Creating a Culture of Grace and Eliminating the Scourge of Gossip, Slander, and Judgementalism in your Congregation.

 

The damage that gossip, slander, and judgementalism do to our congregations and those within them (perpetrators and victims) is incalculable. I outline some of these impacts in Gossip and Slander, the Scourage of many Churches. 

What many church leaders do not understand is that they can actually create a culture where these spiritually damaging behaviors are not practiced in their congregations. This is a roadmap for moving toward a healthier church culture.

First, a note about culture. Culture is what you create or allow. In other words, whatever you allow in your congregation will become part of your culture. The alternative is to intentionally create a God-honoring culture and disallow behaviors that are antithetical to God's character, the fruit of the Spirit, and His teaching. 

In many places, the New Testament makes distinctions between behaviors we are to eliminate from our lives and those we are to practice. For instance, in Ephesians 4 and 5, we are told to eliminate falsehood, stealing, unwholesome talk, bitterness, rage, anger, brawling, slander, malice, unforgiveness, sexual immorality, impurity, greed, foolish talk, coarse joking, and other behaviors that emanate from our lower nature. 

Rather than these, we are to put on truthfulness, forgiveness, love, kindness, and compassion, become imitators of God who live in love, wise living, speaking those things that build others up, unity, humility, gentleness, and peace. 

Paul wants us to declare certain behaviors illegal in the church because they don't reflect Christ and to focus on those that do. This is how you create culture. You call people to a higher standard and are clear on those things he wants us to eliminate and those he wants us to practice.

Disciplemaking churches are clear about behaviors that they will not tolerate. They are equally clear on a culture of grace and obedience. This takes ongoing attention, teaching, and explanation. For instance, when it comes to gossip, people need to understand:

• It does not please God
• It is a form of character assassination
• When we have an issue with someone else, we go to them directly and not to others
• Our words can heal, or they can hurt
• We don't do gossip and slander in our congregation
• We do use a Matthew 18 approach when we have differences
• We live in a culture of grace and extend that grace to others
• We allow the Holy Spirit to convict people of their sins (and ours)
• We will talk to those who traffic in gossip and slander within our congregation

The amazing thing is that you can dramatically eliminate divisive gossip and slander if you are intentional, remind people often, and are clear about how we live with one another. What happens is that you create an expectation of Jesus honoring behavior, and the public nature of your "culture creation" makes it difficult for those who traffic in gossip and slander to do so, as it violates everyone's understanding of who we are and how we love one another.

Think of what it would be like if you attended a church where:

• We accept one another and one another's shortcomings as Jesus does ours
• We are as patient with one another as Jesus is with us
• We speak words that build rather than words that tear down
• We love others as Jesus loves us
• We forgive others as Jesus forgives us
• We major on the Fruit of the Spirit rather than the fruit of our lower nature
• We do all that we can to live in peace and unity with one another

Those churches do exist, although not in the number they should. The reason is that we do not create culture but simply allow culture to happen. Don't do that. Remember that culture is what you create or allow, and the Scriptures give us great guidance on what we should not allow and what we should create. 

Gossip and Slander: the Scourge of many Churches

 

Congregations pride themselves in "being like Jesus." Yet, in many congregations, there is a willingness to overlook one of the most divisive and disruptive behaviors of all. It is not heresy. It is gossip and slander.

Gossip and slander are not having a difference of opinion. Everyone is entitled in the church to differences of opinion. Gossip and slander assassinate the character of another individual. You can kill a person physically - something we would never do in the church. But we seem skilled at killing another's character at will and without any consequence. 

Gossip is defined by the Oxford Dictionary as: "casual or unconstrained conversation or reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true."

Slander is defined as "the action or crime of making a false spoken statement damaging to a person's reputation." Or to "make false and damaging statements about (someone)."

The reason that gossip and slander are so often linked together is that when we engage in gossip, especially when we share details that we cannot confirm as being true, we are often engaging in slander as well. Trafficking in second-hand information where we have no redeeming purpose for sharing such information is an anti-value in the church.

Gossip is often the result of an issue with another without the courage to go and have a conversation with that individual. So rather than seeking to resolve our issue with a specific person, we instead talk to others about them. In doing so, we drag innocent bystanders into our issues, and they often take up our cause with no first-hand knowledge of our issues. Now, we have recruited additional character assassinators for our cause. And, we have left the individual who is our target without any means to explain, defend, or bring reconciliation as they are not even part of the process. 

In one church I am familiar with at present, there is a concerted effort by one couple who is at odds with the pastor (and the board) to bring disrepute to the pastor. They have recruited many close friends to their cause, and the charges against the pastor can be traced back to this one couple. In another church, there have been armchair critics for years in the shadows, sowing mistrust and discord against whoever was in leadership at the moment. 

