Today, we are wrapping up a series we have been doing on how we engage with those who fight, question, and doubt us. The series, which we started more than a month ago, but which has taken some mild diversions, has been based around the idea of Havruta – a idea from Talmudic study that suggests that we should study the Word of God in pairs, asking questions, and digging for deeper answers, because it is the space between two people that the wisdom of God presents Itself. In this series, we’ve unpacked the ways that those who push back on our favorite ideas are some of our best teachers, and how we can learn from them.
We covered those who fight us, those who question us, and now, we reach the most enigmatic of the resistance: those who act by not acting at all.
The Passive Resister
Imagine that you are in a party planning meeting, and everyone walks away with a checklist of 2-3 things they are meant to bring before the next meeting. Maybe one person is in charge of balloons, one person is in charge of games, and one person is in charge of food. The group decided together that the food should be cookies, soda, and trail mix. The next week, everyone comes back with most of their things, including the food volunteer who returns with cookies and trail mix. No big deal, they can just bring the soda next time. But at the next meeting, they only bring a small bottle of soda water. You clarify that you meant soda-pop and give specifics of exactly which brands and what quantities you meant. They show up to the party the following week with only sparkling water, and act confused when you try to point out that isn’t what they signed up to bring.
So you let it go. But what would you assume in that scenario?
That your volunteer truly doesn’t understand the concept of buying soda for a party, when they handled cookies and trail mix fine? Or, more likely, that they, for some reason thought there shouldn’t be soda, but didn’t tell you that?
That is the kind of resistance we’re talking about today. I will be honest with all of you, it is the one I personally have the most trouble working with and learning from. But, true to my premise in this series, I believe that there has to be something we can learn from those who find even the most circumventious ways to push back on our ideas.
Getting to Why
Identifying a pattern of passive resistance can be frustrating, but it is the first step into creating a healthier pattern going forward. People might be resisting for reasons that are very complex, or which are opaque even to them. They may not even be entirely aware they are doing it. For example, when I have tasks that make me nervous, I can tend to procrastinate on them, not because I think they aren’t important, or because I think they shouldn’t be done, but because I am afraid of doing them wrong. Somewhere in my subconscious, I think that maybe the extra 36 hours of wisdom gained by putting it off until later in the week is going to make the difference.
Acknowledging that this is a pattern I have has made it easier for me to identify when I may be more nervous about something that I would have named, and helps me seek out the extra advice or input I may need to feel more confident in my next steps.
In the same way, if you have people who are engaging in this kind of passive non-compliance, it’s worth probing into why someone may have not gotten to a task, with the understanding that the story is often a little more complicated than “I was busy.” The reality is that people make time for things that they are excited about and that are important to them, so while we don’t need to pathologize every missed to-do box, if a person has a consistent habit of skipping specific tasks or can’t seem to complete a specific responsibility, it may be worth it to take some time aside with them and see if there is something else going on. Personality clashes, knowledge gaps, or real hesitations around if something is a good idea can be lingering under the surface.
This brings us to the second important thing to understand about passive resistance: there is a reason this person isn’t using a more direct approach.
Just like this dance of discerning intent is laborious for you, dancing around their real feelings is laborious for the person doing it, so why don’t they just come out and say what they’re trying to communicate more directly?
There is a scene in the otherwise very silly TV show Space Force that I think about all the time. General Naird (played by Steve Carrell) is the head of a semi-fictional military branch called Space Force that has been ordered by the Commander in Chief to have his Space Rangers, who are setting up a lunar base, attack a Chinese lunar base. Naird knows this is an extremely bad idea that may cost all their lives. He goes to his chief scientist, Dr. Mallard, who has just been fired for insubordination, and asks for help defying the order. Here’s what he says:
Mallory: I am going to teach you how to use the most subversive weapon known to man: passive aggression.
Naird: Man, I hate that.
Mallory: Well, yes, you are a straight white man, you’ve always had other weapons you could use, but the rest of us have to be more subtle in our defiance or risk punishment… You could say that you are following through with the order, but then you “forget” to, or you can interpret that order creatively – “Destroy the base” could mean a number of things – and, if all else fails, you can feign incompetence, which shouldn’t be a problem.
The show is a comedy, and they engage in some over-the-top antics of creative non-compliance to save the space rangers and avoid war, but that little exchange has lingered in my head ever since. Passive aggressive resistance is a tool used by people who don’t feel they are allowed to practice open defiance.
Getting Better
If people are passively resisting your idea, it’s because they don’t feel like they are allowed to actively resist it. This could be due to social location, the way they were raised, the cultural norms in your community, or simple personality, and it isn’t necessarily a leader’s fault.
But there is always something a leader can do to try to address it. Establishing a culture where people are empowered to voice dissent, ask questions, and push leaders is not easy work, but it can be done. We at Ministry Incubators have a strong belief that for anything important to happen in a room, there has to be enough shared trust to speak up.
In our on-site events, we utilize games, thought experiments, storytelling and more to build a culture that allows for a slightly different set of cultural “rules” than you may normally experience in a church meeting. While it can be labor-intensive work, it can make a huge difference in how your team interacts. If you want a guide with some free games and activities you can use, you can check out our church innovation guide, and if you’re ready to engage more deeply, you can contact our team.
Additionally, just like in our previous articles on The Fighter and The Worrier, what might serve the Passive Resister best of all is the compassionate ear of a leader who has the space to truly listen to what is happening inside this person when this idea is brought to the table. Do they feel ill-equipped? Nervous? Unsure? Does this change make them feel left behind? Does it threaten who they consider their community to be?
These are the kinds of questions that linger behind a team member who just wont buy the soda, and as pastors and leaders, these are exactly the kind of questions that we are well-equipped to answer.
Next week, we move on to other ideas, but for now, remember that those who resist you, doubt you, and fight you are all people who are engaged with you in some way, they are all people who you have something to learn from, and they are, most importantly, all people made in the image of God, sent to your community and serving alongside you in partnership with the incredible in-breaking of God here in our world.
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