Every year, there was a slight exodus from the church that I pastored. Typically around the beginning of summer, a few members of our community, largely comprised of 18- to 35-year-olds, would venture out for the Great Plan that lay before them. It was a sad yet expected time and the transient nature of our community became a part of the ethos of our church.
While that segment of the population is bent toward mobility across the board, there was always a cross-section of our congregation in search of an easier time of things. Our part of the country (a post-industrial Midwestern small town) is notoriously difficult to find jobs within. The city itself lacks any real cultural options, the educational system is a complete disaster, and local bureaucracy features the same small-town politicians trading the mayoral seat every other election.
In short, there’s a lot of environmental friction here.
I’ve done a lot of thinking, praying, writing, and speaking about environmental friction over the years. It never had the title, but the concept was ever-present in my mind, prayers, articles, and sermons. It’s that reality that each environment—a city, an organization, a family, a work place—holds a certain level of friction you must deal with. The amount of friction will vary, but there’s always some level of difficulty we face in our endeavors in regards to the place and people and culture around us. It’s a part of life.
The common default for most of us is toward the path of least resistance. The reason is that there’s less environmental friction involved. Many of our stories are littered with episodes of having taken that path to avoid the friction we feel in certain environments. We avoid the family reunion because it would require “that” conversation. We leave a church community because there’s “nothing there for me/us.” We move to another city because the job market in our current one never opened up.
It’s all a form of environmental friction.
Part of the response we have to this friction is not only understandable but perfectly reasonable. After all, a person must pay their bills so they must go where the opportunities are. I’ve watched many friends endure toxic ministry environments as pastors or community members only to lose their heart for service to the overwhelming level of friction.
I recently interviewed a songwriter who lived in the middle of New Mexico, far away from any surroundings that would nurture her craft. After several years of attempting to give a career in music a chance from her home base, she decided to make the move to Nashville. When I asked her about her familiarity in Nashville, she stated that she’s only been there twice in her life but that each time “things just happened there for me that have never happened anywhere else.”
For her, Nashville held less environmental friction than what she was used to. At home, the population couldn’t quite understand her calling and craft. Consequently, they could not fully relate to her. At the same time, inspiration was difficult to find and loneliness was a common feeling. She was experiencing the effects of environmental friction and it was overwhelming to her. We’ve all lived there (or even continue to do so).
Sometimes the friction is the indicator that it’s time to leave—to find a new church, a new city, a new circle of friends.
We must, however, also admit that there is a darker side of our response to environmental friction. Perhaps our tendency toward the path of least resistance is not always the right option as Christians. After all, the Gospel compels us to bring love and establish the kingdom of God in the very places that environmental friction reaches its fevered peak.
My wife and I labored in our town in Indiana for many years, eventually coming to the realization that very few people were willing, or else called, to do so. The harvest is plentiful, as they say. The joke told multiple times at church planting conferences I’ve attended is that somehow God is calling nearly everyone to start a work in Denver, Seattle or some other happening metropolitan area.
I was always amazed at the heart and fortitude of the people who committed themselves to our church community. They bought houses in unsafe or unsightly neighborhoods. They started small businesses in economically depressed areas. They dreamed of a new reality in a place where the destructive nature of the present had quelled any sense of hope.
In short, they stood tall in the face of staunch environmental friction and embodied what the Gospel is supposed to do—to call forth the upside-down nature of the kingdom by freely offering ourselves to the margins and doing so in loving community.
Now I find myself at the crossroads of all of this. After eight years it became clear to my family that it was time to step down from the ministry — that a personal toll had been taken and that my own dreams and gifts and passions had changed over time. New leadership was in place and ready to assume my responsibilities, so we made the decision to step aside. With that single decision, my wife and I became a part of the exodus.
We haven’t moved — yet. Those things are in the works and will come soon enough. Yet even a few months after the escape of my own version of environmental friction as a pastor, I find that the overall feeling does not go away. Doubts loom about career decisions that I have made, and they will continue, as they always do, with each choice that I face. Life is not so neatly categorized in terms of right or wrong, at least in my experience.
A friend and I gathered for lunch the other day and the topic du jour was his unmet expectations in seemingly every area of his life. I did what any good friend would do in that moment—offered an ear to listen and told him “that sucks” 10 or 12 times. When he was finished, I asked him what changes he planned on making to get himself out of at least some of these situations.
He turned the tables on me. He asked me why I defaulted to change as the answer he needed. He asked a question that will likely stick with me for some time: “What role does faithfulness play in our lives today? That’s what I am wrestling with now, so I’m drawn to the reasons why you ask me about change.” I sat there in silence. My first impulse came without thinking. I didn’t want my second one to be the same.
His challenge is something I am wrestling with as I consider what to do with the friction that I feel. To stay or leave. To get involved or back away. To commit or to look around. These are the questions that we all face as we search for signs that one person, one situation, one opening, one opportunity is the “right” one to move toward or away from.
As my wife and I continue to make such large-scale decisions, my hope is that we continue to wrestle with what it means to face the environmental friction that we feel and face it faithfully. I pray we are willing to faithfully endure in difficult places where perseverance is needed, yet my desire is also for discernment in case the friction is intended to move us toward something new.
Matt Conner is a former pastor and church planter turned writer and editor. He’s the founder of Analogue Media and lives in Indianapolis.
13 Comments
Chris
Wow, that just hit me right where I’m at right now. Thanks for sharing Matt.
Jud
I haven’t heard the term “environmental friction” before, but I like the way you describe it. This perfectly captures why my wife and I decided to move from the midwest to southern California.
