leadership in church – Page 3

Language problems in Leadership

The operation of much church leadership betrays a simplistic understanding of the inherent complexity of the interaction of the personal gifts of the leader. Nowhere is this more clear than in the use of language and the different effects that the same words from the same person can have on the same people.\r\n\r\nOn two occasions recently I noticed this problem and it gave me cause to stop and think about my own work.\r\n\r\nThe first was during a presentation on the nature of evangelism. Halfway through a perfectly reasonable explanation of some system or other I found myself wondering where the Gospel had gone? I understood the words being said but I didn’t see the connection between Jesus and his world. It’s not that the presentation was entirely wrong. The words were right and clear but at the same time wrong and obscure. I realised that the presentation helped me think as a leader but not as an evangelist or as a pastor.\r\n\r\nBeing alerted to my own discomfort in this situation I then came across an even more stark example in a private conversation about a sensitive topic. The other person used extreme and dramatic language to sustain their argument, to the point where my naturally middle-of-the-road preference in these situations was misread as careless and lukewarm.\r\n\r\nWhen challenged over this extreme use of language the other person argued that it was important to use hyperbole to motivate a congregation to action. It was about leadership.\r\n\r\nAnd there we were. Stuck on a fundamental difference over holistic ministry.\r\n\r\nIn most churches the ‘leader’ is actually also (and better called) the ‘pastor/teacher’, and hopefully this person ‘does the work of an evangelist’ as Paul encouraged Timothy to do. So that’s four roles in one person as a minimum.\r\n\r\nSo how does hyperbole used in the leader role work in other roles of teacher and pastor?\r\n\r\nBadly!\r\n\r\nThe teacher who uses extreme language to teach teaches without balance, and doesn’t help the process of learning, which after all is what teaching is about (most teachers in church wrongly measure their own quality by how well they perform their function rather than how well people receive and learn, but that’s a whole other subject).\r\n\r\nInstead, the teacher who uses extreme language teaches others to do the same – and there we have cults and sects of all sorts in the making.\r\n\r\nThe pastor who uses extreme language looses credibility as someone who is able to deeply listen and weigh up personal issues.\r\n\r\nInstead, the pastor who uses extreme language teaches his congregation that the language of extremes is the context in which personal relationships are enacted.\r\n\r\nSame person. Same words. Same hearers. Different outcomes.\r\n\r\nAnd it’s inevitable if the ‘Leader’ doesn’t think carefully about how one role impacts on another.\r\n\r\nAs ever, Eugene Peterson puts it much more eloquently:\r\n\r\n”descriptive language is about … and motivational language is for getting people to do things they wouldn’t on their own initiative… but personal language, to express, converse … is the language to and with; love is offered and received, ideas are developed, feelings are articulated, silences are honoured.\r\n

[This is] the language of children, as lovers, in prayer, as poets. And it is conspicuously absent when we are running a church.”

Spontaneous Leadership

Spontaneous leadership, by definition, just happens.\r\n\r\nOver coffee, when a friend needs a problem unravelling.\r\nIn a meeting, when an issue is as stuck as ever.\r\nAt home, when the same argument is being rehearsed around the dinner table.\r\n\r\nIf spontaneous leadership just happens, can we prepare for it?\r\n\r\nYes we can.\r\n\r\nBecause spontaneous leadership draws heavily initiative and influence.\r\n\r\nAnd initiative and influence draw heavily on personal capital and relational capital wisely deposited in the past.\r\n\r\nPersonal capital is work usually done on our own. It is the weight of learning, reflecting, thinking, reviewing, reading, and absorbing experiences accumulated at other times in similar or dissimilar situations.\r\n\r\nIt is this personal capital that lays the ground for spontaneous initiative. Rapid fire synapse connections of recognition bringing things before us into focus.\r\n\r\nRelational capital is the work done with other individuals and teams over a period of time to create an environment of trust and believability. It involves deep listening, open vulnerability, compassionate truth-telling, faithful fulfilment of small promises, and sustained action.\r\n\r\nIt is this relational capital that lays the ground for spontaneous influence. Like a kind of relational synapse connections, the unquestioned recognition that someone doesn’t have to think twice before believing that what is being said is true and the person saying it wants the best for all.\r\n\r\nSo, for spontaneous leadership tomorrow – prepare the ground today.

Ambitious Ministry: Oxymoron?

