March 13, 2025 • 19 mins
Three former pastors, Jean F. Larroux, III, Byron Yawn, and Tullian Tchividjian, gather for a heart-to-heart chat about the heavy stuff in life—like pain, heartbreak, and the awkward moments that come with trying to help someone in a rough spot. You know, when you wanna say the right thing, but all you can muster is a shrug and a ‘So, how about that weather?’ They get real about how sometimes, the best thing we can do is just sit with someone in their mess instead of throwing unsolicited advice like confetti. Why? Because advice can often feel like a giant boulder landing on someone who's already down! Instead, they emphasize the importance of just being present, showing up, and saying, 'Hey, I see you, I’m here, and you don’t have to pretend with me.' It’s all about grace, and they dive into how that grace is a lifeline for those of us who’ve taken a few wrong turns.
The trio shares their own stories of falling flat on their faces—think epic fails that would make for a juicy Netflix series. They laugh about how church culture can sometimes feel like a pressure cooker, where everyone feels they need to be on their best behavior. But here’s the kicker: the messier you are, the more you realize that’s where the grace flows. They remind us that grace isn’t just for the polished and perfect; it’s especially for the ones who feel like they’re spiraling. They talk about how vulnerability opens up real conversations, and how leaders who can admit their struggles create a safe space for others to do the same.
By the end of the episode, you’ll be feeling all the feels. They wrap it up with a reminder that our struggles and failures can be our greatest gifts to others. When we share our stories, we help others feel less alone. So, grab a cup of coffee, kick back, and let these misfit preachers remind you that it’s okay to be a hot mess. After all, we’re all just figuring it out together!
Takeaways:
- Sometimes, just being there for someone in pain is way better than giving advice.
- When life hits hard, our failures can actually turn into our greatest gifts for others.
- We often underestimate how sharing our struggles can help others feel less alone.
- Real grace means understanding that falling down can lead to falling into grace.
Chapters:
- 00:10 - Reflections at the Nightclub
- 02:10 - Creating a Culture of Honesty in Leadership
- 05:28 - The Importance of Confession in the Church
- 09:10 - The Weaponization of Hebrews: Finding Hope
- 11:27 - Healing Wounded Healers: Finding Redemption in Pain
- 18:36 - The Power of Struggles in Leadership
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
When somebody says to me, hey,listen, my pastor told me I should
call you and talk about mymarriage, I was like, oh, you must
be really screwed up. And theyalways start laughing.
At a nightclub with my adultson to see a DJ that we wanted to
see, an old friend who my kidsknew. We know his wife, we know his
(00:20):
kids was there that night, andI hadn't seen him in years. And then
I walked to the bar and I comeback and they're like, dad, what's
the deal with what's his face?And I said, why? It's like solo there
making out with some girl. AndI knew he was still married. I'm
like, what? So we're drivinghome. It's like 2:00 in the morning
(00:40):
out 2:30 in the morning. Andthey're like, dad, what do you do
with somebody like that? Iresponded to them and said something
like this. When someone isthat close to the edge, they've already
decided, and there isabsolutely nothing you can do or
say that will stop them. Soyour job is to stand at the bottom
(01:03):
and be there when they fall. Period.
If you take your jumperanalogy, right? So the guy that shows
up to help the jumper isgoing. Jumping is wrong. If you jump,
it will hurt you. We're notallowed to jump. And the guy's like,
yeah, I knew all that when Iclimbed on the ledge, right? If I
can just make sure they knowthe law, then they won't. And the
(01:24):
truth is standing at thebottom. When you understand the gospel,
you know that when Christiansfall, they fall into grace, not out
of it.
You're listening to the misfitpreachers, Talia Chavigian, Jean
Larue and Byron Yan fromProdigalPodcast.com we're plagiarizing
Jesus one podcast at a time.Now here are the misfits, and I will
(01:51):
say this. I had that in thecowboy church that I went to. I had
that at Pat Thermer's church,Living Faith in Cape Coral that I
went to. There are exceptionsto the rule, and I would not be alive
if it weren't for those exceptions.
Agree.