Dave Arnold
Hey Matt! Great article. Really, really good. And you nailed it: God is at work in environmental friction. In fact, He places us in those enviroments to strech us and mold us and break us. Not easy. But necessary. Thanks for the reminder of the purpose of the “upside-down nature of the kingdom.”
Dawson Vosburg
Wow, really awesome work. I think that everyone feels this in some way or another. For me, it seems to be happening in every situation and area of my life. Your words always hit the spot.
Like you said when you were leaving TMH, quoting “World At Large” by Modest Mouse–why do I always feel like I’m caught in the undertow? The thing for me that’s hard to discern is whether it’s the undertow, that call to something better, or that environmental friction that we have to live with?
Jeremy Ashworth
Kudos, brother. Good article. I’ll be emailing you.
Sue G.
We are currently struggling with this same reality… Good questions. (You should have lunch with my husband @the_stuART again to hash through all this. Thanks for giving a term to it: “Environmental Friction”.
Lindsey
I’ve been struggling so much with this, yet in my case I’ve been using the word “contentment.” We’re told to be content, but how do I know whether my discontentment is a sign of my sinfulness and selfishness, or a catalyst towards changing my environment? Good thoughts, Matt. Thanks for sharing.
Peter B
Lindsey, that’s pretty much exactly what I’ve been struggling with lately (along with all that other stuff that follows me around). We are in the midst of massive environmental upheaval, and there appears to be no clear end in sight; every time we think we know something, it’s sucked back into the tornado of uncertainty.
Andy
Thanks for these words, Matt. I went to TMH a few times when my brother was playing guitar there. Indiana (spent my whole life wandering Indiana with a vocational ministry family) just did not seem like an easy place to be in vocational ministry.
As a therapist, I’ve often wondered (not my idea…See Brand & Yancy, The Gift of Pain) if pain (or friction as you eloquently voiced) is our body/soul’s way of saying “enough, I’ve reached the end”, or “I’m reaching the end, pay attention to me”…
EmmaJ
Matt, something that you said reminded me of a snippet of verse from a song I’ve already listened to a bunch since downloading indie artist Heath McNease’s “The Weight of Glory” a few days ago:
“I was born
inside a town
that never understood me
and chased me off through no fault of its own.”
It’s a funny thing, home… and environmental fiction. The choice between staying put and following a road that may take you far away. I followed that road, and I think in retrospect it was good that I did, though it didn’t lead where I expected at all. Instead of continuing to tromp around the globe, my feet took root in a different and unexpected home. And many times (okay, almost daily) I have wrestled with some of the questions that you mention of staying and going, what does faithfulness look like and when is it time to leave. And mixed up in that are questions of loyalty and allegiance to places and people. I’m committed to faithfulness, but faithfulness to who? Interests and loyalties compete.
I’ve never been inclined to give up on anything easily, so it’s hard for me to know when it really is time to let go of one thing and move on to the next.
Kristen P
Matt, thank you for giving voice to the knot in my stomach. This concept of “environmental friction” is one that rises up in me at increasingly regular intervals. I’m sobered by your friend’s remark, ““What role does faithfulness play in our lives today?” It is a fair question and one that needs much more though in my own mind.
I’m grateful for this community that brings these questions to mind and allows me to chew on my own answers.
Tony Heringer
Matt,
I love you bro! Thanks for putting this out there. It is a great tension we all face in this fallen place. Looking for the eject button in whatever uncomfortable or difficult situation we find ourselves is common.
But, there are those times that we are compelled to different places. It sounds like God has prepared both you, your wife and community for this moment. To stay or go? Well, that’s something you will have to lean into the Spirit for and even then each step will be part of the Adventure.
This thought of environmental friction made me think of a concept we have wrestled with in our church in working with reaching a city for Christ. Whether its a local circumstance or in a totally foreign environment (for me) like Sao Paulo Brazil, it’s our aim to asses and nurture a Gospel Ecosystem. This is only done when the whole church in a city brings the whole Gospel to the whole city. Talk about environmental friction!
Just to attempt that on any level is, to use a corny line, “fraught with peril.”. One helpful bit of Scripture that was shared with me a few years back was Matthew 13:24-30 (The Parable of the Weeds). The point in this context is that until Jesus comes back we will always battle these weeds from our enemy. Weeds that take the form of a fallen world system and our fallen nature.
But, admist those weeds are healthy plants that flourish and produce much fruit. The work we do to nurture the health of these plants admist a harsh environment is a work worth doing because we known that one day – oh I pray it comes soon – that the weeds will be gone and paradise will be fully restored as Jessus returns to us and we really do live happily ever after.
Keep wrestling with this one my man. No matter where God takes you all, the Gospel will be there too. I know you two will continue to flourish even though it may not always seem like it.
Kayla
Friend, great insights and I can relate. Thanks for writing this.
Sometimes I attribute it to my age or the nature of my community, but, as you mentioned, I think environmental friction is something that we will always face and always seek to discern. Discerning is the hard part. I think often we are impatient in allowing the time that the discernment for each decision needs. With the pace of our culture, we hardly take time to be and let our lives truly affect us deeply. I think this includes decision-making. From my own perspective, I generally fail to have the foresight to understand the consequences of my decisions. That environmental friction grinds so painfully, and under the pressure and pain, I give. Slowly I am being strengthened, and slowly, too, I am learning to let that process take its course. As I match my pace with the pace of the process, the ebb and flow of strength and pain seem to balance one another. I am thankful for this, as it makes each bearable.
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