Turn It the Other Way - Christianity Today

I nearly lost my religion one day while trying to change a flat tire. I readily confess to being mechanically challenged, but even I can usually change a flat.

This particular day, however, I couldn’t get the lugs off the wheel. I grunted. I groaned. I pushed. I pulled. I beat on the lug wrench with a hammer. But the lugs wouldn’t give. Finally I gave up, left the tire unchanged, and stalked into the house, defeated.

Later that day, I vented my frustration to a friend on the phone. “Try turning the lugs the other way,” he said offhandedly. Now that, I thought, was a stupid suggestion. Lugs and nuts always tighten when turned clockwise and loosen when turned counterclockwise. Every shade-tree mechanic knows that.

Desperate, however, I gave it a try clockwise. Wonder of wonders, it budged! So did the others. In a matter of moments, I had the flat tire off and the spare mounted. I never would have thought to “tighten” the lugnuts in order to loosen them unless my friend had suggested it. I just knew I was doing it the right way.

His recommendation works in ministry too. In 25 years as a pastor, I have learned that mine is a paradoxical profession. It is held tight by lugs that will never be loosened the expected way. Unless we know that, pastoral ministry often won’t get done.

Here are some paradoxes every pastor needs to understand:

The leadership paradox

The harder you try to control a group, the less control you will have.

To many people leadership means control. The strong leader is a no-nonsense, aggressive bulldog. But the more a person tries to control a group, the more reactive the group becomes. And as the group grows reactionary and restless, it weakens the leader’s grip.

Pastors have been told that “strong churches have strong leaders.” So, we put on the general’s uniform and march to church determined to lead. We give orders, issue edicts, and affect an air of confident superiority. Naively assuming that leading a church is like leading an army, we are astonished when our troops don’t show up.

The well-meant attempt to be a strong leader severs the very things needed for strong leadership in a church—trust, respect, community, and laughter.

In Management of the Absurd, business consultant Richard Farson says leaders shouldn’t worry about appearing to be in charge: “Effective leaders and managers do not regard control as the main concern. Instead, they approach situations sometimes as learners, sometimes as teachers, sometimes as both. They trust the wisdom of the group. Their strength is not in control alone, but in other qualities—passion, sensitivity, tenacity, patience, courage, firmness, enthusiasm, wonder.”

An example of the leadership paradox comes from the Tom Hanks movie Big. A 12-year-old boy wakes up one morning looking like a 30-year-old. On the outside he’s grown up, but on the inside he’s still a kid.

He gets a job with a toy manufacturer and is quickly promoted to vice president. To the amazement and chagrin of his colleagues, Hanks is praised for his leadership. His is an unlikely style that has nothing to do with dominance, certainty, or any of the “macho” qualities we usually associate with “strong leadership.” His only goal is to be himself—playful, honest, light-hearted, and asker of dumb questions.

But, in just being himself, he leads. Others in the toy company crunch numbers and plot graphs. He just brings himself to the job, and wonderful, creative things happen.

I need to remember that principle. As pastor I have the responsibility to take some well-defined stands, but leadership is not about dominance. It is about loving what I do and being playful, honest, and real.

The issues paradox

The issues you most want to push cannot be pushed at all.

Most of the things that really matter cannot be manufactured. Both the issues paradox and the leadership paradox speak to a fallacy: the leader can control of what happens in people’s lives.

I used to fret about what I perceived as my “lack of effectiveness” in ministry. I worried because I couldn’t change others. Now I know I can’t.

A good measuring stick for any church is its capacity to laugh. Any church that cannot laugh is in trouble.

We declared a “Celebration Month” to mark our church’s anniversary. We blew up balloons, struck up the band, and cooked food galore, but we couldn’t make anyone celebrate. If celebration happened it had to come from within each individual.

My guess is that some people celebrated and some didn’t. As their pastor, I could only provide an atmosphere of joy, be joyful myself, then hope others would choose to be joyful.

The same thing is true for worship. We execute a well-designed service on Sunday, but that doesn’t guarantee worship. We cannot force worship on anyone. We can only make it available and hope people will choose to encounter God.

And community? As much as we want to build it, community happens not because the preacher proclaims its necessity, but because people grow to love and serve one another.