So I'm grateful for that. WhatI will say in terms of how do you
(02:13):
create an environment, how doyou create a culture where you can
be free to tell the truthabout yourself? The only way that
I know how to do that is to gofirst, like we've talked about.
Yeah, you can. You confess inyour humanity, in your context, are
fired, and then go startanother church.
(02:34):
You lead. You lead with yourHumanity. You don't lead with your
best foot forward. You leadwith your bedhead. You lead with
that, and you keep leadingwith that so that nobody in the church
ever wonders whether you arebetter than they are. And I don't
(02:54):
think there are. And it's notabout. It's one thing to say, yeah,
I'm a sinner. It's anotherthing to confess your sins. Those
are two very, very different things.
That is a very, very true statement.
Yes. And until a leader isready. And I'm not talking about
being indiscriminate, Okay? Imean, my gosh, we're not talking
(03:15):
about vomiting on everybodyevery Sunday.
And we're also going back toour operating assumption. We don't
believe everybody is on the precipice.
No, but I don't think you evenhave to be on the precipice to have
something embarrassing toconfess. How you. What you think
about your. Your, you know,this person in your church.
(03:36):
I struggle with anxiety. I'vebeen trapped in depression. My marriage
is important.
Here I am. I'm. I'm supposedto be the guy teaching you about
faith in God. And I'm scaredshitless that we're not to make budget
this month. What kind of faithis that? Like, I did. My faith is
weak. It is God's faithfulnessthat is strong. I mean, I talk about
(03:56):
the need to pray or read yourBible. I don't. I barely do that
except to prepare sermons.That's an embarrassing confession.
I talk about idolatry, man.Part of me. Part of the motivation
for me to preach is to. Is sothat you guys will think I'm a good
preacher, so that I'll feelmore important. Like those kinds
of confessions. I'm nottalking about, dude. I'm. I'm, you
know, I have a secret lover.I. I'm talking about just the basic
(04:19):
stuff of humanity.
Yeah. Or the pastor. Just goback what you said. The pastor who's
out there that is struggling,that his platform hasn't risen or
his name hasn't risen abovethe level of the bulletin every Sunday.
And he looks around at successand he goes, what am I doing?
Right. Exactly. And why doesthat bother you? Start talking about
that stuff? Dig deep and talkabout that stuff. Why are you so
(04:42):
quick to assess your kids oryour wife? Do you. The people closest
to you, feel like you lovethem and accept them no matter what,
or do they feel like they haveto perform for you? Blah, blah. I
mean, start confessing thatstuff. Just the basic stuff. The
stuff that I Confess isn'tlike, guys, I mean, I am on the brink
of robbing a bank. It's notthat. It's just I don't need to do
(05:05):
that because I have enoughmaterial inside my own heart on an
ongoing basis that I can justtalk about me, my life, my struggle.
And I. You know, I think forpastors in particular, the best way
for you to show your peoplethe best parts of God is to show
them some of the worst partsof you, and we're afraid to do that.
(05:27):
And the reason. And this isthe question that I wanted to pose,
why are churches, like, whyhas church, for instance, the Christian
community become the scariestrather than the safest place for
fallen people to fall down andbroken people to break down? Why
is that? Now, I know there arehistorical reasons, sociological
(05:48):
reasons. I'm talking aboutjust practically why. What's the
reason for that?
I would say answering it fromreverse. When you see the church
most alive in the history ofrevivals, where that is broken out,
it always goes in tandem withthe confession. The reckless confession
(06:09):
of horrific sin.
Yeah.
Always.
Yeah.
And so if. If the church isnot in revival. Right. So we just
chase it backwards. If we'reactually not in revival, what is
the missing out? And the thingthat drives that in revival is. Is
the free, unadulterated offerof grace.
Right.
And. And people throwthemselves and all of their junk.
(06:31):
And yet you and I believed that.
Yep.
And we still do.
Yep.
We believe that still kept secrets.
Oh.
So, I mean, I wrote books onthis stuff.
Yep.
And I wasn't the kind of guythat was like, watch me. I'm the
guy. I'm a moral example. Inever was that guy. I was. I was
talking about my ownweaknesses, talking about this. I
(06:51):
mean, one of the reasonspeople listened to me and read my
books was because I was theguy saying, I'm the worst guy. I
know. But I still had secretsand did not feel safe sharing anything
with anybody of importance inthe Amen. Why?
