Mike: 00:07

Welcome to Speak the Truth, a podcast devoted to giving biblical truth for educating, equipping, and encouraging the individual in local church and counseling and discipleship.

Mike: 00:18

Hello. Hello. Hello. As I've been saying, I'm in studio, Mobily speaking. I'm still at the Made to Minister Conference twenty twenty five, where I've been saying the goal and the theme of this year's conference is our ultimate treasure, the transformative power of knowing Christ.

Mike: 00:34

And I'm joined with special guests who has I I feel like I've had a lot of his friends on the podcast. I'm thinking of Jonathan Holmes specifically. Oh, yeah. But I have with me Timothy St. John, which do you go by Tim or Timothy as you were just sitting here asking me what do I go by?

Tim: 00:49

I I like Tim. Yeah. Okay. Good. Tim is good.

Mike: 00:52

So cool. I'm here. I'm joined with Tim St. John. He is over in California, and I'll let him speak a little bit about his context.

Mike: 01:00

But before he does that, just just know as far as the episode is concerned, we're gonna launch into just as we've been talking in the previous episodes, is just getting into the breakout sessions from this year's conference. And Tim's his focus is really looking at church leadership and when church leadership fails and just how the deep scars. And so we're gonna press into that a little bit. But before we do, Tim, you wanna share a little bit about your context, brother?

Tim: 01:23

Yes, Michael. Thank you so much for having me. It's an incredible blessing to be here at this conference and on on the podcast with you. And just thank you everyone listening and who have a hunger and a thirst to seek Christ and to help others know and seek after him in the midst of hardship. And, yeah, so what I have the privilege of doing in Torrance, California, which is this little beach town in LA County in California, what I get to do is I'm the counseling pastor at Lighthouse Community Church in Torrance.

Tim: 01:49

Lighthouse Community Church is is a church plant planted by a Japanese American church planted in 02/2003, and by God's grace, we've grown. And we have we've been able to establish a pretty robust biblical counseling ministry. We have about 32 biblical counselors, seven supervisors, a mix of staff counselors, lay counselors. A lot of the pastors enjoy counseling too, and it's just a sweet place to be. I think, like, counseling at Lighthouse is it's not just a ministry you want.

Tim: 02:17

It's part of the DNA and the culture that we want. We really want the discipleship culture of our church to be a place where people are honored when they share their burdens, where they're led toward Christ with humility and joy. And, yeah, so it's a really sweet place to to be and to fellowship and to grow, not just to pastor others, but to be discipled and to be cared for. I could talk a lot about how much I love my church, but, yeah, just that's where I think I continually draw inspiration and encouragement for this ministry.

Mike: 02:44

Yeah, Tim. That's really awesome in that. Sorry. I didn't wanna interrupt you, but 32 counselors. And did you say seven supervisors?

Tim: 02:51

Yes. Yeah. By God's grace. Yeah. So it's a nice mix.

Tim: 02:54

We have a lot of people who've gotten different trainings from different seminaries, some from, like, Westminster, some from Talbot, some from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, some from Masters University and Seminary. And everybody goes through our biblical counselor training. And we've just learned a lot from so many different organizations and biblical counseling ministries like ABC. And I just, yeah, we're really thankful. We're just trying to think through, how do we faithfully train up the discipleship culture in our specifically, like, predominantly Asian American church culture and faithfully train them to care for one another.

Tim: 03:27

So that's that's what we get to do.

Mike: 03:29

Yeah. That's good. And I know also another thing too, just even within that culture, shame is a huge topic and a huge sort of theological work of the gospel. Right? But before we jump into that, I just I want to acknowledge, again, just how awesome it is that you guys are pressing in at that level, to have that level of the personal ministry of the word.

Mike: 03:52

Because I see in a lot of evangelical churches, like, there's the highest priority is on the public ministry of the Word. Yeah. And so to press into that level of discipleship and equipping the saints for the work of ministry is awesome. And you're right, we could talk about that all day. At any rate, though, just speaking of church and discipleship, in the process of discipleship of sort of those gospel centered strategies for counseling church hurt.

Mike: 04:16

That's obviously a big thing, at least in my counseling ministry, now that I'm focusing more on consulting. But I still do counseling. And a lot of my counseling is marriage counseling and then counseling with pastors. This is a big one. Yeah.

Mike: 04:30

Because early on, I would get a lot of people in the church, like struggling with the church. And so just a little bit of context and framework on that.

