Champions and systems

A wise person has observed that “nothing starts without a champion and nothing lasts without a system.”

That truth explains the reason that many organizations (including churches) that start well do not continue on that trajectory and eventually plateau out. And why other organizations and churches are able to transition into long term effectiveness.

Champions are those individuals who have the vision, drive and fortitude to start something new and fresh. Ministry founders are such champions. Church planters are such champions. Missionaries who forge new ground are such champions. Every successful ministry had a champion whose vision and tenacity along with God’s blessing are why they are there.

While starting takes a champion, actually lasting takes something very different: systems that allow the ministry to stabilize, grow and flourish for the long term. As long as the ministry is dependent on its founder for its glue one either has a personality driven ministry or one where everything comes back to the champion. The personality gives the organization excitement and drive but long term that champion or personality will not be present so the transition from founder driven to leader and system driven is a crucial issue.

On a large scale, this was played out with Prison Fellowship with the ministry moving beyond the wonderful leadership of Chuck Colson or Focus on the Family as it moved on beyond James Dobson. On a smaller scale it is played out in numerous ministries where there is a transition from founder to systems.

Founders and champions can make this transition but it is a hard one. Founders are visionaries who were champions for a ministry that had to run by the seat of its pants to get started, was messy in the process and were highly flexible because the founder was the voice and the decision maker. That works for a while. But eventually for the ministry to get to the next level, the founder must either become a leader and build systems or the chaos and messiness of champions takes a toll on focus and effectiveness of the ministry.

Champions are always necessary to get a ministry up and running. They must then transition to leaders with a developed leadership team and systems if they are going to be around for the long run and meet their full potential.

Do we really believe that all people matter to God?

We have made remarkable progress in overcoming the marginalization of people based on color and ethnic background – but there is still a group that the church and society at large have not seen as full members of God’s family: those with physical or mental disabilities.

In many parts of the world, those who are handicapped are “throw away people” as they have little economic benefit. Often, the only people who pay attention to them are believers who understand that God made all men and women in His image, that He does not have a plan A or a plan B for His people but only a plan A. And that includes living up to our full potential, dignity as a full member of His body, living out the unique role He designed for each of us (Ephesians 2:10) and contributing something unique to God’s work on earth.

Only a very small minority of churches in the United States are handicap accessible. Think of the statement that makes to one who is and shows up! Only a small minority of congregations have ministries designed to meet the needs of those with disabilities leaving families with disabled kids to struggle alone with the care and challenges that go into raising them. For many of us the people group that make up those with physical or mental challenges are a “hidden group” just like others in the past were not on our radar screen. It is a subtle overlooking of a whole segment of people who matter to God.

Those congregations who have gone out of their way to invite, welcome and design both facilities and programs for this forgotten group quickly find grateful families coming through their doors! And there is a vibrancy and beauty to those congregations because in learning to love people who others often marginalize and ignore, their hearts become more like Gods and they realize that their new friends have as much to give them as they have to give – if not more. Some of the most happy, loving and radiant Christ followers I have known are those who have mental impairment. Their simple, joyful faith is what God longs for all of us to have. Those with physical disabilities have had to trust God in ways many of us have not and often have a tenacity that is absent from those whose life is easier. Again, we have much to learn.

God designed all people in His image, not some people! As image bearers, there are no people that should be hidden from our view or the ministry of the church. And unlike our world’s evaluation, in God’s economy everyone matters, has something to contribute and is equal in the site of God and therefore should be in our sight as well.

My tribe or his tribe

I belong to a tribe – the EFCA. In a day when denominations are supposed to be gone and done with they live and breathe and are driving forces for church planting, church health, seminary training and missions. Tribes are a good thing. They provide fellowship, accountability and allow congregations to do together what they could not do separately.

All that said, I do not believe that our denominational tribes should necessarily be our highest allegiance. In the local setting it often creates competition, isolation from other churches and fragmented community impact. In fact, how we think about out tribe (if we have one) needs to be informed by the prayer Jesus prayed for us just before his death: “May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

Our unity is a sign of Jesus’ divinity! That is a scary thought given the lack of unity among congregations in most local settings. When we compete rather than cooperate, do our own thing rather than work together for the reaching of our communities we actually hurt the reputation of Jesus!

Fortunately this is starting to change. Take Austin, Texas for example. Dozens of evangelical churches are working together to reach their community. The same in Lake County, Illinois and other locations. Rather than thinking independently, or only about their tribe, local congregations are coming together to form a local tribe – a coalition to reach their city or region for Christ. When that happens the community sees and experiences the church and therefore Jesus in a new way.