Let me answer your question.
All right.
Let me give you my run at it.
(07:11):
All right.
I listened to the podcast Soul Boom.
Soul what?
Soul Boom, I think is the name.
Okay, what's the last word?
Boom.
Boom.
Okay. Boom. And they had boob.
Jean, calm down.
They had.
I heard boob.
You are a boob man. They hadan American church historian on there,
(07:35):
and this lady who had writtenall these books and the moderator,
leader of the podcast isasking her questions about the American
Christian church, and she haswritten tons of book on church history,
has been in her position inthis institution for decades and
(07:55):
decades and decades. And heasked her a very insightful question.
He said, in all of yourresearch and in everything that you've
observed and all that you'velearned and all that you've taught
and all that you've written,what is the one single lesson you've
come away with about theAmerican Christian church? And the
(08:19):
American Christian church isobsessed with winners.
Yeah. Which.
And there is no place for losers.
Right. Yeah.
So therefore, can't be weak,can't be broken. Can't.
That's absolutely.
Do you remember what was saidto me? We just wish you were better.
(08:40):
Yeah.
And I think to your quoteearlier with the McShane quote, you
know, my congregation'sgreatest need is my own personal
holiness. I actually. Iactually think to get it, you go,
my congregation's greatestneed is imputed holiness.
Yeah.
Stop trying to get it.
Yeah. So without holiness, noone will see. The Lord isn't talking
(09:01):
about your holiness.
Well, not the one I got to offer.
Not talking about my holiness.Not talking about your holiness.
It's Jesus's holiness thatgets us in, not ours.
The simple answer to theweaponization of Hebrews, chapter
12 is this. What peoplecompletely forget in context is that
the whole chapter is abouthope. It's a whole thing is don't
(09:23):
worry.
Right.
Right. And you get to thatsection, it's like, life is going
to be rough. Right. It's goingto be difficult. You're going to
get sharpened through theprocess. So hold on. God has you.
Right?
It's not meant to scare no anyone.
Or create a bunch of pietisticpeople who actually believe they're
(09:45):
pulling it off.
Well, with anyone inside, aslong as you lower the.
I don't. I shouldn't exactly.I shouldn't even go here, man. I
just shouldn't even.
Well, that's fine, but listen,I'll start.
Not 70 minutes.
Okay, I will. Let me say this,though, for the people. And this
is what I think we want peopleto hear. And that is that your greatest
(10:09):
failures, the dirt under yournails, the failure on your resume,
will be your greatest gift topeople. They will be the things that
you learn when you're at rockbottom. The empathy that develops,
the wisdom, the. Even as I wastalking about in a previous episode,
(10:30):
I'm a different guy than Iused to be. I think I'm easier to
live with. I'm more free. Idon't care nearly as much about the
things I used to care about. Iwould have learned none of that I
wouldn't have been set freefrom any of that stuff had I not
crashed and burned andbottomed out. And in the introduction
to my book, Carnage and Grace,well placed this episode.
(10:55):
Brought to you by Tully and Chaviki.
There's a small part of theintroduction where I say I wanted
to do something with myregrets, hopefully something that
matters, something that mightbe helpful, redemptive for me, yes.
But also possibly for you.I've learned that our pains, whether
(11:18):
self induced or caused byothers or both, can be redeeming
if they are harnessed to helpothers find. Healing wounded healers
is the way that Henry Nouwentalked about it. You know, leading
with a limp.
Yeah.
When I. When I was inministry, our church went through
(11:40):
a major split. Right. Moved itfrom pietistic fundamentalist church
to.
Do more, try harder, getbetter, reformed.