Tim: 04:37

Yeah. No, I would say, like, the last six or seven years in our counseling ministry, the top things that we have been dealing with and as far as presenting problems are domestic abuse and church hurt. And the main symptom of both of those has been shame. You're just in this world where maybe you've been living under someone else's law, and you're seeking to try to achieve some kind of works righteousness under that person's law, whether it was a spouse or it was a pastor, and you're just trying to be enough, do enough to please them to receive some kind of acceptance or approval, and it's just never coming. And you just feel more and more shame compounded.

Tim: 05:21

And so then people a lot of times they'll walk into our counseling ministry and they won't have the label abuse or church hurt. It's like I'm struggling with anger and bitterness over my previous church or I'm struggling with they might use the word shame, but yeah, lot of times it's I'm struggling with anxiety. Like, I don't know what to do. I'm confused. And so we we try to slowly invite them to share their stories and help them begin to tell their stories.

Tim: 05:45

But it is a huge honor for someone who's been hurt by a church to come to another church and make the decision to be vulnerable again. I think that for me is I don't want to at all minimize or under esteem the level of perseverance it would take to say, you know what, the church is Christ's bride. I'm not going to just give up on the church. God said he will build his church and the gates of hell won't prevail against it. So I am going to pursue counseling in another church, and I am going to be vulnerable.

Tim: 06:17

And to me, that that speaks volumes of hope that they already have, even as they're walking into our counseling room.

Mike: 06:22

No, that's really good. And so with some of this, though, in this, I would imagine with that many counselors, how much of that, as far as church hurt, do you see like from people in house, not just maybe people coming from other churches, right? Because I would imagine they know, oh, lighthouse. They are the lighthouse. Go get go get some help.

Mike: 06:40

But I would imagine to some degree you've got in house or like in house or to put it that way.

Tim: 06:45

Oh, sure. And I'm sure I like you could interview people who like, have left our church because of hurt. I, I am thankful for the humility of our elders. And I think we have acknowledged from the pulpit that we're definitely imperfect and we have hurt. And I find myself asking for forgiveness a lot.

Tim: 07:02

Think being a community defined by grace, hoping in grace, I I try to lean on grace and not self defense when things are brought up to us. So but I would say the majority of actual church hurt cases are from other churches and even like from maybe, I would say, lower level staff or assistant pastors coming from other churches who maybe had a really close proximity to the maybe senior pastor or something and just saw kind of an unrepentant selfishness, entitlement and pride behind closed doors that maybe the could be hidden from just that kind of like you were saying earlier, like that public ministry of the word, we can hide a lot of the wrinkles that that come out in interpersonal ministry, where it's gonna be less easy to hide yours who you really are as a person.

Mike: 07:47

No. It's really good. And so with some of that, though, because I think in this conversation, when we talk about gospel centered strategies for those who have been hurt. But I think the temptation to those who have been hurt is to, their temptation is to be careful so that they don't find themselves in this presumptuous self righteousness, where the hurt becomes so focal that it's easy to just remain there versus accept the reality of those gospel centered strategies. And so what is a gospel centered strategy in terms of dealing with the offended versus the unrepentant offender, and how we communicate to the offended, the unrepentant sin of the offender.

Mike: 08:29

And that's a dynamic that's it's, that's a little complex, right? Yeah. And so how, so what strategies would you employ to those conversations?

Tim: 08:37

Let me first say I I've really mainly when it comes to spiritual abuse or church hurt, I'm not typically getting the opportunity to minister to the one on the spiritual abuser side because usually that's a pastor of another church. Yeah. Whereas, like, with domestic violence, I actually have that is one of the main things I've been able to do is walk with abusers. And that's a huge privilege. And I wanna honoring them, disarming them, and helping them see themselves in Christ.

Tim: 09:04

That's a wonderful opportunity. I haven't had the privilege of actually walking alongside maybe one of one of these pastors who've been oppressive in their churches and who've hurt the sheep. So I'll talk about gospel centered strategies for the maybe the victim of church hurt and spiritual abuse. I think one of the first things I wanna do is help them really be able to tell their story of suffering and in a way that isn't pressuring them or and so sometimes if they have an advocate that they bring in with them that can share, like, who witnessed what happened, that's helpful.

Mike: 09:36

That's huge.

Tim: 09:37

Yeah. And so, hey. This person, they've been through it, and I just wanna relate to you their testimony and be here to handle questions because they've had it for them, they get confused even trying to retell it because it was such a hard situation. But I think other things, though, sometimes when people tell a story of suffering, they have a way of of just saying talking about the hurt, but not actually highlighting how evil the sin was that was done against them. So they don't have a vocabulary of of this was cruelty, selfishness, pride.

Tim: 10:11

This was murder.