This really is about whether we think our thing – our church or our denomination – is more important than His church. Jesus did not die for the SBC  or EFCA or whatever tribe you belong to. He died for His church that is made up of many tribes. And our unity or lack of it says a lot about where our highest commitment lies. I love my tribe but I have a higher allegiance and that is to the cause of Christ and the spread of the gospel. And I am encouraged whenever local congregations band together to reach their communities with the gospel. When that happens, people find Jesus and His name is lifted high – because of our unity.

I wish we could call a halt to our competitive spirits for the sake of the cause of Christ and move from competition to cooperation. I take my hat off to all who have! May their tribe increase!

The power of courageous resolve

One of the key indicators of a good leader is their resolve! Any time you point an organization in a certain direction; there will be push back because most people are simply resistant to change. If you were to take a vote, the comfortable way we have always done things would win. Yet, to move forward, change, innovation and meeting the needs of a new day is inevitable. What got you to here got you to here but it will not get you to there. Another way of saying is it is “If you always do what you always did you always get what you always got!”

Missional organizations are intentional, change friendly and have great clarity around what matters to them.

But, whether or not the organization moves forward and aligns itself around that change and clarity depends in large part on the resolve of the leader. Organizations are made up of people who respond differently to change. Many take the view that this is simply the new flavor of the month that will go away – sometimes with good reason! Too many leaders articulate a direction but don’t stick to it themselves which breeds a certain cynicism.

In the darkest days of World War two, things looked very bleak for England. They were unprepared for war, made some significant tactical errors, had appeasers who simply wanted to placate Hitler, did not have the arms or personnel to fight, and faced the prospect of invasion. The game changer was Winston Churchill, who whatever his own inner fears (he was a realist) displayed such iron resolve that the nation chose to not give way before what many thought would be ultimate defeat. The resolve of Winston made all the difference in the world.

Resolve means that a leader will clearly articulate the direction a ministry is going to go and not deviate from that direction. They are clear, consistent and make decisions that are consistent with that vision. Over time, it becomes abundantly clear to those they lead that they are serious, that they will not deviate, that they are committed and that they are not going to compromise. That resolve creates a powerful movement within the organization. Resolve leads to clarity and directional integrity while lack of clarity and resolve leads to ambiguity and often cynicism. Resolve leads to stability as people understand that there is a compass that drives the organizations decisions that can be relied on.

Often the reason leaders do not have more resolve is that they have not done the hard work of defining direction and they themselves are unsure as to what that direction should be. That lack of “true north” is picked up by others. When true north is absent there will be organizational instability or a movement back to the comfortable, known and status quo. Resolve is only possible when there is great clarity in the mind of the leader (and their leadership team) and that clarity is what guides their own decisions.

The clearest signal to an organization that their leader has resolve is when they are willing to make hard decisions that are nevertheless consistent with the direction they have articulated.  That includes personnel decisions where there is not alignment with the organizations direction.

In our organization, people often hear from me, “Do not underestimate my resolve!” I am committed to moving toward our aspirational goals, our “gold standard” on a regular basis. I know we won’t get there tomorrow, I know change takes time and I know that people respond to change at different paces. But it is the resolve of myself and our leaders that will keep moving us down the field toward our goal.

Congregational Malaise

I spoke recently with a church board who described what I can best articulate as a general malaise in the congregation: rumblings, complaints, critical spirits and non involvement in ministry. The congregation runs around three hundred and the leaders are sensing they are not in a good place.

Unfortunately, this is not a unique situation. Some in the congregation are probably feeling like they are smaller fish in a bigger pond as the church has grown and it irritates them. Others miss the “family” nature of the congregation when it was small. Growth does not always bring just good things to a church – it can often bring certain uneasiness as well to some.

Rumblings, complaints, critical spirits and malaise are also indicators that the congregation does not have a compelling mission and vision that unites it in ministry. In the absence of this, people turn inward and often go south in their attitudes. One of the most important things leaders can do in this situation is to clarify who they aspire to be under Christ as a church and lead the congregation into real ministry endeavors that are focused outward to the unreached community. Missional congregations have a lot less time and need for the intramural conflicts that are so common.

In situations of malaise what I usually find is that leaders have not well defined who they believe God wants their church to be. There is not clarity around mission, around non-negotiable guiding principles that determine behavior, around a central ministry focus that identifies what they need to be about every day or around a definition of spiritual transformation that define the end goal of ministry. These are actually the four sides of a ministry sandbox (see the book Leading From the Sandbox, chapters two, three and four).

Lack of such clarity leads to ambiguity and a lack of intentional, missional direction for the congregation – a dangerous place to be. Without clarity everyone defines what the church should be which is a recipe for conflict and bickering. Clarity brings focus on the right and healthy things the congregation should be about and rules out certain behaviors.

