A Community Divided
From LeaderWise’s Good News Stories.
The reality TV show Traitors showcases how the narratives we tell about one another, often built on very little evidence, create a trap of misinforming and dividing us. The show features a group of 17 “faithfuls” who watch one another carefully, looking for clues of deceit and working together to banish the 3 “traitors” among them before the traitors expel them from the game. Inevitably, however, the faithful end up banishing their own because they start to see evidence of betrayal in the stories they are telling about one another and become too convinced of the cases that they are making. Sadly, the same is often true when LeaderWise consultants enter any group divided against itself. A congregation. A staff team. An organization. A judicatory. A denomination. Our work as consultants is to break down the narratives and find a bridge back to one another.
This story of good news begins in May of 2019 when Stephen Earl became the Interim Executive Presbyter for the Homestead Presbytery, serving 44 churches in Nebraska. It was a system riddled with toxicity. After a misconduct case occurred in the Presbytery in February 2019, no one wanted to talk to one another. There were even secret Facebook groups amongst clergy. No one knew who was “faithful,” and true to the game, people saw suspicion everywhere. Added to the toxicity was a time of profound crisis for Central Nebraska after a historic flood. Homestead Presbytery became a major responder to the several churches, church manses, and church members affected by the flood, providing volunteers and grants of assistance/rebuilding. Little did they know that they were also on the eve of a global pandemic.
The Presbytery hiring team wanted Stephen’s interim to last one year. However, Stephen almost didn’t know where to begin. “You’ve got to be open about what you are facing,” he shared with us, “but I had to do a lot of digging to discover it.” Nevertheless, his first step was to form a Strategy Team composed of highly respected and trusted members of the Presbytery.
Stephen’s next step was to talk with LeaderWise. He had completed his Executive psychological assessments through LeaderWise and found it very helpful. Now, he turned to our leadership development team. Working with Mary Kay DuChene and Cindy Halvorson, they shared strategies that would allow both the Presbytery and congregations to uncover mistrust and build a bridge back to one another.
One of those strategies was the Bridgebuilder process, developed by church consultant Peter Steinke to address conflict with family systems in mind. “We couldn’t move on until the harm was named, and people didn’t yet feel safe enough naming it. Through the LeaderWise consultants, our focus was to create a safe enough space where people could name what was going on with each other.” Bridgebuilder offered multiple containers for safe spaces: some shared in individual sessions with consultants, in small groups around a specific topic, and large group sessions like “Tell It to the Bridgebuilder,” where one person tells their story to the consultant while the larger group listens. Each was a sacred space with solid ground rules for sharing and listening. “We created space for real dialogue to occur,” Stephen told us. “There were people who stood up and confessed how their reactions to someone else’s sharing opened them up. There were tears. It helped people to reinvest their energies, both in their congregations and in the larger Presbytery.” Out of the Bridgebuilder experience came a worship service for the larger Presbytery that told the story of what they had experienced, how they had confessed and been transformed, and a new vision for who they were becoming together.
One year of interim ministry became almost four years (3 years, 9 months but who is counting?). (It also included a few other strategies towards health, but that is a story for another day.) Stephen left the position after the Presbytery approved a healthier structure of governance: “It was a different body when I left.” He is now a part-time Pastor to a congregation of about 30 people, most of whom are over 60, on the West Coast. “They are a small church with a big heart,” he says with a smile. “They are a warm welcoming spot, and I’m just having fun!”