Mike: 10:11

Yeah. They don't have a lot of synonyms for those things.

Tim: 10:14

This is just like I they just I kept failing, and I left because I didn't know what else to do. Or they might say, oh, like, the pastor cussed me out, and it and my blood pressure went up, and so I didn't. They'll have, like, stories. So, like, I I couldn't stay because it's just bad for my health. And actually, several times, there's had to be something really major that's happened for them to leave in a way that where they didn't feel like I don't know.

Tim: 10:36

Because they were afraid what the pastor or what someone might do if they left. They kind of lived under fear there. I think, like, they'll just tell me stories. I remember one guy, he was he told his pastor, first person he'd ever told that he was struggling with same sex attraction. And the pastor responded, If we were in the Old Testament right now, we would take you outside and stone you.

Tim: 10:57

And that was his answer to that moment of vulnerability. And and so for him to come to another church and then share that with share with me about this struggle was to me that was I was really encouraged that this man does have a genuine relationship with God. He does want to be led toward Christ in the midst of his struggle. But I want to help him see that wasn't just the wrong thing to say. Like, that was actually sin against him.

Tim: 11:23

That was a misuse of scripture. That was oppressive. That was dishonoring. That was prideful. That was shaming.

Tim: 11:29

That was not the heart of Christ. So I'm like, I think sometimes when we get hurt, we just move away from that pain. But we don't really understand why did that hurt. It hurt because what was done was sin.

Mike: 11:40

Yeah, like we don't articulate the extent of it, like really what happened. Yeah, it's good.

Tim: 11:44

That was a sin not only against you, but against God that and it sounds like they're not repentant. So then another question that comes up is so then do I go confront them for their sin? And so that's another thing we have to navigate. And thankfully, scripture helps us with that. Like, I look at Proverbs nine.

Tim: 12:01

Hey, do they seem humble like they are willing to receive feedback and typically not Right. Because if you were to rebuke a scoffer someone who doesn't fear the Lord, you're going get shame, harm and abuse. According to Proverbs nine, seven, eight, don't rebuke them. Rebuke a wise man and they'll love you and increase in learning. So I'm like, let's just be careful because I don't want you to suffer more.

Tim: 12:21

And there could be a situation that arises where we do need to bring this to the to to this church leader's attention, but I don't want you to do that alone. But we try to navigate that very carefully if we think other people are being really harmed in those ministry settings. But, yeah, there are no there's those are some of the ways we start to try to provide some gospel centered strategies. The first gospel centered strategy is we just want their story. We want to give them ways of sharing their story.

Tim: 12:47

We want to honor them as they share it. And we also want to give them categories for understanding their suffering, that there's a reason things hurt so much. And it's because what was done was wrong, and it was against God. And God is actually against what was done, even though the person doing it was supposed to represent God's authority in their life.

Mike: 13:05

No, that's really good. And I think that's because in, in one sense, you've got the body, the congregation, who may have that experience with somebody on staff or the teaching or lead pastor or whatever. But then you also experienced that at the staff level. And then so as you were sharing that and making some of those distinctions, one of the things I was thinking of is for our listeners out there for for those who are like on church staff, and they find themselves, they're pretty convinced that they work in a toxic environment. And there's, they're not the only ones, to your point, where they fear the response, the consequence.

Mike: 13:41

And so they, like most people that are being oppressed, just they see themselves as the problem to some extent, and they're wrestling with that. But what would be a strategy? And this is legitimate because I see this in churches all the time. Like you did do some, a lot of domestic abuse, but it was more church discipline with men in our congregation. So I took Chris Moses' Men of Peace material.

Tim: 14:04

So good.

Mike: 14:05

And worked with a lot of that and worked with some of our elders. And so we had some, we had some DA cases. But I think the hard part to what you're saying is like, that seems to be a little bit more clear to traverse. But when you start getting into some of those more complicated staff level dynamics, we're like, how do you actually so for those listeners out there who are like, yeah, man, that's my situation that I have. I'm on staff.

Mike: 14:31

I feel like I'm the I'm one of the I'm like one of the offended. And we all feel a bit when I say we all, there's a good number of staff that feel a particular way that the pastor is really abusing his authority. And what would be a strategy of what's what's charting a good pathway to actually bring some, like, confronting? Because I think that's the hard part where you've got a couple of people like who else is an authority, like, an elder level that could actually approach, where it's you don't need to know who said it. It remains anonymous.

Mike: 15:05

But brother, there's a couple of like people in our congregation at the staff level that we got a problem here. Yeah. And like you like having to actually confront that.

