Is Your Church Healthy or Toxic?

As has often been said, “the local church is the hope of the world.” I believe that. Local churches not only preach the soul-saving message of Jesus, but they also provide tangible proof that the gospel can completely transform the daily lives of individuals and entire communities. 

Wherever the Spirit of God is present among the people of God, miraculous things happen. That’s our mission: to advance the heavenly kingdom, to see lost and broken people find eternal hope and healing.

However, we can’t offer a healing that we have not experienced ourselves. While God is powerful to do his supernatural work in even the most adverse situations, we hamper our effectiveness when we fail to pursue both holiness and wholeness. 

When churches are unhealthy, far from being a transformative presence in their communities, they can wreak havoc in the lives of the people who interact with them or who languish in their midst.

But what are the warning signs that a church is cultivating an environment that is unhealthy or even toxic? Here are four signs that your church is not healthy.

1. Church Bullies Are Given Free Rein. 

When unruly individuals grow in influence within a church, they can quickly create a hostile environment. While they may be small in number, they can create serious and unnecessary distractions from the mission of the church. 

For most church bullies, their time to shine is at congregational business meetings. They know exactly how to navigate Robert’s Rules of Order with nitpicky precision, say something inflammatory enough to rile up their support base yet vague enough to maintain plausible deniability of fault, and generally just aggravate the church’s leadership. 

In between those meetings, they do a fair bit of politicking, creating strategic alliances with other influential members of the church to advance their agenda, which usually stands in opposition to whatever vision has been cast by the pastor or elders. 

Church bullies are the kind of people who offer to buy the pastor coffee or lunch and then spend the whole time “sharing concerns” and talking about “what people are saying.” And when the pastor doesn’t move in the direction they desire, they apply pressure, often in the form of spreading gossip.

Sometimes, the rumors they spread are half true. Other times they aren’t even remotely true. In every case, they cause division and distrust, quenching the work of the Holy Spirit. 

Too often, church bullies are given free rein, because they are usually longtime members who are well respected and know a lot about the Bible. Further, they can lay on the charm and feign selfless concern when they need to. 

Confronting them requires coolheaded wisdom. Even still, the situation is often fraught. However, if church bullies are allowed to run the show, they will create an unhealthy environment that will cause harm to others.

It can often feel too risky to take church bullies on. But if you want to be a church on mission, pastors and church leaders can’t afford not to.

2. Leadership Can’t Be Questioned.

Having been a pastor who was sometimes at the mercy of self-appointed yet biblically unqualified congregational “leaders,” I’ve sometimes been tempted to think that a healthy church is one where the pastoral leadership holds the power. But a quick look at the headlines will illustrate that toxic churches can be found having all forms of church governance.

While churches with more of a top down authority structure don’t have to endure the drama of persnickety people at congregational meetings, they often lack transparency and accountability. And that becomes a breeding ground for abuse. 

When pastors hold a disproportionate amount of power and wield a disproportionate amount of influence, it rarely ends well. At the very least, it can result in unwise leadership decisions that could have benefited from more input. At worst, it can cultivate an environment where abuse is not only possible but also overlooked and even accommodated for.

I don’t imagine any church leader sets out to make foolish decisions or behave in ways that harm others. But when leadership can safely skirt accountability by virtue of their influence, they have been given a kind of power that is dangerous to both them and the people they lead.

The people who work most closely with pastors and church leaders are often the first to notice that something is not right. But too often, they don’t have the ability to question a leader or raise concerns in a way that won’t leave them ostracized, unemployed, or both. 

We can’t afford to only give lip service to leadership accountability and transparency. Systems must be put in place that have actual teeth, rather than just the appearance of decency

While it isn’t necessarily healthy to give everyone in a congregation an equal voice to speak to leadership issues, at least a few people need to be granted permission and access to speak truth to power, potentially steering the church away from abuse and scandal.

3. No Negative Emotions Are Allowed. 

Lament is a biblical category that far too many evangelical churches ignore. We do so to the detriment of our collective spiritual health.

To be sure, Christians are to be marked by an unshakeable joy that is anchored in the hope of the good news of Jesus. But we must never weaponize that call to joy to keep us from holding space for the very real and difficult issues present in our churches and communities, whether they be loss, tragedy, or injustice.

This is particularly true where the Church has historically been complicit in perpetuating problematic structures that have led to abuse or inequity. Too often, instead of repenting and seeking to do better, we accuse those of bringing these issues to bear in our local contexts of being divisive and distracting from the gospel.

Nevertheless, not every church that is unhealthy in this regard is so nefarious as to actively suppress calls for lament or repentance. It’s just that they hold the misconception that Christian joy necessarily avoids unpleasant conversations. This isn’t so much biblical joy as it is toxic positivity

While churches should never be known for their negativity, healthy churches are ready and willing to wade into weighty and difficult issues with teary eyes and listening ears, seeking to bring comfort, recognition, and reconciliation to individuals and groups within their communities that are experiencing real pain.

4. Partisan Politics Overshadow Biblical Community.

A wise pastor once told me that a church’s statement of faith should never be so specific that people who are going to heaven aren’t allowed to be a member of your church. In other words, we don’t have to agree on everything in order to recognize our common bond as followers of Jesus. 

Even more than doctrinal differences, some churches have unofficial litmus tests for membership that pertain to political affiliation. To these churches, coming under the banner of Jesus requires coming under the banner of a particular political party. While few would ever say that, it’s too often the unspoken reality.

But when partisan politics become closely associated with a church’s identity, the result is that our people are discipled in behaviors and tendencies that are antithetical to the way of Jesus. Outrage, fear-mongering, power-seeking, and hatred of neighbor are hallmarks of our partisan climate. Not only are all these things ungodly, they’re also unhealthy and do not create a church marked by unity, love, peace, or joy.

The truths of Scripture speak to civil and political issues. Engagement with important social issues is not itself a distraction from the gospel. But when “speaking the truth” is simply code for compulsory and uncritical adherence to a political party, it is. What’s more is that it is deeply unhealthy.

Healthy Churches Start With Healthy People. 

Churches are full of broken and sinful people, led by broken and sinful people. Nevertheless, Jesus came to make all things new, and that begins within the walls of our churches. 

When we pursue spiritual and emotional health—both individually and collectively—we create healthy environments that testify to the fact that Jesus offers something different from the world. 

May our prayer always be that the heavenly kingdom would come and Jesus’ will would be done here on earth as it already is in heaven. And then may our actions map to the expectation that God can and will do just that. When this is our posture, we invite the Holy Spirit to work through us in ways that only he can.

This article appeared here and is used by permission. 

Dale Chamberlain
Dale Chamberlainhttp://ChurchLeaders.com

Dale Chamberlain is content manager for ChurchLeaders.com. With experience in pastoral ministry as well as the corporate marketing world, he is also an author and podcaster who is passionate about helping people tackle ancient truths in everyday settings.

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