Ending Church Conflict: 5 Loaves, 2 Fish, 1 Pouting Pastor

The food pantry was my project, my baby. I started it—but they took it over. Church conflict grew, until I realized I was the problem.

Pastors aren’t immune to immense egos. In fact, sometimes we excel at developing them. Here’s what I did when I realized that, while we all had issues, I could only truly deal with my own.

Five Loaves, Two Fish

When I was a kid, my parents had a tabletop plaque that read, “Love is a basket of five loaves and two fishes. It’s never enough until you start to give it away.” This was my motivator for starting a food pantry at every church I served as pastor. Except the last church—because my penultimate congregation burned out on the idea of food distribution. What changed? How did the church conflict get started? And what did I do about it?

First, let me tell you why food distribution was so important to me…

My First Food Pantry

Ideas don’t happen in a vacuum. I had several positive influences that led to my decision to start a food pantry:

My parents were founding members of the Central Virginia Foster Parents Association. One of the perks of that organization was the ability to shop at the Central Virginia Food Bank. I remember odd assortments of scratch-and-dent containers, outdated-but-good packages, and too-ugly-to-sell produce. I learned the importance of food distribution at an early age.
The Baptist Student Union at VCU, as well as the student kitchen at my seminary, BTSR, had small food pantries with signs that said something like, “If you have extra leave it; if you need extra, take it.” These were helpful for starving students.
My first church couldn’t pay that much. They never knew that our groceries were frequently supplemented by the Goshen Baptist Association’s food pantry, discretely administered by the Director of Missions, Murphy Terry (love you, man!).

This prompted me to pay it forward to whatever degree I could. I asked that same church that couldn’t pay me well to take care of each other by starting a small food pantry à la my college and seminary. Have it? Leave it. Need it? Take it.

Members Only?

This first food pantry was designed to be for members only. Not that we were stingy—it was just a tiny cupboard with some extra nonperishables. It wasn’t meant to be a massive food distribution. It was just an easy thing to do, that we never advertised.

Of course, it didn’t remain a members-only thing. One example is a family that stopped by the church in a snowstorm, looking for food and gas money. We emptied the food pantry for them, and gave them some of my family’s peanut butter, diapers, and baby formula as well. While the pantry was intended for parishioners to take care of each other, its benefits certainly extended beyond the church family.

So, that’s how the food pantry got started at my first church. I did something similar at my second church, and my third. By the time I arrived at my fourth church, starting small food pantries was predictable and easy. Until it wasn’t.

Five Loaves, Two Fish

By the time you’ve pastored four churches, you’re pretty sure you know what you’re doing. Maybe you’re too sure. At my fourth church, I set up the same sort of pantry in a discrete location of the building so people could pick up extra food without calling attention to themselves. It remained that way for a year or so—until somebody got the idea to expand the pantry and make it available to the community.

That was definitely not what I had planned. Not that it was a bad idea—it just wasn’t my idea. But, I thought, if we had enough volunteers to staff such a food distribution, who was I to stand in its way? They named it (predictably) “Five Loaves, Two Fish.” Church members got excited about a food ministry for our community. They donated more groceries than I had anticipated. We publicized the event. When the day of the distribution came, we were overwhelmed with the response. It was during the time of the US housing crash, so lots of people were struggling. By the end of the day, not a can was left on our shelves. My church members declared it a success—but I saw problems ahead.

Problems with Sharing Your Food

I’m sure that when the little boy shared his lunch with Jesus, he meant well. But some of the disciples must have seen the problems that would arise. It was going to take a lot of time. It would be noisy and chaotic and there would have to be organization and extra baskets to collect the leftovers, and even a secondary distribution of the leftovers. And it was going to be a mess!

Those were some of the things I was thinking, too. As a natural introvert, I was happy with a small pantry that served people’s occasional needs. I was unprepared for what developed—a monthly onslaught of strangers to tax my emotional reserves. First, they came for the food boxes. Then, the group of dedicated helpers got the amazing idea of offering a hot meal in conjunction with the food boxes. After that, someone else started a clothes ministry so people could shop for free stuff to wear at the monthly meal. It was a huge, disordered success!

At first, I thought I could simply bless the new ministry and step back, letting the volunteers take the reins. I thought wrong. I was informed, in no uncertain terms, that I was expected to be there for the half-day distribution, one Saturday each month. Never mind the fact that every Sunday was a full workday, and I had a family that needed me on the half-weekend that I got (because ministry robs pastors of full weekends with their loved ones). So, not only was the event emotionally taxing for me—my family had to foot the bill too.