Tim: 15:14

Yes. Yeah. I would say it would I love if the scenario could be that there you're not alone, that you can see other people on the staff are also experiencing something similar. And because I that really helps if someone listening feels I don't actually I'm sure I tell myself it's all in my head because I don't see other people who have a problem with this. I would just say just start an incident journal.

Tim: 15:41

That's not a record of wrongs necessarily.

Mike: 15:43

Tim, are you suggesting I have an HR log here

Tim: 15:46

that like, it's got to start because otherwise I think we can, we'll minimize. Oh, no, they just preached a great sermon. I, it's just supposed to be in my head. What was I thinking? I was acting silly.

Tim: 15:57

Keep a record because

Mike: 15:58

you objectively keep a record,

Tim: 16:01

not a record of wrongs where you're fueling your bitterness, but because you're trying to navigate a relationship of care, like it is loving to point out sin to someone. But then you need to be able to say, Okay, what is actually happening here? What did what would God say about the about this situation? Maybe it's the intense yelling and the anger. Maybe it's the the constantly changing expectations for the work environment and the or maybe the it's the silence and the coldness, the maybe just feeling like dismissed or never appreciated.

Tim: 16:37

I don't know. Whatever it might be that is contributing to like a feeling of shame and of unworthiness in that work environment of feeling like you're not measuring up, you're not enough. Just I would ask yourself, is it taking if there are things happening that are taking you away from the heart of Christ and the Kingdom of Christ and centering you around being hyper aware of a leader's emotions, words, and you're trying to really make sure you're falling in line under them. That that is something that I would say leads us away from the Kingdom of Christ and it needs to be brought up. Either bring it up to your counselor or bring it up to if you have an HR person, that would be great.

Tim: 17:19

But bring it up to the pastor if you feel like you can do that. Some point, though, I would just say, come before the Lord and say, God, is this where you want me to be discipled? Because a church work environment is not just an occupation. Is your discipleship culture. And you're meant to be around people who you want to be like.

Tim: 17:42

That's the whole reason that you chose this church. They were.

Mike: 17:45

It hurts so much, too, right? When it happens. That's good.

Tim: 17:48

Yeah. Like this is the person that is supposed to embody Christ. Paul never uses the word disciple or discipleship in any of his letters. His word for discipleship is imitator. Imitate me as I imitate Christ.

Tim: 17:59

And he says it in so many different ways, in so many different contexts, whether it's finances, gifts, serving, suffering, imitate me as I imitate Christ or imitate these other churches. So that Greek word mimikos, where we get the word mimic, is we're imitating. So just ask yourself, is this who you want to imitate? Your church job is so much more than an occupation or a chance for you to use your gifting. It should be a place where you long to follow Christ the way others following Christ.

Tim: 18:29

And I think what can make it really hard is if there's maybe other people on staff that you do look up to that way. And you're like, so do I have to make a decision then? Like, maybe this person isn't who I want to be, but I really love this person over here or this layperson in the congregation. So I think it does require a lot of wisdom and thoughtfulness. I think it is good if you can talk to someone in with some authority and get get some counsel.

Tim: 18:52

But I know each situation could be very unique, and it needs to be handled carefully.

Mike: 18:57

No. That is really good. And as you return some of those last thoughts on that, I was thinking about, like, when you were talking about specifically about if there's an offense that happens and something's happening where you go to the Lord about it. And Proverbs nineteen eleven came to my mind. Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it says glory to overlook an offense.

Mike: 19:16

And there is something to say about when we're offended, like a legitimate offense. Now now like we're not sure, but like you said, like, was a legitimate sinful offense. Yeah. But am I willing to overlook it? And I do.

Mike: 19:30

And I'd be real curious to hear your thoughts. Because I do think there is a threshold where are we overlooking those offenses? And I think that's the power of the gospel in that sense, where we can overlook that offense to where, cause I am the one that was hurt and offended. But if I'm going back to gospel strategies where it's like, okay, Christ was the most offended. Yeah.

Mike: 19:49

And he, and he took that, he overlooked the offense. That was literally the whole point of the cross in that sense. But it's like what, but if it's, if it's like a pattern with this person, begin to think through that. And I think that's a good reflection point of just depending on where the offenses are, if it's the first offense or whatever, begin to pray about that offense, to pray about. And I appreciate what you were saying towards the beginning there of actually calling something what it is.

Mike: 20:13

Yeah. If it's evil, call it evil. Yeah. And if it's sinful, call it sinful. And even words that describe the extent of that offense, so that you can hopefully, and then going back to what you're saying of being able to write that out and be able to keep a log.