Malaise and discontent is a sure indicator that leaders have some work to do to clarify, define a God honoring church culture and lead missionally. Leaders set the ministry agenda and direction for a church, in the absence of which others will set their own agendas and it is not always pretty.

Is your church more missional or institutional?

Every church falls somewhere on the continuum between missional and institutional. However, the fact that the vast majority of churches in the United States are either plateaued or in decline would indicate that there are far more institutional churches than missional.  One of the primary jobs of leaders is to keep pushing the church in missional directions and resist the temptation to move into the comfort zone of the institutional.

Institutional churches place an emphasis on organization and status quo at the expense of other factors. Common characteristics of institutional churches include the following:

• A focus on themselves

• Love of meetings, boards, committees and bureaucracy

• Guarding of the status quo

• Resistance to innovation

• Inward rather than outward focused

• Infighting and power struggles

• Live in the comfort zone

• Few spiritual conversions

• Threatened by strong missional leadership

• Change resistant

• Lots of rules
• Self reliant

Most sadly, they usually live with the allusion that all is well!

Missional churches on the other hand have a deep and abiding commitment to the great commission (more believers and better believers) and that mission always comes first and is the driving force of all energy, direction, funding and personnel. Their characteristics are very different from the institutional church:  

• Leadership is about the future. They celebrate the past but are always reinventing the future whereas institutional churches worship the past and want the future to look like the past.
• Understand the mission of the church: more believers, better believers

• Are outward focused

• Flexible in methodology

• Empower everyone to be involved in ministry in line with gifting and wiring

• Regularly innovate

• Have little bureaucracy: The structure serves the mission

• Have great trust

•  See significant fruit

• Have an attitude of “Whatever it takes.”

• Few rules

• Allow leaders to lead

• Keep the main thing the main thing all the time
• Spirit empowered

When you think about it, Jesus was all about mission while the Pharisees were all about institution. It makes one think...

The power of our thinking

This last weekend I had the privilege of interacting with a great group of pastors and church leaders from Texas and Oklahoma. In our dialogue session on missional and empowered churches the question was asked about overcoming barriers to growth - as most of these congregations were three hundred or less. My answer to them may have surprised them but I believe it goes to a principle that applies to both churches and ministry organizations that desire to see their influence and ministry grow.

Perhaps the biggest barrier to our growth is how we think about ourselves. A small church often thinks like a small church. A mom and pop ministry organization often thinks like a mom and pop ministry organization. That very mindset is the very thing that often keeps us from going to the next level. To get to the next level, one must think like one would think - and therefore act - at that next level.

Take a wonderful ministry that I interact with from time to time. It is still in the entrepreneurial start up phase characterized by low levels of salary for employees, lack of strong internal infrastructure or ministry stability and a board that constantly gets into management decisions. Its very internal structure is designed to keep it where it is and prevent it from growing into a more disciplined, stable organization. They think small, act small even though they want the opposite.
 
What this ministry needs to do to grow to the next level is to start to act like a ministry would act at the next level. It is counterintuitive but to grow one must act as if the organization were larger - and often it will catch up!

This is equally true with churches who desire to get to the next level. If you are a church of 200, ask the question: "What does a successful church of 400 look like and what are they doing differently than us?" Often it goes to the quality of what they do and a mindset that is more external than internal. How the leadership thinks and acts is also probably different. Leadership that is locked into the minutia of who locks the church and who can use the gym do not have the time to focus on the very issues that will help them move to the next level.

The bottom line is that growing ministries have leaders who are thinking ahead of the current size of their ministry. They know where they are but they think like a larger ministry and make their own decisions accordingly. While there are many barriers that can hold us back it is this unseen barrier that may be the most important to pay attention to. 

Unattended baggage

All of us have areas of our lives that don’t fully conform to God’s plan for us. It is the gap between our knowledge of God and our daily practice and the fact that we are even aware of that gap is the ministry of the Holy Spirit who gently nudges us toward conformity to Christ.

Often the reason we have not confronted these areas of our lives is that we have not had the courage to face the issue – or the courage to get serious about resolving it. Courage is the operative word because admitting to ourselves that our unattended baggage must be faced, named for what it is and resolved takes real personal courage and significant resolve. It takes courage to look sin or areas of great deficiency in the eye, strip away our rationalizations and avoidance techniques, name it for what it is and confront it head on.

These issues may be health, financial, moral, relational, ethical or spiritual. They may be public issues or private issues. Once we are aware of our unattended baggage, it dogs our conscience and thinking until we agree with the Holy Spirit that it is time for us to resolve it.