Confessional, grace centeredchurch, you know, it moved as I got
comfortable in my own skin.It's inevitable. I had a complete,
overwhelming, paralyzingepisode of acute anxiety. Not in
(12:04):
a moment, but over months, sixmonths trapped in it, couldn't tell
anybody about it. And then Ibroke down and it happened. Make
it through the split, get backin leadership in the pulpit, go to
therapy, work on myself. WhenI came back, the elders of that church
(12:27):
so owned their responsibilityin that for not noticing things and
not treating me like a truefriend, that they completely changed
their approach to leadershipin caring for leadership. There were
elders assigned for thecompassionate care of elders. Things
like go to the wivesthemselves and really literally just
(12:53):
ask them what they need. Whatdo you need? What pressure's on your.
What would take anxiety away?Where could we provide some leaves,
relief? And they were veryanimated. Mandatory therapy for the
entire staff. Part of thepackage now. Mandatory sabbaticals
for any pastor who's beenthere within three years. And every
(13:16):
three years you get one forfour months, everything paid. Therapy's
in there. We'll give you avacation as well. We'll send you
and your wife away, we'll getyou in group therapy so you can talk
to people about all thesethings. There was such an urgency
because of what happened tome, which was horrific. It was horrific.
(13:39):
Never want to go through itagain, that these men got it. I mean,
they totally got it. They werethe most compassionate, gracious
people because they believedthe avatar that I was putting out,
this guy's above it. He's agood communicator, he's leading a
strong church and blah, blah,blah, and he has all the answers
(14:01):
and all those kind of Things.And then they. When I fell down,
they went, he is just like me.
Yeah.
He's a human being who couldstand the weight of this sort of
thing. And for the last fiveyears that I was there, before I
resigned, to go do otherthings. Elder meetings were my group.
(14:24):
Those dudes crushed it, and Ilove them for it to this day. We
would meet a little bit ofadministration. We would share highs
and lows and talk about Christand what we were doing. And then
the last hour and a half, theywould go into my office, flip open
one of those stools that'salso a hidden container, pull out
a fifth of bourbon that webought cases of, shut it, light the
(14:47):
fire in the back, light thecigars, talk and be friends.
Yeah.
And I want to tell yousomething. The net effect was not
just that it blessed me.Those. Those dudes became true elders
that weren't tangled in thethings that most elders get tangled
in, administration anddecisions. All they wanted to do
(15:10):
was make sure that whathappened to me never happened to
anybody else in the congregate.
Yeah.
It was. It was an incredible gift.
That's rare.
It was an incredible.
There are a lot of guys whowill hear this, men or women, if
they're in pastoralleadership, and go, damn it, I want
that.
Yeah.
There's. It's not with. It'snot within 100 miles.
(15:33):
So. So let me deliver amessage to any elder that might be
listening that doesn't wantthis to happen to their leader because
they want them healthy.
Yeah.
Email us.
Yeah.
I will send you a plan. I willget on a phone with you. I will talk
to your. So somebody on socialmedia attacked me yesterday and said,
(15:55):
who wants any of this? Myresponse immediately was a little
punchy. The person whowouldn't darken the door of your
church.
Yeah.
But I will tell you this. I doknow who wants it. I tell you who
wants it. Is that board thathears this message and has no idea
how to prevent that sort ofpain from happening in their past
(16:17):
life. If there's acompassionate one there. There is
a specific strategy and planthat can be put in place that will
revive the soul of your pastorand keep him healthy. Be more concerned
with him or her as a humanthan you are in their role. Because
(16:40):
if you don't, you're going tooffset their identity and identify
them and what they're doing,not who they are.
And I absolutely believe that.Completely agree. Butter. I just.
I think that. I think, as Isaid before, lowering our anthropology.
(17:06):
I'm not saying you. I'M sayingpeople in general lowering their
anthropology, expectingsinners to sin. You can put all of
the preventative maintenancepieces in place and you're still
going to see crashing andburning all around you. And to not
be shocked by it, to expectit's one reason why I told you guys
(17:28):
Paul's all My friend neverblinked when he was walking through
the valley of the shadow ofdeath with me. And things got a lot
worse before they got better.And every time it got worse, I was
convinced he was going to walkaway. He's bailing. And the reason
he didn't is because heunderstood the human condition well
enough to have a very lowanthropology. He expected liars to
(17:51):
lie. He expected, you know,deceivers to deceive. He expected
broken people to break down.So none of my shocked him, which
kept him by my side.