Mike: 20:26

Because it's helpful because when you let time pass, you and it was pretty concrete in your mind, and you can speak objectively to it, if you don't write it down, you try to call it back to memory before, the likelihood of you being able to articulate it to the point where you did initially, very unlikely.

Tim: 20:41

Yes. Yeah. No. And I yeah. I there could if you if it is a work environment, there could be legal implications depending on what's done.

Tim: 20:47

And so I think that's another reason to keep a kind of a record. You just you wanna know what has happened. The HR is gonna wanna know what's happened. The leadership's gonna gonna wanna know what what all went on. And it's better that it's already written down than also, if you're navigating a shaming and difficult relationship, it's confusing.

Tim: 21:06

Like, the kind of a common word is crazy making. Like, things go up and down and

Mike: 21:11

You start feeling gaslighting, like, they're gaslighting you a little bit?

Tim: 21:14

Yeah. Yeah. And then, like, you gaslight yourself. Right? You're just selling it.

Tim: 21:17

Yeah. It's I'm blowing this out of proportion. And then there's other things that kind of come into play too with church hurt because then you're like, don't want to gossip about this pastor. So I don't even know how to talk about what happened. And they're just like, even in counseling where there's like, just share freely, things are

Mike: 21:34

You got to process that.

Tim: 21:35

Yeah, let it out. It's it's I am trying to be so careful because I don't want to do anything that would hinder the gospel ministry of another church. And while I respect the sentiment of that, their story of suffering is what is going to allow us to come alongside them with the grace of Christ. If they don't share that, we're not going to able to come alongside them. And actually, it's protecting an unrepentant sin pattern that can exist in that church setting.

Tim: 22:00

So sharing that story is it's gossip. It's is more about doing things to defame someone and maliciously take them down. Right? This is about wanting to navigate a course back to God. This is where my story has taken me and I really want to move my heart and life toward Christ.

Tim: 22:18

And so I'm trying to make sense of what happened in this environment that was supposed to take me to Christ. But now I'm away. I feel farther than him than I ever been. And I'm just trying to live to maybe please and my pastor or try to do things that would keep him calm or something like that. I don't know.

Tim: 22:35

I think we want to give people the space to share freely. And I know that there's some simple thoughts.

Mike: 22:41

No, that's good. That's good. But it is helpful to think because I do believe that there's a lot of people out there that really legitimately struggle with this particular topic and trying to navigate. Sure, because it is. It's like how, what do you do when the people that are called to care for you actually hurt you?

Mike: 22:57

Yeah. Like, the worst that you could feel hurt. So any just concluding thoughts to encourage those who, again, we alluded to a few minutes ago that I mean, if this is like you in real time and you're trying to process where you may be, what would be some helpful strategies that you would encourage them in?

Tim: 23:11

I would just start with the hope of God as the good faithful shepherd. Like Ezekiel thirty four one through 16, I would meditate on those verses because it is a passage where God calls out the shepherds of Israel. He says, you were supposed to be feeding the sheep and you are eating the sheep. Right? You are supposed to be protecting them and you are you are using them to your for your own selfish gain.

Tim: 23:36

Right? He and he keeps saying, you're supposed to do this and you did the opposite. And then he says, I will care for my sheep. I will be the one to care for them. And then he fulfills that with Christ as the good shepherd who lays his life down for the sheep.

Tim: 23:49

The ultimate reverse of using the sheep to prop yourself up and make yourself great at their expense, Christ lays himself down, humbles himself to the point of death to to show us how much he loves us and to lift us up so that we can know him and have life and actually have truth that orients us in the midst of the dark and confusing world of spiritual abuse and church hurt. I can find light and help and hope because of what my Good Shepherd has done to meet me in this valley and to comfort me, to prepare a table in front of my enemies, my enemies that were supposed to be my pastors. He has prepared a table before me to remind me of who he is, even in the presence of a very difficult, challenging situation that I'm sure how to make sense of, I can at least make sense of this. Christ, my good shepherd, is leading me, and he will lead me no matter what. His goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life.

Tim: 24:47

So I would meditate on who that good shepherd is and the promises that come with that.

Mike: 24:51

We thank you. Appreciate that. That was really good. Tim, that was super helpful. And I appreciate you joining us on Speak the Truth.

Mike: 24:59

And again, for those of you who are listening, if that's you, and if there's something specific, maybe a little more nuanced to your situation, please you can email us at topicsspeakthetruth dot org. We'd love to hear from you because I'd love to have Tim on again.

Tim: 25:11

Yeah, that'd be great. Awesome.

Mike: 25:12

Thank you guys for joining us. Thank you for listening. We look forward to next time. We'll see you soon.