Besides this, the church’s benevolence committee realized that when you purposely invite struggling people to show up and receive, they’re going to present other needs as well. What started out as a box of food per family ended up as requests for assistance with electric bills, car repairs, home maintenance, medical expenses, and more. It wasn’t long before the ministry was draining the church.

Church Conflict

I probably didn’t do a good enough job masking my annoyance, or making my position understood. When I expressed my concerns, they likely saw me as the pouting pastor who didn’t like his pet project outgrowing his control. Looking back, that would have been one way of seeing things—and not without its validity. But I was also protective of my family, trying to be a good steward of church resources, and attempting to set healthy boundaries for myself.

Our little church’s Loaves and Fish ministry grew to the point that it was “the thing” that we became known for in the community. Geographically, we were at the intersection of three counties—which meant that all three counties caught wind of what we were doing. Church members were feeding people from three counties with donated groceries they paid retail prices for. Something had to give.

So, I tried to institute a vetting process. I suggested that recipients should demonstrate some documentation that they were on public benefits of some kind. They could be on SSI, SSDI, WIC, SNAP, or any other kind of assistance-acronym you could imagine, I said. My only point was that we shouldn’t be giving food out willy-nilly to everyone. The movers and shakers of the food ministry piously quoted Revelation 22:17 at me— “Whosoever will may come.”

Then, they began to spread the word through the grapevine that I was opposing the Lord’s work of feeding the poor. Some started withholding their tithes to the church, funneling that money directly into the food program instead. This created an engineered crisis in which my salary became a burden for the tightened budget. What started out as a difference of viewpoint became full-on church conflict. It looked like there was no solution in sight.

Some Solutions to Church Conflict

By now, I hope I’ve communicated that both parties were right, and both parties were wrong. Each had valid points and was unwilling to see the position of the other. I would be lying if I told you that the Holy Spirit floated in like a dove and solved all our problems. We were all praying for answers—but we were each praying for the other to realize the error of their ways. While the conflict was never completely resolved as long as I remained at the church, I still had a good, long tenure there because we figured out how to make things better. Here are the solutions we found.

As the need grew, people got creative. Somebody got the bright idea that the church could get supplies from the local food bank. Instead of asking people to donate groceries they bought at retail prices, we asked them to give the money they had been spending on that food—and just like Jesus multiplying the loaves and fish, we got exponentially more for the same price.
As the ministry grew, so did the church’s reputation.This meant more people came to see what God was doing at the church. The more people joined, the more they gave. And soon, we had a brand-new kitchen and fellowship hall with expanded classrooms and a full-sized pantry dedicated to the distribution. And my salary wasn’t at risk anymore. We learned that God blesses the work, even if you do it with faltering hands.
I never stopped caring for my people. When they gossiped about me, I loved them even more. I baptized their children. Buried their dead. Celebrated their victories and comforted them in their losses. I understood that a person may be right, but they may also be an ass. And I didn’t want to be an ass. So, I took them to lunch, listened to their concerns, heard the love that motivated their actions, and made some decisions to change.
If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. That’s what I finally told myself, regarding the one half-Saturday a month. Honestly, it wasn’t a good solution for my family. But when I stayed away, the amount of conflict it caused in the church caused my family more headache than the few hours a month it took for me to keep the aggressors happy. Sometimes there are no perfect Church conflict is hard. Missing Saturday mornings is hard. You have to choose your hard. And, if you get to keep your job, it’s better for your family.
I found a way to participate that I could get excited about. I saw that there was one thing missing in the Saturday morning event. People could come for boxed groceries, a hot lunch, and free clothes—but what about the prayer? What about the one-on-one ministry that many of them needed? So, I set up a spot in the back of the fellowship hall, with white noise to mask private conversations. I circulated among the tables, shaking hands, greeting people, and listening to their stories. Not only did caring for them meet their needs, but it also met mine. As an introvert, I couldn’t deal with volunteering as kitchen staff. But I could meet people one-on-one, blocking out the crowd, and looking into two eyes at a time.

Remembering That We’re Family

I learned that, when it comes to church conflict, there isn’t always a perfect solution. But there are ways to improve matters. That will mean getting creative, sharing the work, and consistently loving those who do you wrong. It means finding ways to compromise, even if you have to give a little ground to make peace. And it means prayer—lots of prayer.

I’d love to say that by implementing these changes, everything was fixed. It wasn’t. Eventually, I left the church to serve another congregation, but it wasn’t because of Loaves and Fish. And, when I left, it was on good terms. The key to church conflict is remembering that we’re family—and treating each other the way you’d treat family. “Love is a basket of five loaves and two fishes. It’s never enough until you start to give it away.”