Speaking of amending myanswer, I'll do that later because
we need to land this plane andI could go on and on and hopefully
it's left at least a curiousmind in the pastors and the non pastors
(18:19):
and the leaders out there thatthey could care for this. There's
no perfect solution, but atthe end of the day we do, we do love
them. This, this particularepisode comes from the most sincere
place.
And I will just simply add onefinal thing and that is do not, and
(18:43):
I hope anybody who's listeningto this, pastor or not human, do
not underestimate the power ofyour struggles in helping other people.
So when someone shares theirsuccesses with me, I may feel temporarily
inspired. But when someoneshares their failures with me, I
feel less alone in this world.And I think we radically underestimate
(19:08):
the power of weakness andfailure and struggle in you in helping
people who need help.
That's vaguely, that's vaguelybiblical in my mind.
Can I give an email address aswe close pastorsisfitpreachers.com
email us church BoardsPastors. We will be a resource to
you.
We'll be your vault. Yes,thanks for listening.
(19:33):
You've been listening to theMisfit preachers like subscribe and
share more grace centeredresources@prodigalpodcasts.com that's
prodigal P R O D I G A Lpodcasts with an s dot com.
When somebody says to me, hey,listen, my pastor told me I should
call you and talk about mymarriage, I was like, oh, you must
be really screwed up. And theyalways start laughing.
At a nightclub with my adultson to see a DJ that we wanted to
see, an old friend who my kidsknew. We know his wife, we know his
(00:20):
kids was there that night, andI hadn't seen him in years. And then
I walked to the bar and I comeback and they're like, dad, what's
the deal with what's his face?And I said, why? It's like solo there
making out with some girl. AndI knew he was still married. I'm
like, what? So we're drivinghome. It's like 2:00 in the morning
(00:40):
out 2:30 in the morning. Andthey're like, dad, what do you do
with somebody like that? Iresponded to them and said something
like this. When someone isthat close to the edge, they've already
decided, and there isabsolutely nothing you can do or
say that will stop them. Soyour job is to stand at the bottom
(01:03):
and be there when they fall. Period.
If you take your jumperanalogy, right? So the guy that shows
up to help the jumper isgoing. Jumping is wrong. If you jump,
it will hurt you. We're notallowed to jump. And the guy's like,
yeah, I knew all that when Iclimbed on the ledge, right? If I
can just make sure they knowthe law, then they won't. And the
(01:24):
truth is standing at thebottom. When you understand the gospel,
you know that when Christiansfall, they fall into grace, not out
of it.
You're listening to the misfitpreachers, Talia Chavigian, Jean
Larue and Byron Yan fromProdigalPodcast.com we're plagiarizing
Jesus one podcast at a time.Now here are the misfits, and I will
(01:51):
say this. I had that in thecowboy church that I went to. I had
that at Pat Thermer's church,Living Faith in Cape Coral that I
went to. There are exceptionsto the rule, and I would not be alive
if it weren't for those exceptions.
Agree.
So I'm grateful for that. WhatI will say in terms of how do you
(02:13):
create an environment, how doyou create a culture where you can
be free to tell the truthabout yourself? The only way that
I know how to do that is to gofirst, like we've talked about.
Yeah, you can. You confess inyour humanity, in your context, are
fired, and then go startanother church.
(02:34):
You lead. You lead with yourHumanity. You don't lead with your
best foot forward. You leadwith your bedhead. You lead with
that, and you keep leadingwith that so that nobody in the church
ever wonders whether you arebetter than they are. And I don't
(02:54):
think there are. And it's notabout. It's one thing to say, yeah,
I'm a sinner. It's anotherthing to confess your sins. Those
are two very, very different things.
That is a very, very true statement.
Yes. And until a leader isready. And I'm not talking about
being indiscriminate, Okay? Imean, my gosh, we're not talking
(03:15):
about vomiting on everybodyevery Sunday.
And we're also going back toour operating assumption. We don't
believe everybody is on the precipice.
No, but I don't think you evenhave to be on the precipice to have
something embarrassing toconfess. How you. What you think
about your. Your, you know,this person in your church.
(03:36):
I struggle with anxiety. I'vebeen trapped in depression. My marriage
is important.
