5 Signs Your Leadership Has Quit On You

When I lost the support of my congregation's leaders, I was completely caught off guard.

I had been with the church for a couple of years. We were a rural congregation (about 200 people) with many different programs in place. I had started a small groups ministry and revamped our benevolence and youth ministries. Everything was going great. Or so I thought.

There's an old joke about a minister coming back from vacation to find an eviction notice hanging on the parsonage door. Well, my experience wasn't quite that bad, but it was traumatic.

The previous summer I'd taken a church growth course for my M.Div. My course project was to assess our congregation's abilities and potential for growth. After I studied our congregation and community, I concluded that while we were mission-minded, our opportunities for growth and expansion were limited due to the low population and the high-church culture of our area. As a result, my recommendations for the future—while by no means ignoring conversion—focused on discipleship and expanding our benevolence ministry, neither of which traditionally result in baptisms. This was the direction I believed we needed to go, but the congregation's other leaders did not agree with me. Almost immediately, tensions rose in my relationship with the leaders. I felt a bit like a lightning rod—attracting vague, negative energy.

The holidays rolled around. My family and I spent Christmas with the in-laws, and returned to ring in the New Year with our congregation. I had spent an entire Monday (usually my day off) planning that year's activities and programs. I'd printed off copies of my vision for the year, and polished up my presentation. I walked into our leadership meeting with a plan for a great year. I shook hands with everyone, and swapped pleasantries about the vacation.

We opened with prayer, asking God's presence to be with us as we met. Then every eye in the room turned to me.

"We have decided not to continue with you as our minister."

At first, I thought I had misheard. Didn't they shake my hand? Didn't they just ask me about my trip and my family? I was shell-shocked. The next few minutes were an emotional blur as one leader outlined my failings as a pastor. Later, I'd find out that an influential family in our congregation did not like my preaching or that I spent a great deal of time mentoring younger leaders.

Unfortunately, this was not the first time I had an unpleasant conversation with a congregational leadership team about my future. When I was in seminary, I served as yoiuth pastor for a congregation that was (in the words of the seminary president who arranged it) "extremely difficult to work with." About two weeks into this new ministry, the church's leadership came to me as I was working late one evening and informed me that they were "going to fire [me] as soon as possible." They had never wanted to hire a youth minister, they said, and did so only to quiet the younger families in the congregation.

Ever since I have struggled with doubts about my ability to lead and minister. More than once, I considered leaving the ministry. And eventually, my ministry shifted. I moved into full-time teaching at a university about three years ago. I still serve local congregations, although I do it on an interim basis now—as well as assisting the ministers of the congregation that I am currently attending with teaching and pastoral care. And the difficult experiences of my pastoral life have made me spiritually bolder, professionally stronger, and a little wiser. I know others can learn from my experiences—and hopefully without enduring as much pain. So here I offer my five warning signs that your leadership has quit on you.

1. They meet without you.

I know, this sounds obvious. After I presented my growth report, I began to notice that Monday evening meetings began running longer—although I was quietly excused since the meeting was officially "over." Things began feeling awkward and tense with the other leaders and I was receiving tepid responses to plans I proposed.

2. They are looking for someone else.

I had agreed to a six-month interim in a local congregation—a sort of trial period because I have chosen bi-vocational ministry. I was called to a meeting where I believed we would discuss the transition of bringing me on permanently. Instead, one of them simply said that they had polled the congregation and that a significant amount of the congregation did not want me to stay. This caught me completely off-guard because my polling of the congregation revealed something completely different. In the meeting, when I pressed them about what the next step was, they informed me that they had already contacted someone who they thought would be interested in serving their congregation and that I was being put on notice. I could stay until the new minister arrived. What I pieced together later was that this leadership was courting another minister without telling me.

3. They withhold information from you.

It is difficult working effectively when you do not have a complete picture of what you are supposed to be doing or how you will be evaluated. This is Management 101 stuff. Yet I have found that leaders who have quit on their ministers often resort to this tactic to put the minister on the defensive. A friend of mine told me about an experience with a congregation where the leadership redefined the parameters of his position without telling him. As a younger minister, he had been hired as an associate to an older minister who was planning to retire. The older minister was hoping my friend would assume the primary ministry role. The leadership, however, was not on board with this plan, and therefore failed to inform my friend of this plan. Instead, they hired him only to serve as an associate, having him focus more on the youth ministry and benevolence. After a few frustrating years of wondering why the older minister continued to preach even though he had informed my friend of his plan to retire and turn the reigns over to my friend, my friend announced his resignation.

4. They cannot make unified decisions.

Being in harmony does not mean that everyone has to agree on every decision. It means that all those involved are willing to put aside their agendas to do what is best for the congregation. In the case of my interim ministry, the leadership was squarely divided over whether I should actually leave. One of the leaders contacted me and said that I should fight the decision to let me go in favor of another minister. Additionally, the leadership could not come to a unified decision on when the new minister should start. One of the leaders kept changing the arrival date while another held out hope that I might wind up staying on following the trial sermon. In short, these leaders had different ideas about what should happen. Decisions need not be unanimous, yet leadership teams should be unified.

5. They operate out of fear or panic.

One congregation I was with was struggling financially and could not understand why they were not growing. The problem really went back to a nasty split that had occurred a few years before. The congregation split three ways over music. They continued to operate as if they were 350-member church rather than coming to terms with the fact that they were down to 75. Instead of addressing the issue of their tarnished reputation, they operated as if they were a growing, healthy congregation. Eventually reality set in, especially when they could not meet the budget. The announcement came on a cold morning in December: "If everyone doesn't start giving more money, we are going to have cut staff." And that is exactly what happened to me. Yet it would not solve the congregation's problems. Five years later, they continue to shrink and struggle. The worst thing leaders can do is operate out of a sense of fear or panic.

In retrospect, it was a blessing to be let go from each of these congregations. I learned a lot about leadership and conflict management. But it's much better to see the warning signs, and to deal with the tensions before they result in being dismissed.

Rob O'Lynn is director of the Bible and Ministry program at Kentucky Christian University.