From one angle, the issues paradox is one of the most frustrating mysteries of ministry. The issues we most believe in are least amenable to our control. Try as we might, we cannot force people to faith, love, commitment, or any of the other virtues that make life worth living.

But from another angle, the issues paradox is one of the most liberating oddities of pastoral life. We’re called to do what we can do, but there is a limit to our power. At some point, we have to recognize that what we most want people to experience is actually in the hands of God and the individuals themselves. So, we can relax. We can quit playing God.

I know now that I have little control over others; I am responsible for myself. And the best thing I can do to foster celebration, worship, and fellowship in my church is to experience celebration, worship, and fellowship myself. If I do, there is a better chance that others will, too.

The negotiation paradox

Serious issues cannot always be handled seriously.

I have seen it happen many times. A meeting drones on, grave topics weigh heavy on spirits, and then someone does something playful or unexpected, and the morbid spell is broken.

A good measuring stick for any family, business, or church is its capacity to laugh. Any church that cannot laugh is in trouble. And any church that is deadly serious all the time will eventually be dead.

Rabbi Edwin Friedman, in Generation to Generation, writes: “The capacity of clergy to be paradoxical … sometimes crazy … often does more to loosen knots in a congregational relationship system than the most well-meaning ‘serious’ efforts. … The act of being playful frees others by forcing them out of their serious ‘games.'”

I now approach committee meetings with this thought: If we’re going to get anything done, we’d better have some fun! What can I do to bring some light-heartedness to this meeting?

In those meetings that are relaxed and even zany, good things happen. When we have serious meetings, everyone grows somber and not much positive happens. We might feel as if we’re doing the Lord’s work in those sessions, but they drain us, discourage us, and deflate our joy.

Blessed are those churches that have some earthy, playful, and sometimes crazy people (and pastors)!

The learning paradox

You tend to learn more of what you already know.

When I wander into the Borders bookstore near my house, I am confronted by thousands of books. I head toward the sections that grab my interest.

In the religion section, I usually look for books that match my theology, books written by my favorite authors, books fitting my slice of Christian, Protestant, Evangelical religion.

I am a selective reader.

I should read outside of my comfort zone. I benefit from books on astronomy and economics, but even those selections are governed by my preferences. A wise uncle often told me, “You are stuck with the way you are glued together.”

Older now, I see the wisdom in his words. I am stuck with my appearance, temperament, history, and experiences. The die has been cast for me, and I’m headed down a path of knowledge that is not likely to veer too far afield.

I am not unique. As the sign on the Alaskan Highway supposedly warned drivers years ago, “Choose your rut carefully. You’ll be in it for a long time!”

I want to put in a good word for staying faithful to the road I already travel. Rather than abandon the interests fostered by my peculiarities, I think it wiser to revel in my rut! Explore it. Become expert in it.

I know this flies in the face of postmodern wisdom, which encourages us to seek broader horizons, to dabble in many things. I am all for new learning opportunities, but if I spend too much time in uncharted territory, I will never develop enough identity to make a mark!

Ernest Campbell writes, “Mastery is always resolved through resolved limitation. The man to be pitied is the man who believes in everything just a little bit, the miscellaneous man who has never brought the tattered fragments of his life under the command of a single voice, or gathered his abilities around a single passion” (Locked in a Room with Open Doors).

So let me explore my rut. Let me be the finest, wisest, Christian, Protestant, Evangelical pastor I can be. Let every pastor investigate his or her own field of interest, fully aware that God uses many people traveling different paths to bring his kingdom into the world.

I refuse to criticize myself because of the learning paradox. I will keep learning more—mostly about the things that interest me. And I trust that, with God, depth is preferable to dabbling.

More amazing discoveries

I still remember my surprise in the garage that afternoon when the lugs came loose. Once I knew to turn them the opposite direction, I was home free.

I cannot guarantee that knowing these paradoxes will make the task any easier. Pastoring a church is demanding no matter how many idiosyncrasies we pinpoint.

Every bit of knowledge helps though. And every time we turn even one lug the right direction, ministry gets a little more satisfying.

Judson Edwards is pastor of Woodland Baptist Church 15315 Huebner Road San Antonio TX 78248