Posted in Ministry

The Irrational Decision In (my) Ministry Leadership

For those of us who have committed our lives to serve Christ, we are susceptible to the irrational decision. But, in a good way, right?

We know Christ’s calling and direction for us (or our churches) may not line up with what culture says is rational. And those decisions even among other Christians may be considered atypical. What may completely align with God’s direction for you personally may seem irrational to others.

We have a limited view, God does not. God can use all means of people or circumstances to bring about His purposes.

Yet, even when we sense God’s clear leading it can still feel irrational. We hope God does His “crazy work” in others people’s lives and not ours. But what happens when after prayer, counsel and scripture reading the decision seems a little bit crazy?

Resignation and Rationality

Recently, after a decision my wife and I made, even my six-year-old daughter was questioning my rationality. And she went further to let me know if I acted on my decision, I was on my own.

To set the stage and update some of my readers who do not know…I’ve resigned my Executive Pastor position at Brentwood Baptist Church. Just more than six years ago God gave us Brentwood Baptist to call home. A place to serve, and a place to be served. This is a fantastic church to serve and I’ve had an incredible position in which to serve. Thus, the (seemingly) irrational decision. And to make it feel more irrational, well, I resigned without my next place of service determined.

So, back to my youngest daughter. We had told our older kids about the decision a couple weeks earlier, and now we were telling my seven-year-old son and his six-year-old sister Blake. After telling them about the decision to resign, Blake quipped, “Well, you have another job, right?”

After I tried to manage a response to her questioning of why I’d leave a good job without another one to go to, I could still tell maybe they weren’t getting the gravity of the decision. So, I tried to explain that this decision could mean a move away “from here.” She looked at me in the eyes, and said, “Welp, we’ll miss you, Dad.”

So what happens when you or your church feel God’s leading toward a decision that for all rational and practical reasons, just doesn’t seem right?

Safety in the Status Quo?

I’m a status quo guy. I like to have a plan. In fact, I like to have contingency plans for my plans. I’m not afraid of the unknown, per se. But I am afraid of entering an unknown when I don’t have plans to deal with the unknowns (okay, I’ll admit, I’m leery of unknowns).

My decision is requiring me to exercise faith muscles I haven’t had to use in some time.

But I’ve been here before. Both in my own personal pursuit of God and even in my position of serving a church. Things that seemed scary, and too big, and were fraught with “what ifs” ended up being a clearly designed path by a God who sees it all from an eternal perspective.

So, this blog post doesn’t have any “practical takeaways for everyday church leadership.” I’m not far enough into this faith step to try to articulate what I’m learning. Yet, I do know that God’s ways are not our ways and in some cases, God will ask us to trust Him more than our human rationality He created in us.

I encourage all of us who have stewardship of people and churches to lead reasonably, to lead rationally. But in a way that leaves room for God’s prompting toward irrational steps of faith.

A p.s. for inquiring minds: in early July I made a decision to resign. There was nothing dramatic to it. But simply a decision that reflected months of discernment. Since then, I’ve had the privilege to serve in my role as we worked out a transition plan for my work. This plan is now close to me handing off my “executive pastor duties” to other capable people. After that I will continue to serve the church in other ways for a period of time. Some of you may care to know what’s next. The answer, we don’t know. We’re asking God to provide clarity, and in the meantime, courageous faith. I love serving God in ministry and I’m hopeful for what’s ahead.

The Mistakes of Coaxing Volunteers (and Fixes)

When’s the last time you volunteered your (unpaid) time to something or someone? Did you do it reluctantly? Or excitedly?

I speculate if you volunteered your time with any level of excitement it was because the person asking compelled you to serve. They presented it as a calling and did it in a compelling way.

Recruiting church volunteers is difficult work. But I think recruitment can be eased with a little work on the front end by the recruiters.

Cajoling vs Compelling (the already called)

Often we resort to cajoling or arm twisting. And from time to time, for one-time or short-term volunteer needs, the coaxing methodology suffices. But their volunteering doesn’t typically last.

Others of us tend to fill our volunteer slots through convicting messages. We play the prophet role and convict them into volunteering. We proof text scripture to help our convicting message or we just plain convict them with guilt. This method often leads to ministry volunteers who serve reluctantly, guilt-ridden and without joy.

But what if we could match their calling with a compelling need?

How can we be a part of them discovering their calling from God? A volunteer opportunity matches their hard wiring, their calling from Jesus, and a compelling need.

A compelling opportunity doesn’t have to be sexy or a fun assignment, per se. But it should show how their service can make a difference. People want to know their role will play a part in a bigger Kingdom initiative.

