Seams

Transitions are the seams of our lives. They can let things leak out that had been hidden, like an urge to write at 3 o’clock in the morning about lilacs and cynics. They can let things in, like resentment, friends, or God. Or they can unravel and let you fall apart completely. It’s not just individuals that go through transitions. Groups do, too. Sometimes a group’s transitions are too slow to notice, or too big, or they just don’t match up with our personal experience. But they are just as significant.

I had to think about this in my latest cross-cultural experience, one I would not have foreseen, a three-day seminar with sixteen men. When I walked in the room, there were just men everywhere, and I hadn’t walked into a situation like that for a long time, and I reacted, just coming in the door. “Wow, it’s all men.” They were kind. “Were you looking for the Great Women of the Faith course down the hall?” they asked. I laughed. I almost turned around to ask the registrar if, even though I was signed up for this class, would they let me in the other one? But I stayed, and eventually one other wife joined us, so it wasn’t so bad. Really, it wasn’t so bad. This had to be a room full of the most caring, the most non-judgmental, the most empathetic men on the planet. (I’m keeping track, as you know.) Over the three days of the course, most of them took a moment to come up to me or to sit down deliberately in a chair next to me to ask quietly how I’m doing. Some doctors I know could take lessons from such men. In the course, they treated me no different from anyone else.

And what made the experience cross-cultural wasn’t just that it was all men, but that it was about Canadian churches. Specifically, it was about Canadian churches going through transitions between pastors, in other words, having their own Oz moments. After a lifetime south of two borders, watching baby churches get started, and developing local leadership, I hadn’t put much thought into what happens farther down the line when churches transition from pastor to pastor, but my guess is that most of us have watched this process happen in a church somewhere. Our home church here is actually going through this right now. It can get rough when emotions run high, and people aren’t agreeing. If a married couple faced a transition like this, we’d be recommending a counselor, but sometimes we forget that groups of people can need help, too. This course was about how to coach congregations through transitions.

My favorite moment was when the instructor stood in the center of the room and told us to react instinctively when he made his next statement, which he did in a loud voice, “I AM CONFLICT!” Susan and I made for the ends of the room, standing behind podiums and tables, while two of the men, including Robert, of course, practically had their arms around the guy. They insisted that moments of conflict are opportunities. Well, I guess so, but I’d rather be safe behind a podium. The instructor then drew five stations around the room, representing the ways you can respond to conflict, and again asked us to react instinctively. Here are the five:

·         Avoid the conflict

·         Accommodate the other side

·         Compromise, so both sides give up something

·         Assert your position

·         Cooperate

Then he said something that surprised some of us: Jesus did all of these at one time or another. Really? Jesus avoided conflict? Jesus gave in? What a relief! Because that was where I was headed. So, remember when the crowd tried to crown Jesus king, and he slipped away invisibly, evading the issue because the timing was off? Remember when the Temple authorities demanded a tax, and he paid it to keep from offending? Of course there are the times you have to face the storm, but sometimes my avoidance instincts are right after all—who knew? We might assume conflict is always wrong. But that’s not true. Even Paul and Barnabas had conflict during a transition in a joint project, and their solution was to split the task in two, and go their separate ways. And remember Gethsemane? When we are in conflict with each other, that is not the problem; the problem is how we deal with it.

Transitions are hard, especially transitions experienced by whole groups of people, and Christian groups, believe it or not, are no exception. It doesn’t help to think, “Oh, my group couldn’t possibly fall into conflict when things go wrong or there’s change in the wind. MY group wouldn’t be that immature.” Uh huh, right. Groups need coaches probably even more than individuals do when transitions come, especially transitions to new leadership. I’d never thought about this before. I appreciated learning about church culture, about the importance of checking the seams that hold us together, and about the effort it takes to manage conflict so that transitions don’t become times for leaking toxic stuff but times when hidden gifts get tapped, and maturing happens, and God gets in. This was my lightbulb moment today.