had a class of fifteen.
2. Identity. When I came to the church, several people made an intriguing statement: “Our church doesn’t know what it wants to be when it grows up.” I understand that statement now.
I believe the split had affected our ability to discern our corporate identity. In children, trauma can block emotional development. The people who went through the split felt so much pain, they chose to block out the good days of the early years. That made us orphans. It cut us off from the mission of the godly people who planted our church. That disconnection translated into a struggle to answer “Who are we now? Where are we going?”
Our healing meant we could accept our past and face our future. We have written a new mission statement that reflects both our history and our present multi-ethnic context: “Sharing the light and love of Jesus Christ in every way with everyone.”
More important, we possess a new sense of mission to guide our choices. We have reconnected with our history of evangelism and outreach to children. In the last year, our church has birthed a vision to reach kids through after-school programs and has freed our youth pastor to pursue it.
We are an inner city church now, and we face the tension of choosing between becoming a commuter church or staying a community church. Our history again has guided that choice—we will work to stay a community church.
By retelling the stories and reconciling with our past, we’ve come home again. And we’ve found we like it here.
Kenneth Quick is pastor of Parkway Bible Church 77 Ivordale Crescent Scarborough, Ontario M1R 2W7
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