If your church is planning to honor your pastor, our pastor’s anniversary planning guide has practical ideas for doing it well.

By Brent Lacy

The call comes on a Tuesday afternoon while you are at your day job. Someone in the church is upset. There is a conflict between two members. A volunteer is not doing their job. A family is thinking about leaving. A deacon is questioning your leadership.

You cannot deal with it right now. You have three hours left in your workday. But you also cannot let it sit for a week. Unaddressed conflict in a small church grows fast. What starts as a disagreement between two people becomes a faction. What starts as a frustrated volunteer becomes a pattern of passive resistance. What starts as a family considering leaving becomes a conversation that has already happened with six other families.

This is one of the hardest parts of bi-vocational ministry. The pastoral work does not pause while you are at your day job. But you cannot always respond immediately. And when you do respond, you are often tired, distracted, and emotionally depleted from a full day of work.

Here is how to handle it well anyway.

Why Bi-Vocational Pastors Avoid Difficult Conversations

Before we talk about how to have these conversations, it is worth naming why pastors avoid them. Because avoidance is the default, and it is worth understanding why.

You are already exhausted. A difficult conversation requires emotional energy you may not have at the end of a workday. The path of least resistance is to hope the problem resolves itself. It rarely does.

You are afraid of making it worse. Small churches are fragile ecosystems. A conversation that goes badly can fracture relationships that took years to build. The fear of making things worse keeps many pastors from addressing things that need to be addressed.

You do not have time to do it right. A difficult conversation done in 15 minutes between other commitments is often worse than no conversation at all. The bi-vocational pastor who cannot find an unhurried hour for a hard conversation often just does not have it.

You are conflict-averse by temperament. Many pastors went into ministry because they love people and want to help them. Conflict feels like the opposite of that. It feels like failure. It feels like something has gone wrong. But conflict is not a sign that something has gone wrong. It is a sign that you are leading real people in a real community, and real communities have friction.

The First Rule: Acknowledge Quickly, Act Thoughtfully

When you get the call or the message, respond immediately even if you cannot act immediately. A text that says: I heard. I care. I will call you tonight. does more pastoral work than you might think. It tells the person they are not being ignored. It buys you time to think and pray before you respond.

The worst thing you can do is go silent. Silence reads as indifference, even when it is just busyness. In a small church, where everyone knows everyone, silence gets interpreted and the interpretation is almost never charitable.

Before the Conversation

Most difficult conversations go wrong before they start. The pastor goes in reactive, underprepared, and emotionally activated. Here is what to do before you sit down with anyone.

Pray specifically for this person

Not a general prayer. A specific one. Ask God to give you genuine care for this person, not just a desire to resolve the situation. Ask for wisdom about what to say and what not to say. Ask for the ability to listen without defending yourself. This prayer is not a formality. It is the most important preparation you can do.

Write down the one thing you need to say

Not three things. One. What is the core issue? What do you actually need to communicate? When pastors go into difficult conversations without this clarity, they end up saying too much, covering too many issues at once, and leaving the other person confused about what the conversation was actually about. One thing. Write it down.

Identify your goal

Is this conversation about restoration, clarity, correction, or closure? Your goal shapes everything about how you approach it. A conversation aimed at restoration looks different from a conversation aimed at correction. A conversation aimed at closure looks different from one aimed at clarity. Know what you are trying to accomplish before you start.

Choose the right setting

Private. Unhurried. In person when possible. Not in the parking lot after church. Not over text. Not in a public space where either of you might feel observed. A conversation that happens in the wrong setting often goes wrong for reasons that have nothing to do with the content of the conversation.

Give yourself enough time

Do not schedule a difficult conversation between two other commitments. If you only have 30 minutes, wait until you have more. A conversation that gets cut off before it is finished is often worse than no conversation at all. It leaves things unresolved and communicates that the other person is not worth your full attention.

Ask yourself: am I calm enough to do this well right now?

If you are angry, hurt, or exhausted, wait. Not forever. But until you can approach the conversation with genuine care rather than reactive emotion. The conversation you have when you are activated is rarely the conversation you want to have had.

During the Conversation

Open with care, not accusation

Say: I wanted to talk with you because I care about you and about our church. Not: We need to talk about what you did. The first opens a conversation. The second starts a confrontation. The way you open a difficult conversation determines whether the other person is able to hear what you say next.

Describe behavior, not character

Say: I noticed that the Sunday school room was not set up last week. Not: You are unreliable. Behavior can be changed. Character attacks produce defensiveness. When you attack someone’s character, they stop listening to the content of what you are saying and start defending themselves. Describe what you observed. Let them respond to that.

Ask before you conclude

Before you state your conclusion, ask: Help me understand what happened from your perspective. Then actually listen. You may not have the full picture. And even if you do, the person needs to feel heard before they can hear you. A person who does not feel heard cannot receive correction. They can only defend themselves.

Name what you need specifically

Vague requests produce vague responses. Do not say: I just need things to be better. Say: I need you to set up the Sunday school room by 9:45 every week. Or: I need you to come to me directly when you have a concern rather than talking to other members first. Specific requests give the other person something concrete to respond to and something concrete to be held accountable for.

End with a clear next step

Before you leave, both people should know what happens next and when. What is going to change? Who is responsible for what? When will you check in? Vague endings produce vague follow-through. A conversation that ends with I hope things will be better is not a conversation that has accomplished anything.