Here I am. I'm. I'm supposedto be the guy teaching you about
faith in God. And I'm scaredshitless that we're not to make budget
this month. What kind of faithis that? Like, I did. My faith is
weak. It is God's faithfulnessthat is strong. I mean, I talk about
(03:56):
the need to pray or read yourBible. I don't. I barely do that
except to prepare sermons.That's an embarrassing confession.
I talk about idolatry, man.Part of me. Part of the motivation
for me to preach is to. Is sothat you guys will think I'm a good
preacher, so that I'll feelmore important. Like those kinds
of confessions. I'm nottalking about, dude. I'm. I'm, you
know, I have a secret lover.I. I'm talking about just the basic
(04:19):
stuff of humanity.
Yeah. Or the pastor. Just goback what you said. The pastor who's
out there that is struggling,that his platform hasn't risen or
his name hasn't risen abovethe level of the bulletin every Sunday.
And he looks around at successand he goes, what am I doing?
Right. Exactly. And why doesthat bother you? Start talking about
that stuff? Dig deep and talkabout that stuff. Why are you so
(04:42):
quick to assess your kids oryour wife? Do you. The people closest
to you, feel like you lovethem and accept them no matter what,
or do they feel like they haveto perform for you? Blah, blah. I
mean, start confessing thatstuff. Just the basic stuff. The
stuff that I Confess isn'tlike, guys, I mean, I am on the brink
of robbing a bank. It's notthat. It's just I don't need to do
(05:05):
that because I have enoughmaterial inside my own heart on an
ongoing basis that I can justtalk about me, my life, my struggle.
And I. You know, I think forpastors in particular, the best way
for you to show your peoplethe best parts of God is to show
them some of the worst partsof you, and we're afraid to do that.
(05:27):
And the reason. And this isthe question that I wanted to pose,
why are churches, like, whyhas church, for instance, the Christian
community become the scariestrather than the safest place for
fallen people to fall down andbroken people to break down? Why
is that? Now, I know there arehistorical reasons, sociological
(05:48):
reasons. I'm talking aboutjust practically why. What's the
reason for that?
I would say answering it fromreverse. When you see the church
most alive in the history ofrevivals, where that is broken out,
it always goes in tandem withthe confession. The reckless confession
(06:09):
of horrific sin.
Yeah.
Always.
Yeah.
And so if. If the church isnot in revival. Right. So we just
chase it backwards. If we'reactually not in revival, what is
the missing out? And the thingthat drives that in revival is. Is
the free, unadulterated offerof grace.
Right.
And. And people throwthemselves and all of their junk.
(06:31):
And yet you and I believed that.
Yep.
And we still do.
Yep.
We believe that still kept secrets.
Oh.
So, I mean, I wrote books onthis stuff.
Yep.
And I wasn't the kind of guythat was like, watch me. I'm the
guy. I'm a moral example. Inever was that guy. I was. I was
talking about my ownweaknesses, talking about this. I
(06:51):
mean, one of the reasonspeople listened to me and read my
books was because I was theguy saying, I'm the worst guy. I
know. But I still had secretsand did not feel safe sharing anything
with anybody of importance inthe Amen. Why?
Let me answer your question.
All right.
Let me give you my run at it.
(07:11):
All right.
I listened to the podcast Soul Boom.
Soul what?
Soul Boom, I think is the name.
Okay, what's the last word?
Boom.
Boom.
Okay. Boom. And they had boob.
Jean, calm down.
They had.
I heard boob.
You are a boob man. They hadan American church historian on there,
(07:35):
and this lady who had writtenall these books and the moderator,
leader of the podcast isasking her questions about the American
Christian church, and she haswritten tons of book on church history,
has been in her position inthis institution for decades and
(07:55):
decades and decades. And heasked her a very insightful question.
He said, in all of yourresearch and in everything that you've
observed and all that you'velearned and all that you've taught
and all that you've written,what is the one single lesson you've
come away with about theAmerican Christian church? And the
(08:19):
American Christian church isobsessed with winners.
Yeah. Which.
And there is no place for losers.
Right. Yeah.
So therefore, can't be weak,can't be broken. Can't.