Is it right to be ambitious in ministry?\r\n\r\nA pertinent question in this season of job hunting, and not a straightforward one in my experience.\r\n\r\nThe Latin word behind our word ambition means to seek votes, office, popularity or fame. It has the idea of campaigning for support.\r\n\r\nBishop Stephen Neill put it this way when talking to ordinands who were about to be ordained:\r\n\r\n“I am inclined to think that ambition in any ordinary sense of the term is nearly always sinful in ordinary men. I am certain that in the Christian it is always sinful, and that it is most inexcusable of all in the ordained minister”\r\n\r\nThat should put job applications (and rejections) into perspective!

Lead everyone or lead your favourite few?

One leadership question arising from the Organisation of the Modern Anglican Benefice is this:\r\n

“If you are a church leader, who are you leading?”

\r\nIt is easy to focus leadership efforts in church on a small group of core committed people.\r\n

A group who ‘get it’.

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A group who will move forward willingly, not kicking and screaming.

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\r\nIt is hard to lead across the levels of membership.\r\n

A wide spectrum of people, from the uncommitted to the core member.

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A group who have different needs pastorally, theologically, socially.

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\r\nIf the choice is made to lead only a few in the church, and not the whole church, then this leadership can be called many things.\r\n

It can be called leading enthusiastic young adults.

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It can be called leading those who want to be led.

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\r\nBut if most of the church aren’t being led there’s one thing it can’t be called:\r\n\r\n… it can’t be called church leadership.

Reorganisation of the Modern Anglican Benefice

It would be reasonable to assume that most Church of England clergy are uncomfortable with the idea of simply transferring business models and methods into the church.\r\n\r\nAs the church wrestles with questions of long-term sustainability some new thinking about structures has to be carried out, and it is not enough to simply adopt a streamlined management plan from a profit-motivated organisation and hope that the Anglican church can adapt. For start, most corporate internal organisation charts don’t include the client; they focus instead only on the Team, which can be controlled, not the public, (and for public read ‘Ordinary Church Member’).\r\n\r\nIt was reflecting on this problem which led to the doodle which led to the diagram below. It proposes an alternative organisational diagram for the modern Church of England Benefice.\r\n\r\nFor a larger version for zooming in see here.\r\n\r\nOn the same subject see Models of the Successful Modern Church of England Benefice\r\n

The successful modern Church of England benefice 3 – Campus

The successful modern benefice in the Church of England will need to become a Campus. This means it will draw together resources for teaching, mentoring, coaching and training, for the purpose of helping Christians deepen their discipleship and witness. Lay ministers will need to work in a more flexible way, working in teams, with each person working to their strength, be it research, writing, preaching, coaching. The Campus church will also attract external resources from outside the Anglican church – theologians and educators – as well as offer resources to all local colleges and schools (not only Church of England schools!) to build up the life of society as a whole.\r\n\r\nThis is 3 of 4: see the whole poster go here\r\n\r\nOr see each individual post here: 1-Organic 2-Networked 4-Planting\r\n

Promotion, Preferment, Sacrifice

Its job hunting time for curates all over the country, and on Friday mornings new jobs are advertised in the Church Times (today’s are in Ireland, Scotland and Brittany – tempting – and a school in Ashford). Depending on the rules of their particular diocese curates in their third or fourth year have to move on and many are keen to go, ready to spread their wings and take more responsibility.\r\n\r\nAnd yet.\r\n\r\nTraining for ministry is not just about ‘learning the ropes’, as it’s inelegantly called. Occasional offices. Running a PCC meeting. Preaching. Not ruining worship services.\r\n\r\nSkills aren’t enough.\r\n\r\nAnd that is because – if leading in ministry is not empowered by a tangible, dynamic, and forceful spiritual authority then it will waste the good time of congregations and fail a world that is, according to Jesus, waiting for someone to step up (Matthew 9/Luke 10).\r\n\r\nThe alternative to a ministry of Spirit Empowered Spiritual Authority is a well practised ministry that is ineffective in the spiritual world, and consequently unfruitful in the temporal one too.\r\n\r\nSo how is spiritual authority gained?\r\n\r\nUnfortunately this aspect of the job cannot be taught by Diocesan training staff or learned easily in theological colleges.\r\nIt doesn’t come with the job, and it isn’t conferred by a hopeful PCC.\r\nIt doesn’t come automatically with the Bishop’s license to minister, and it isn’t handed out with a promotion.\r\n\r\nNo, spiritual authority in leadership comes from the public and private practice of surrender and sacrifice. And as Jesus modelled in the Gospels, it is often discovered in the desert.\r\n\r\nWhich means that in trying to make sense of some of our hardest years of leadership behind or ahead we should take encouragement from the following quote about the road to spiritual authority in leadership:\r\n\r\nIt is not won by promotion, but by many prayers and tears. It is attained by confession of sin, and much heartsearching and humbling before God; by self surrender, a courageous sacrifice of every idol, a bold uncomplaining embrace of the cross, and by an eternal, unfaltering looking unto Jesus crucified. It is not gained by seeking great things for ourselves, but like Paul, by counting those things that are gain to us as loss for Christ. This is a great price, but it must be paid by the leader who would not be merely a nominal but a real spiritual leader of men, a leader whose power is recognised and felt in heaven, on earth, and in hell.\r\n\r\nSamuel Logan Brengle