If you can compel them, how do you keep them?

Once you compel them, then you need to consider how to keep them. How do we ensure they stay connected? Retention takes ongoing work.

If you’ve already compelled them with a clear and compelling vision, the retention will take coaching and celebration.

We church leaders have a bad habit of getting volunteers in place, and basically leaving them there. We background check them, give them a name badge and implicitly, if not explicitly, say “good luck.”

Coaching and Celebrating

People are willing to take on challenges in volunteer roles if they believe the persons who lead them will coach and resource them. Volunteering time is a sacrifice, but volunteering when you feel unequipped and alone on the proverbial island is punishment and people won’t take it for long.

Coaching is not a onetime thing. It can’t be limited to our cleverly themed annual volunteer meetings. It will require ongoing training and development (a pipeline of leadership training).

And as they serve with you, celebrate. Celebrate them and their work. But also celebrate the fruit of their work. Pause and make sure they know how God is using them and your church.

Retention of volunteers means we continue to compel them to service. It means ongoing coaching and it means celebrating what God’s doing. And that leads straight back to them seeing themselves as a part of that compelling vision you gave them.

So, next time you make the “volunteer ask” of someone, in advance ask yourself, “Will I be compelling them or cajoling them? Will I try to match their calling with a role, or force them to fill my biggest volunteer need?”

Calling and competencies left in our churches parking lots

I’m pretty convinced every Sunday people drive into our church parking lots who have been called by Jesus, been made capable by Jesus, but not yet been compelled to being on mission with Jesus. Other days of the week, they function as high caliber, caring, and committed people in their work and homes, but at church, they pull into their parking spot and basically leave all they have to offer in their car as they walk into our churches.

Part of that is on them and between God and them. Yet, part of that is on us. My guess is if we were helping them to discover their calling and compelling them toward a vision that includes their service, well, they’d bring all of who God called them to be into our churches.

The Dangers of Our Perpetual Ministry Activity

“In the church, as long as you appear busy, people rarely question your knowledge or effectiveness. They assume whenever there is a cloud of dust, meaningful activity must be just ahead of it. So I started kicking up perpetual dust clouds.” – Fil Anderson

Fil Anderson is the author of a book I read more than a decade ago, Running On Empty. His book, sub-titled, “Contemplative spirituality for overachievers” is a helpful one I recommend. Fil began to see a revelation of who he was becoming… a minister running on empty in multiple areas of his life. In his own words, “So I started kicking up perpetual dust clouds.”

How much dust are you kicking up? How do you identify if your ministry is kicking up dust clouds? Maybe the best way to identify the cloud is to understand the things the cloud might be hiding.

What could be hiding behind the dust clouds:

An absence of true direction

It could be you’re not called to vocational ministry or to lead your church’s vision, and when you don’t have that calling, you replace it with other stuff. You stir up dust clouds in hopes no one will notice there’s nothing holy or substantive about the work you’re leading.

Sin

Frenetic work and ministry activities can easily conceal sin. And many times, the dust clouds aren’t even intended to conceal, but rather to compensate. You have guilt about your personal sin, so you strive to make up for it by manufacturing more ministry.

Tired people

Within these dust clouds we create, there are tired volunteers. We don’t want to be tired alone, so we invite others into our dusty worlds. We recruit them with great vision and momentum, and when we tire them with endless activity, they not only lose steam, but also the joy of their service.

Inadequacy

There will always be more dust to kick up. There will always be more ministry to do. But there will come a day when your pace slows down, and people will notice… “He used to make so many more hospital visits.” “She used to offer more support groups for our community.” “I can’t believe he doesn’t attend our group study anymore.”

You’ll hear these whispers and feel inadequate…And the truth is, you are.

You can’t keep up a façade of effective ministry via meaningless activity. Albeit meaningless, it’s still tiring. At some point you’ll reach “empty,” the dust cloud will settle, and you’ll realize you don’t know what to do next.

So how do you avoid this dusty reality?

You can avoid the perpetual dust cloud by understanding who you are in Christ. By understanding what God has called you to do. By clearly understanding what the church has called you to do… and what it hasn’t.

I believe with all my heart God will provide you with enough clarity to take the first steps to move out of the dust clouds. Search scripture. Seek wisdom about designing purposeful ministry plans. If you’re considering a new position, ask the next question in the church’s interview process…how do they define success? Is it meaningful work they want you to accomplish, or frenetic work that will temporarily drive up attendance or budget numbers?

What do the next seven days look like on your calendar? How many of your activities are simply dust cloud creating? Begin the hard work of making your personal and ministry life a dust cloud free zone.

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