Knowing and resolving are not the same. The first is a gift of the Spirit to get our attention. The second is courageous resolve to bring that area of our lives under the supremacy of Christ by addressing it. And no effort to move closer to God’s best for our lives goes unnoticed in the heavens and the same Spirit that brings unattended baggage to our attention gives us the ability to start dealing with it. It is then our responsibility to develop a plan by which we are going to deal with our issue. A plan is more than good intentions: it has concrete steps we are going to take coupled with evaluation points. And, hopefully a friend who can pray for you and encourage you in the process.

As Christian leaders we have even greater responsibility to deal with unattended baggage since we call those we lead to do the same. Our personal credibility is built on life authenticity and courageous engagement with our own issues.

Sayed Mossa Released

World Magazine is reporting that Sayed Mossa - previous blog - Dying for his faith - has been released and sent into exile. We rejoice with his family. It was the international Christian community which put pressure on the Afghan government.

See the report.

Dying for his faith

This is a portion of a letter to believers around the world that was written from a prison in Kabul. Sayed Mossa is a Red Cross worker from Afghanistan that has been condemned to death by the Afghan courts for converting to Christianity. In spite of the fact that Afghanistan is a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and its religious freedom clause (Clause 18) and the Afghan constitution that promises to uphold this right, Sayed has been condemned to death without legal counsel and in spite of pleas from governments around the world. His only crime is accepting Christ as his savior.

Please pray for Sayed and his family. May this be a reminder that across our globe there are believers who die for their faith weekly and as Sayed says in his letter - are willing to make a public testimony for their faith! This is also a reminder of the stakes in the current upheaval in the Middle East. Afghanistan claims to be a democracy yet it does not uphold the rights of the minority - in this case believers in Jesus. This scenario has already been played out in Gaza under Hamas, Iraq where Christians have been driven out in droves and numerous countries where it is a crime to convert from Islam to Christianity.

As believers in the west who have amazing religious freedom, we ought to pray daily for those around the world whose life is in danger daily because of their faith.

You can read Sayed's story on these sites:

International Christian Concern

World Magazine

National Review Online

Missions in the 21st Century: Two Circles, one goal

 

Missions has changed significantly since I grew up as an MK in Hong Kong in the sixties. My parents would leave for a term of four to five years to a place they had never been to before. Instead of Skype and phone calls there would be a weekly letter home. Our supporting churches knew only what we told them as short term teams were not an option with the high cost of travel. The world was big, travel was expensive, and communication slow.

Missions was also very local as signified by the left hand circle above. It was local because it had to be local given the realities I just described. It was also very hands on with missionaries doing the hands on evangelism and church planting. In many places where they went there were few local believers to partner with. But we saw ourselves as the practitioners, the doers! We also replicated our own brands, Methodist, Free Church, Presbyterian, Covenant - all the brands we had in the west. Huge strides were made for the gospel in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

We live, however in a very different world today. Travel is cheap, communication instantaneous for much of the world: it is a small, flat interconnected world. Missions is accessible to even the smallest church, indigenous movements around the world are sending their own missionaries and missionaries from the west are increasingly coaches, mentors, and trainers as they develop, empower and release local leaders, pastors and church planters and serve as partners rather than the leaders.

With the rise of movements around the world, cheap travel and easy communication, there is a whole new opportunity for missions as represented by the right hand circle above. Here, we come alongside whole movements and movement leaders who may span countries or even continents, helping them do what they do, mentoring and training their leaders, partnering in whatever ways we can to see the gospel penetrate whole regions. Those who work in the right hand circle are servants who mentor, train and equip movement leaders. The potential impact is huge.

The goal of both circles is to see Acts 19 communities emerge where the gospel penetrates not just a neighborhood but a large region. Acts 19 is the story of the church in Ephesus which impacted a huge area around it. This is an intentional church planting strategy to see a saturation of churches planted. The goal is not to replicate a certain brand but to work with all evangelical partners to see His church replicated.

Often this will be in complex urban centers as the populations of the world move to the city. This requires the willingness to partner with those who are present already, to raise up local leaders from the start and to not need to own, control or count anything as ours. Paul did not, we should not.

The two circles with the intersection of Acts 19 communities was not possible in the pre globalized world. The globalization of our world allows us to move toward multiplication in a way never possible before. But it requires us to make some basic shifts in our thinking and practice:

• From being in charge to serving the global church

• From doing addition to working toward multiplication

• From replicating our brand to focusing on His brand

• From independence to interdependence

• From competition to cooperation

• From owning and controlling to counting nothing as ours

• From hands on to developing, empowering and releasing others

• From purely local to local and regional