That's absolutely.
Do you remember what was saidto me? We just wish you were better.
(08:40):
Yeah.
And I think to your quoteearlier with the McShane quote, you
know, my congregation'sgreatest need is my own personal
holiness. I actually. Iactually think to get it, you go,
my congregation's greatestneed is imputed holiness.
Yeah.
Stop trying to get it.
Yeah. So without holiness, noone will see. The Lord isn't talking
(09:01):
about your holiness.
Well, not the one I got to offer.
Not talking about my holiness.Not talking about your holiness.
It's Jesus's holiness thatgets us in, not ours.
The simple answer to theweaponization of Hebrews, chapter
12 is this. What peoplecompletely forget in context is that
the whole chapter is abouthope. It's a whole thing is don't
(09:23):
worry.
Right.
Right. And you get to thatsection, it's like, life is going
to be rough. Right. It's goingto be difficult. You're going to
get sharpened through theprocess. So hold on. God has you.
Right?
It's not meant to scare no anyone.
Or create a bunch of pietisticpeople who actually believe they're
(09:45):
pulling it off.
Well, with anyone inside, aslong as you lower the.
I don't. I shouldn't exactly.I shouldn't even go here, man. I
just shouldn't even.
Well, that's fine, but listen,I'll start.
Not 70 minutes.
Okay, I will. Let me say this,though, for the people. And this
is what I think we want peopleto hear. And that is that your greatest
(10:09):
failures, the dirt under yournails, the failure on your resume,
will be your greatest gift topeople. They will be the things that
you learn when you're at rockbottom. The empathy that develops,
the wisdom, the. Even as I wastalking about in a previous episode,
(10:30):
I'm a different guy than Iused to be. I think I'm easier to
live with. I'm more free. Idon't care nearly as much about the
things I used to care about. Iwould have learned none of that I
wouldn't have been set freefrom any of that stuff had I not
crashed and burned andbottomed out. And in the introduction
to my book, Carnage and Grace,well placed this episode.
(10:55):
Brought to you by Tully and Chaviki.
There's a small part of theintroduction where I say I wanted
to do something with myregrets, hopefully something that
matters, something that mightbe helpful, redemptive for me, yes.
But also possibly for you.I've learned that our pains, whether
(11:18):
self induced or caused byothers or both, can be redeeming
if they are harnessed to helpothers find. Healing wounded healers
is the way that Henry Nouwentalked about it. You know, leading
with a limp.
Yeah.
When I. When I was inministry, our church went through
(11:40):
a major split. Right. Moved itfrom pietistic fundamentalist church
to.
Do more, try harder, getbetter, reformed.
Confessional, grace centeredchurch, you know, it moved as I got
comfortable in my own skin.It's inevitable. I had a complete,
overwhelming, paralyzingepisode of acute anxiety. Not in
(12:04):
a moment, but over months, sixmonths trapped in it, couldn't tell
anybody about it. And then Ibroke down and it happened. Make
it through the split, get backin leadership in the pulpit, go to
therapy, work on myself. WhenI came back, the elders of that church
(12:27):
so owned their responsibilityin that for not noticing things and
not treating me like a truefriend, that they completely changed
their approach to leadershipin caring for leadership. There were
elders assigned for thecompassionate care of elders. Things
like go to the wivesthemselves and really literally just
(12:53):
ask them what they need. Whatdo you need? What pressure's on your.
What would take anxiety away?Where could we provide some leaves,
relief? And they were veryanimated. Mandatory therapy for the
entire staff. Part of thepackage now. Mandatory sabbaticals
for any pastor who's beenthere within three years. And every
(13:16):
three years you get one forfour months, everything paid. Therapy's
in there. We'll give you avacation as well. We'll send you
and your wife away, we'll getyou in group therapy so you can talk
to people about all thesethings. There was such an urgency
because of what happened tome, which was horrific. It was horrific.
(13:39):
Never want to go through itagain, that these men got it. I mean,
they totally got it. They werethe most compassionate, gracious
people because they believedthe avatar that I was putting out,
this guy's above it. He's agood communicator, he's leading a
strong church and blah, blah,blah, and he has all the answers
(14:01):
and all those kind of Things.And then they. When I fell down,
they went, he is just like me.