Common Scenarios in Depth

A member spreading gossip or causing division

This is one of the most damaging things that can happen in a small church, and one of the most common. Gossip thrives in information vacuums. When people do not know what is happening, they fill in the gaps with their own interpretations, and those interpretations are almost always worse than the reality.

Address it privately and quickly. Do not let it go for weeks hoping it will stop. It will not stop. Name the specific behavior: I have heard that you have been sharing information about [situation] with other members. I need that to stop. Ask them directly: Will you commit to coming to me directly with concerns rather than sharing them with others?

If it continues after a direct conversation, involve a deacon or elder. This is not escalation for its own sake. It is accountability. A pattern of gossip that continues after a direct pastoral conversation is a pattern that requires the involvement of church leadership.

Someone angry about a decision you made

Let them talk first. Do not defend yourself immediately. The impulse to explain and justify is strong, but if you do it before the person feels heard, they will not be able to hear your explanation. They will just get louder.

Acknowledge their concern before you respond to it. Say: I hear that this decision was frustrating for you. I want to understand why. Then listen. Then explain your reasoning. You do not have to agree with their assessment. You do not have to change the decision. But you do have to listen, and you do have to explain. A decision that is made without explanation breeds resentment. A decision that is explained, even if people disagree with it, can be accepted.

A volunteer is not doing their job

Start with appreciation for what they are doing. Then name the gap specifically. Do not say: You have not been very reliable lately. Say: The Sunday school room has not been set up on time for the last three weeks. I wanted to check in and see if something has changed.

Ask before you conclude. Sometimes the volunteer is dealing with something you do not know about. A health issue. A family crisis. A change in their work schedule. Ask: Is everything okay? Is there something that has made this harder recently? You may find that the problem is not what you thought it was.

If the problem continues after a direct conversation, have a direct conversation about whether this role is still the right fit. Say: I want to make sure you are in a role that works for you. Is this still something you are able to do? Sometimes the most pastoral thing you can do is release someone from a commitment that is no longer working for them.

A family is leaving the church

Ask to meet before they go. Not to talk them out of it. To understand why, to bless them, and to keep the relationship. How you handle departures shapes your church’s culture more than you know. A church that handles departures with grace and genuine care becomes known as a church that loves people well. A church that handles departures with guilt and pressure becomes known as a church that holds people hostage.

In the meeting, ask more than you talk. Why are you leaving? What could we have done differently? Is there anything unresolved that I should know about? Listen to the answers without defending yourself. Thank them for their time in the church. Pray for them. Mean it.

A deacon or elder questioning your leadership

This is the most personally threatening kind of difficult conversation for most pastors. When someone in leadership questions your decisions or your direction, it can feel like an attack on your calling. It is usually not. It is usually a person who cares about the church and has a different perspective on how to lead it.

Meet privately. Listen fully before you respond. Ask: Help me understand your concern. What specifically are you seeing that worries you? Then actually listen. You may learn something. You may find that the concern is legitimate and that you need to adjust. Or you may find that the concern is based on incomplete information and that you need to explain your reasoning more clearly.

Do not get defensive. Do not treat the question as a threat. A leader who cannot be questioned is a leader who will eventually make a catastrophic mistake because no one felt safe enough to raise a concern.

A staff or volunteer conflict

Do not take sides until you have heard both. Meet with each person separately first. Ask each one: What happened from your perspective? What do you need? What would resolution look like to you? Then bring them together if needed.

Your job is not to declare a winner. It is to restore the relationship and the ministry. Sometimes that means helping both people see how they contributed to the conflict. Sometimes it means helping them find a way to work together despite their differences. Sometimes it means acknowledging that they cannot work together and making a structural change.

After the Conversation

The conversation is not the end of the process. It is the beginning.

Write down what was said and what was agreed to. Memory is unreliable, especially in emotionally charged situations. Both people will remember the conversation differently. A brief written summary of what was discussed and what was agreed to protects both of you and gives you something to refer back to if the issue comes up again.

Follow up within one week. Check in. Ask how things are going. This communicates that the conversation was not just a formality, that you actually care about the outcome, and that you are paying attention.

Pray for the person by name. Not as a spiritual discipline exercise. Because they are a person in your congregation who is struggling with something, and prayer is the most honest thing you can do about that.

If the conversation did not go well, give it time and try again. Not every difficult conversation resolves cleanly. Some people need time to process before they can hear what you said. Some conversations need to happen more than once. Do not give up after one attempt.

Taking Care of Yourself

Difficult conversations are emotionally draining. For bi-vocational pastors who are already running on limited reserves, a hard conversation at the end of a workday can leave you depleted in ways that affect your family, your sleep, and your ability to function the next day.

After a significant difficult conversation, give yourself time to decompress. Talk to your spouse or a trusted friend. Pray. Write in a journal. Go for a walk. Do not go straight from a hard pastoral conversation to your next obligation without some kind of transition.

Find a peer pastor or counselor you can talk to about what you carry. Not to violate confidentiality, but to process the weight of it. Bi-vocational pastors often feel they have no one to talk to because they are not embedded in a staff team. Build that relationship intentionally. It is not optional. It is how you stay in ministry for the long haul.