The successful modern Church of England benefice 2 – Networked

A successful modern Church of England benefice will need to be Networked. That is, it will need to work across churches of different styles, theology and history, and across parish boundaries. Networked churches will make the most of resources, limiting duplication to maximise effectiveness and sustainability. To create and environment for sustainable growth the successful benefice will draw on the expertise of many people wherever they are found, in Anglican churches and others.\r\n\r\nThis is two of four: see the whole poster go here\r\n\r\nOr see each individual post here: 1-Organic 3-Campus 4-Planting\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The Networked Benefice

The successful modern Church of England benefice 1 – Organic

A successful modern Church of England benefice will need to be Organic. That is, it will need to grow and flex within existing and new areas – geographically, physically, theologically and socially. Rigid strategies won’t cut it. Leaders will have to be creative and articulate, the people they lead will need to be patient and forgiving – and more involved! All will have to be totally committed to making it work if it is to grow. This has not been the Church of England way in recent times, but if it is survive into an uncertain future then traditional Anglican sensibilities will have to be challenged.\r\n\r\nThis is 1 of 4: see the whole poster go here\r\n\r\nOr see each individual post here: 2-Networked 3-Campus 4-Planting\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The Successful Modern Benefice is … Organic

Why are there so few APEs in church?

APEs.\r\n\r\nApostles. Prophets. Evangelists.\r\n\r\nWhere are they?\r\nWhy so few?\r\nWhy is the leadership of the local church almost entirely in the hands of Pastor/Teachers?\r\n\r\nHere are three possible reasons:\r\n\r\nFirst, the Trustees of the institutional denominations (generally) don’t trust APEs with the established church, and they prefer to install Pastors/Teachers.\r\n\r\nSecond, the Pastors installed in the local church (generally) can’t lead APEs, being focused as they are on ensuring the wellbeing of the Ordinary Church Member.\r\n\r\nThird, the Ordinary Church Member is (generally) afraid of APEs and would rather be left alone with their Pastors and Teachers to grow in peace.\r\n\r\nFar fetched? Maybe not.\r\n\r\nThe word that is perhaps at the root of this issue is ‘Trustee’.\r\n\r\nAt a deep level this word ‘Trustee’ has come to define much of our understanding of what a good church leader should be at all levels of church life, lay and ordained.\r\n\r\nThat’s fine and right. Church leaders must not be careless.\r\n\r\nBut to be balanced we need to remember that we are Trustees of the Gospel as well as Trustees of the Church. We were given this trust of a Gospel to proclaim by Jesus himself.\r\n\r\nAnd Jesus kept the church for himself. His Bride, not ours. And we should give him credit that he’s managed the church quite well for 2,000 years often in spite of our efforts.\r\n\r\nOf course, identifying people by their gifts in this simplistic way is exclusive and somewhat debilitating. The messy human reality is that each of us has a mix of gifts, wisdom, experience, skills, beliefs and connections and it is out of this humanness that the church can flourish and grow by the leading of the Spirit.\r\n\r\nAnd APEs need to be better. Better at being careful, better at being led, and better at communicating to the wider church.\r\n\r\nThat being said, it should still be a matter of great concern that so few leaders, and even fewer Ordinary Church Members, seem to have been given the permission to stir up the necessary gifts within them to create a vibrant, Holy Spirit inspired, resurrection energised, culture challenging, life enhancing and dynamic church.