The "chicken and egg problem" is related to a challenge I call the “imperative to virtue gap.” Simply put, we can’t expect performance where we lack capacity. As we know, spiritual formation concerns practices that form habits, and habits create virtue—holy capacities of thought, heart, and action. But in the church, we regularly traffic not in practices but in imperatives: “Do this, do that.” But performance will not emerge at the sharp end of a command. We need to practice.
But here is where the chicken and egg problem comes in. Many of the practices churches are asked to engage in require virtues they don’t yet have. Virtues are acquired through practice, but sometimes you need the virtue to engage the practice. Laziness, busyness, defensiveness, or anxiety can interfere. So what comes first? The virtue or the practice?
To illustrate the chicken and egg problem, here are some examples I’ve encountered in my work with churches.
To have a productive conversation about race, certain virtues have to be in place: emotional self-control, empathy, perspective-taking, tolerance for conflict, and a capacity for moral self-criticism. A degree of maturity is required. But to create these capacities, you need to have some difficult conversations. Difficult conversations cultivate the very virtues they demand. So you see the problem. Without the capacities, the conversations don’t happen. And without the conversations, the capacities aren’t developed.
Ask any pastor who has tried—or wants to try—to talk about race in their church. Pastors want to have the conversation, but congregants often lack the virtues necessary for a productive discussion. So the conversation never happens, and the church never changes. Chicken and egg.
Hospitality, especially extending it to people on the margins, is one of the issues I encounter most in consulting. Hospitality is hard when the groups involved are very different. The social encounter can be confusing, awkward, and anxiety-inducing. Hospitality demands emotional and relational capacities that are acquired only by stepping into it, being willing to try, learn, and make mistakes. Experience is always the best teacher, but you have to be willing to have the experience in the first place.
Churches want to be more hospitable, but the hospitality they want to extend creates anxiety and disorientation. Many churches lack the tolerances required to step into this ambiguity, so they back up. And if they back up, they never acquire the skills and experiences needed to cultivate friendships on the margins. Hospitality requires capacities, but those capacities are only acquired through practicing hospitality. Chicken and egg.
You also see a chicken and egg problem during Sunday worship. Many leaders want to make the stage more inclusive, giving more members a chance to participate rather than relying only on the most talented musicians, singers, and speakers.
But widening participation often lowers the level of polished performance. Less experienced musicians may hit wrong notes, vocalists may struggle, and a less practiced speaker may deliver a sermon that feels uneven or boring. In our consumeristic culture, congregants are shaped to expect excellence. Worship is often experienced like a product, and anything that falls short of the polished standard can lead to boredom, frustration, or disengagement.
Here’s the chicken and egg: leaders want to broaden participation to form virtues in the congregation, but the congregation lacks the capacities to tolerate lower-quality worship. Knowing this, leaders hesitate to make changes. Yet it is precisely through inclusive worship that the congregation could develop patience, charity, and a willingness to embrace imperfection. Inclusion requires capacity, but capacity is only gained by practicing inclusion. Chicken and egg.
Even widely desired spiritual practices like Sabbath reveal a chicken and egg problem. Everyone wants rest. But no one does it. Practicing Sabbath requires shame-resiliency: the ability to step away from striving for success, the courage to let peers advance while you pause. Sabbath is a zero-sum game: if you’re resting, you’re not working, and if you’re not working, you’re not advancing. Sabbath demands tradeoffs, and many of those tradeoffs go to the heart of our identify and self-esteem. Consequently, many of us lack the virtues to pay the price of Sabbath, so we avoid it. Sabbath demands shame-resiliency, but without shame-resiliency we don’t practice Sabbath. Chicken and egg.
Approaching Chicken and Egg Problems
Okay, how are we to deal with chicken and egg problems?
First, there is no silver bullet for these challenges. Spiritual formation in churches is like searching for the Holy Grail: endlessly pursued, never fully mastered. But I've shared the following with churches I've spent time with.
Pastors do not possess the power of spiritual formation, but they do possess the power of narration. And yet, to my constant astonishment, this power is rarely used. Pastors tend to speak generically, abstractly, and Biblically. They rarely speak concretely about what is happening in the room—relationally, emotionally, attitudinally.
In psychotherapy there is a technique called “immediacy,” where the therapist draws attention to what is happening in real time. “I notice your voice raising a bit right now.” That sort of move surfaces defensiveness and increases awareness.
This is what pastors can do. When the congregation grows tense, bored, anxious, or defensive—name it. When you attempt something new and people are uncomfortable—name it. Help the church see itself in the moment. You cannot force formation, but you can narrate the experience of formation as it unfolds. That is your superpower. Use it.
Spiritual formation is often framed as an individual task, but chicken and egg problems are easier to face collectively. Take Sabbath as an example. If you simply tell individuals to practice Sabbath, results will be uneven. But if the entire church takes up a shared challenge, something changes. “We’re all doing this together.”
And don’t just assign the practice—tell the story of it. Give people space to share what they are experiencing. Talk about consolation and desolation. Put people on stage and let the church hear from itself. Formation deepens when the community narrates its own journey.
Big ministry initiatives can feel heavy and high-stakes. Instead, think about short-term, targeted experiments. Borrowing from Mark Scandrette, use small, concrete, experiential practices.
Want people to engage hospitality? Try a simple, time-bound challenge. Want people less attached to their phones? Have everyone leave them at home one Sunday a month. Keep it creative, playful, and specific. You’re not solving the problem. You’re chipping away at it.
Direct approaches often trigger defensiveness. Telling a congregation, “We need to have a conversation about race,” may be necessary, but it can also be too much given our polarized moment.
Instead, curate experiences. Take a Civil Rights tour. Watch a documentary together. Create shared encounters that shape perception. People’s hearts and imaginations are often changed through experience, not argument. No one enjoys being scolded or labeled. But many people are open to seeing something new.
Chicken and egg problems require a kind of bootstrapping—pulling a little here, a little there. Psychologists call these micro-habits. Small actions that, over time, accumulate into meaningful change.
You want to develop a new rhythm? Start small. Put the running shoes by the door. Move the phone out of the bedroom. Put a sticky note on the mirror to remind yourself to pray. These are tiny moves, but they matter. Don’t crash into your church. Nudge it forward.
And finally, pray. Don’t turn spiritual formation into a godless, disenchanted bit of behavioral technology. Pray that the power that raised Jesus from the dead is at work in your life and in your church. Chicken and egg problems are persistent, frustrating, and often paradoxical. But God is with us, and with God all things are possible.
