The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
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The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
Building Bridges, Not Walls: Can Friendship Heal Divisions in the Church?
What happens when twelve pastors from different backgrounds and theological views come together to foster understanding amidst division? Discover the compelling journey documented in "Leap of Faith" as we explore the vital importance of friendship and faith in bridging differences. I recount a childhood memory of a well-meaning pastor who struggled to connect, reminding us that the key isn't about proving others wrong but about listening, learning, and loving without judgment. This episode passionately argues for the power of relationship-building across theological and cultural lines to heal divides within our churches and communities.
Join me, Todd Rhoades, as I challenge you to step out of your comfort zone and seek common ground with those who may be different yet are still part of the kingdom. The path to unity involves reaching out in our local ministries and communities, nurturing healthier relationships, and advancing the kingdom of God collaboratively. If you're looking for guidance on beginning this transformative process, my team and I are ready to support you. Reach out to us at podcast@chemistrystaffing.com and learn how to create a ministry that emphasizes building bridges rather than walls.
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Hi there and welcome to this episode of the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. I'm your host, todd Rhodes, one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom, and today we're tackling a topic that's been weighing heavily on my heart with the season that we're going through neck deep in a political season and just culturally, the past few years, this is a topic of I'm talking about division, fracturing inside the church. It's not just inside the church, but can we be honest, it's politically, it's culturally. We're just a mess and I want to talk about that today. The thing that kind of sparked my interest on this and I admit I've not watched this documentary yet, but it's on my watch list okay, it's a new documentary I want to talk about a little bit. It's called Leap of Faith and it tackles this very issue of being fractured in the church. So here's the premise of it. Let me set this up and, again, I'm really looking forward to watching that. Maybe I should have watched it before I talked about it, but, like you, I have opinions on things I know nothing about, probably. But here's the premise of the show, leap of Faith.
Speaker 1:Okay, it follows 12 pastors from really diverse backgrounds and really diverse theological perspectives as they gather to see if friendship and their faith can bridge some of the things that divide them. Okay, so now, this wasn't just some kind of a feel-good experiment. There were some ground rules involved, right? So these, as I said, these pastors represent a wide range of viewpoints like really diverse, like from ultra-conservative to ultra-progressive on issues that spark debate theological issues, cultural issues. They wrestle with questions like social justice. They differ on LGBTQ stuff. They wrestle with even the role of the church in the world. But here they had some ground rules. Okay, here's the key. They committed to doing it together, regularly, in a spirit of humility and openness, and that means that they all chose to listen more than they spoke, to learn and to love, even when they disagree. And guess what? Some amazing things happened the wall started to come down and misunderstandings started to clear up and some genuine connections were formed.
Speaker 1:Now I know you probably got some questions for me right now and you're saying, todd, I don't advocate what you're advocating here. I am not. Please hear what I'm not saying. I'm not saying that we all need to get into a room and join hands and sing kumbaya and all agree to agree on everything. That is not at all. That wasn't, from my understanding the purpose of this group and that's not at all what I'm trying to put out there.
Speaker 1:What I'm saying is that so many of us as church leaders are siloed in our churches, are siloed in our theological tribe, that we don't ever have a conversation with anybody that doesn't almost totally agree with us theologically or culturally or politically, and I think that is, it's quite honestly a shame. We need to have different perspectives and we need to have people that we are regularly not just in contact with but in relationships with that differ from us theologically and differ from us culturally. Now that doesn't mean that we change our convictions. That doesn't mean we change our deeply held theological beliefs at all. That does not mean that at all. But there are people believe it or not, and I grew up in a very independent fundamental Baptist and I love all my independent fundamental Baptist friends. But I grew up believing that or being taught that essentially heaven was going to be filled with independent Baptist people. If you weren't an independent Baptist, this could be the whole camel and the eye of the needle thing. That's just really hard for you to make it. But the kingdom is much bigger than our little pocket of people or our little church. So I think it really does help us to get to know each other. And to get to know each other without judging to seeing I'm going to get into that in a second Let me share an example from my independent Baptist background.
Speaker 1:All right, so I remember when I was young I mean I was probably 12, 13 years old I remember that we got a new pastor in our church and on Sunday nights yeah, back when we had Sunday night services he started a series where he wanted to talk about all the other churches in town. And here was the premise. His goal, which I think was an admirable goal, was to sit down with every pastor, invite every pastor of every church in town out for coffee, to introduce himself, to get to know him, and that was a good thing right. To introduce himself, to get to know him, and that was a good thing, right. But he also had an agenda. His agenda was to introduce himself and then essentially tell them why they were wrong. So he was not building bridges, he was building walls, intentionally building walls. And what he did on those Sunday for that Sunday night series is each week he would take a different church in town and tell about his meeting with the pastor and tell him how he would tell them they were wrong, and tell our church what their response was when he told them they were wrong. It was just quite an uplifting series. I do remember him. It left a big enough impression that I remember it. 50 years later that's pretty impressive, but I do think it's important.
Speaker 1:I think he started with the right idea, which was to talk with people that believed other than him. Where he lost it was where he tried to set them. That's not what this group was trying to do. They were trying to listen to other people's stories intentionally not trying to convince them or win them over to your point of view, but to hear their stories and understand, and I think that's really valuable. We just don't do that in our culture and particularly in our churches. So how can we do this personally and in our churches? I'm already out of time and I've got four points here, so let me go through them very quickly.
Speaker 1:First of all, if you're not intentional, it's never going to happen. You have to be intentional about building relationship with those that are different from you. Maybe take my childhood pastor's thought and run with it. Maybe you reach out to other pastors in your denominations or other denominations and people with other theological beliefs and invite them out for coffee, not to win them over, just to introduce yourself and start a relationship, share a meal, listen to their stories. I think that would be awesome. So that's first. Second of all, maybe create some spaces for some respectful dialogue. Maybe you start a relationship with another church in town or something. Maybe it's you and your staff and them and their staff and you go out and you do something fun together. Just go and listen, listen to their stories and, again, listen more than you talk and just to build those bridges.
Speaker 1:Third, you know, focus on shared values, even when we disagree on certain things, even when we disagree on certain secondary theological issues. When we disagree on certain secondary theological issues, we can often find some common ground where our love for Jesus and our desire to serve others preempt that, and maybe there are ways that you can work together. Maybe there are ways that you can't work together, but those conversations are really important. And fourth, just practice empathy. Try to understand where others are coming from, without judging them and without trying to win them over to your side of the theological or cultural argument. Listen to where they're coming from. Everybody has a story. You don't have to agree with their perspective, you don't have to agree with where they land on it and they don't need to agree with where you are, but it's really important to have those conversations.
Speaker 1:So here's your bottom line.
Speaker 1:Divisions in the church aren't going to disappear overnight, matter of fact. They're probably never, ever going to totally disappear, but we can start building some of these bridges. I think it's really important, I think it's healthy to do, to get outside of our comfort zone. So let's commit to engaging with those who maybe are a little bit different than us, but they're still in the kingdom, seeking some common ground where we can working together to advance the kingdom of God where we can. And if you're navigating this and just want to talk with somebody on our team about how you can do this we've got some people that do this really well in the ministry situation Just reach out to me at podcast at chemistrystaffingcom. I'm here to help, my team is here to help you as well, and we'd love to be able to have a conversation with you about how you can start building bridges, and not walls, even in your local ministry and your local community. All right. Thanks so much for joining us. Hope you'll join us again tomorrow right here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast.