Yeah.
He's a human being who couldstand the weight of this sort of
thing. And for the last fiveyears that I was there, before I
resigned, to go do otherthings. Elder meetings were my group.
(14:24):
Those dudes crushed it, and Ilove them for it to this day. We
would meet a little bit ofadministration. We would share highs
and lows and talk about Christand what we were doing. And then
the last hour and a half, theywould go into my office, flip open
one of those stools that'salso a hidden container, pull out
a fifth of bourbon that webought cases of, shut it, light the
(14:47):
fire in the back, light thecigars, talk and be friends.
Yeah.
And I want to tell yousomething. The net effect was not
just that it blessed me.Those. Those dudes became true elders
that weren't tangled in thethings that most elders get tangled
in, administration anddecisions. All they wanted to do
(15:10):
was make sure that whathappened to me never happened to
anybody else in the congregate.
Yeah.
It was. It was an incredible gift.
That's rare.
It was an incredible.
There are a lot of guys whowill hear this, men or women, if
they're in pastoralleadership, and go, damn it, I want
that.
Yeah.
There's. It's not with. It'snot within 100 miles.
(15:33):
So. So let me deliver amessage to any elder that might be
listening that doesn't wantthis to happen to their leader because
they want them healthy.
Yeah.
Email us.
Yeah.
I will send you a plan. I willget on a phone with you. I will talk
to your. So somebody on socialmedia attacked me yesterday and said,
(15:55):
who wants any of this? Myresponse immediately was a little
punchy. The person whowouldn't darken the door of your
church.
Yeah.
But I will tell you this. I doknow who wants it. I tell you who
wants it. Is that board thathears this message and has no idea
how to prevent that sort ofpain from happening in their past
(16:17):
life. If there's acompassionate one there. There is
a specific strategy and planthat can be put in place that will
revive the soul of your pastorand keep him healthy. Be more concerned
with him or her as a humanthan you are in their role. Because
(16:40):
if you don't, you're going tooffset their identity and identify
them and what they're doing,not who they are.
And I absolutely believe that.Completely agree. Butter. I just.
I think that. I think, as Isaid before, lowering our anthropology.
(17:06):
I'm not saying you. I'M sayingpeople in general lowering their
anthropology, expectingsinners to sin. You can put all of
the preventative maintenancepieces in place and you're still
going to see crashing andburning all around you. And to not
be shocked by it, to expectit's one reason why I told you guys
(17:28):
Paul's all My friend neverblinked when he was walking through
the valley of the shadow ofdeath with me. And things got a lot
worse before they got better.And every time it got worse, I was
convinced he was going to walkaway. He's bailing. And the reason
he didn't is because heunderstood the human condition well
enough to have a very lowanthropology. He expected liars to
(17:51):
lie. He expected, you know,deceivers to deceive. He expected
broken people to break down.So none of my shocked him, which
kept him by my side.
Speaking of amending myanswer, I'll do that later because
we need to land this plane andI could go on and on and hopefully
it's left at least a curiousmind in the pastors and the non pastors
(18:19):
and the leaders out there thatthey could care for this. There's
no perfect solution, but atthe end of the day we do, we do love
them. This, this particularepisode comes from the most sincere
place.
And I will just simply add onefinal thing and that is do not, and
(18:43):
I hope anybody who's listeningto this, pastor or not human, do
not underestimate the power ofyour struggles in helping other people.
So when someone shares theirsuccesses with me, I may feel temporarily
inspired. But when someoneshares their failures with me, I
feel less alone in this world.And I think we radically underestimate
(19:08):
the power of weakness andfailure and struggle in you in helping
people who need help.
That's vaguely, that's vaguelybiblical in my mind.
Can I give an email address aswe close pastorsisfitpreachers.com
email us church BoardsPastors. We will be a resource to
you.
We'll be your vault. Yes,thanks for listening.
(19:33):
You've been listening to theMisfit preachers like subscribe and
share more grace centeredresources@prodigalpodcasts.com that's
prodigal P R O D I G A Lpodcasts with an s dot com.
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