These situations are an internal cancer in any church. The New Testament is explicit that gossip, slander, and anything that does not build up the body is anti-Christ behavior. In addition, Paul warns against those who cause division in the church. Certainly, gossip and slander cause division, mistrust, ill feelings, and deep hurt to those who are the targets. To make matters worse, many who traffic in gossip do so under the guise of "we need to pray for _____ about." In other words, they hide their gossip by declaring their spiritual intent, which is total nonsense and probably not well received by Jesus Himself. 

The church is ill-served by professional Pharisees who love to snipe at others about lifestyle choices, dress, and any number of personal choices. How in the world can we expect new folks to feel comfortable in our midst when the critical Pharisiacle spirits are allowed to run rampant among us. Gossip is one of the most prevalent reasons that people do not feel safe in the local church. This is also why spiritual formation is such a challenge. How can you do true spiritual formation in a culture where gossip and backstabbing are OK?

Culture is what we create or allow. If we allow gossip in our body, we are allowing behavior that the New Testament strongly condemns. The alternative is to create a culture where gossip is not OK and where the expectation is that we deal with differences in a Matthew 18 manner. And that we learn what it means to live in the same grace with one another as Jesus grants to each of us on a daily basis. Think of the difference in our relationships if that were true. 

For some suggestions on how to create a culture of grace and eliminate gossip and slander from your congregation, see Creating a Culture of Grace and Eliminating the Scourge of Gossip, Slander, and Judgementalism in your Congregation. 

It is all about focus

 

Eight signs that your church is on the downward slope of its life cycle

 

Every organization has a life cycle that includes initial growth and accomplishing its original vision. Once that vision is completed, the organization starts to plateau, and unless it can reenvision for the next ministry run, it goes into a long, slow decline. This plateau and decline are often not recognized because, like the frog in the kettle, it can be subtle, and the collective memory of the organization is its former glory days that members mistakenly think still define them. 

There are key signs that a church is on the downward slope of its life cycle. Here are eleven such indicators.

There is no clear definition of who the church is or where it is going. Lack of clarity is a sign that an organization is in significant jeopardy. A church that cannot clarify who it is and where it is going will simply wander without a missional agenda or clear purpose. By clarity, I am not referring to something defined in the bylaws that no one can remember but a compelling mission, clear guiding principles, a defined culture, and an understanding of what we are about every day. If staff cannot clearly articulate this and if the congregation does not understand it, there is not adequate clarity. 

The church lacks internal alignment. This is a natural result of a lack of clarity. Without clarity, different staff and ministries of the church simply do their own thing without any internal cohesion and often at cross purposes with other ministries. This allows individuals and staff to pursue their agenda rather than a common and aligned agenda of the church. Any time a ministry cannot answer the question: "How does this ministry contribute to the mission and goals of the church as a whole," it lacks alignment.

No one asks hard questions, or if they do, they are marginalized. In healthy, vibrant organizations, challenging questions are welcomed because they help the organization stay on its mission. When one can no longer ask those hard questions without being marginalized, it is a sign that the organization is now in a preservation mode rather than a growth mode. 

There is a steady leak of people out the back door. People often leave a church when they sense there is no longer a compelling mission and vision. They usually go quietly, but when people who have previously been engaged leave and it becomes a trend, take notice.

The church guards its money. Healthy churches tend to be generous, while those who have moved from missional to institutional tend to protect their resources, and a scarcity mentality sets in.

Meetings and bureaucracy replace action and outward-focused ministry. In their growth phases, congregations are outward-focused, while in their plateaued or declining phases, they tend to be inward and self-focused. As this happens, congregations make it hard to start new outward-looking ministries. 

The congregation and its leaders are comfortable. Comfort means that change is resisted, the familiar is embraced, innovation is difficult and rare, and the focus becomes far more internal than external. This is an essential indicator because missional churches value ministry results over personal comfort, while the opposite is true when a church has plateaued or is on a downward slope.

There is a collective memory of the congregation's "best days." For people who have been around for a time, there is a memory of the period when the church was at its best and perhaps its most significant. What is interesting is that these same people often believe that this is who they still are. They need to recognize that the times have changed, ministry opportunities have changed, the neighborhood has often changed, and they need to change. In reality, they live in the past rather than the present or the future.

While organizational life cycles are predictable, one does not need to settle for a plateau or a downward slope. To change the game, however, leaders must reenvision the congregation for the next ministry season and live opposite of the eight indicators listed above. Churches that remain vital and healthy:

• Have a clear vision and mission
• Insist on the internal alignment of all ministries around that vision and mission.
• Invite hard questions to challenge the way things are done and help the organization get better.
• Close their back door and find out why people leave
• Are generous with meeting needs outside the church
• Are outward ministry-focused rather than internally focused
• Intentionally live in the uncomfortable ministry zone rather than the comfort zone
• Rather than live in the past, they honor the past but plan for the future

Most of all, the focus is always on the Gospel, a culture of love and grace, and a deep concern for the hurting and those who don't know Jesus.