The single most important decision we make

The single most important decision we make is the decision as to how we will leave our ministry when our time is up. It is more important than the decision to come and it is more important than many of the decisions we make along the way. Because this final decision has the ability to hurt and destroy all that we have built and this decision reveals our true character. Will we do all that we can to uphold the Bride as we leave or will we do something to hurt the bride on the way out! And whatever choice we make, it cannot be undone.

As a church board member and organizational leader I have watched people make both very good and very poor decisions on how they exited their ministries. 

I have had people come and say, "T.J", I sense it is time for me to go and I want to do everything I can to make this a seamless, God honoring transition that blesses the organization and leaves it ready for the one who takes my place.

I have had others who came with demands and indicated that if those demands were not met they would do all they could to hurt the organization on their way out. And I watched some who did just that. Their bitterness drove ungodly behavior which undid much of what they had done during their tenure. 

How we leave is a test of our true character. Those who try to hurt a ministry or its leaders on the way out reveal a bitter spirit and heart that is willing to see God's work compromised in order to justify their own sinful behavior.

Contrast this with Paul who knew that some people preached out of envy and rivalry and even selfish ambition but "what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice (Philippians 1:18)."

No matter what the circumstances with which we leave we always have a choice. To be gracious for the sake of the One we serve and His Bride. Or to be bitter and divisive because we can. The first reflects the Spirit while the second reflect the flesh in all of its sinfulness. How we leave is a test and a reflection of our true character. 

Ministry Briefings from Todd Rhoads and Matt Steen

Todd Rhoads and Matt Steen are offering a new service to keep you up to date on what is happening in ministry.

• First, everyday Todd and Matt share a short video talking about "ministry stuff", they tend to be five minutes long, and we hope that they start a dialogue among those who watch (our youtube channel is here).
• Second, each month Todd and Matt are releasing a print piece called Ministry Briefing. This is a compilation, and executive summary of stories that we see throughout the month that are helpful for church leaders. While some of these stories have corresponding videos, many do not. The piece is made up of news articles, blog posts, studies, etc, that catch our eyes during the month. This month's piece has 115 summaries with links.

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Your freedom is a threat to my legalism

That is a great quote that I heard recently. The Scriptures give us an amazing amount of freedom in choices we make. Yet there are always professional legalists lurking in the background ready to pounce on those who make choices they would not make. These are not the "innocent" who will be hurt by our lifestyle decisions but legalists who are threatened by our liberty and who believe that others should make the choices they make - restrictive ones which is the nature of legalism.

The funny thing is that their legalism is not a threat to our liberty! Those who live in freedom are not threatened by legalism: Indeed they find it repulsive and sad.

In the early days of my tenure as leader of ReachGlobal we changed some policies that had a legalistic cast to them. Everyone cheered me on - except a few legalists who were deeply threatened by the change. Even though we had not asked them to change their individual convictions the fact that we were no longer legislating those convictions on everyone was a threat to them. Some actually left the organization because of it. Legalists like to impose their view on others. Those who live in freedom give others the choice to make decisions that Scripture leaves grey and up to individual conscience.

Why? Because Christian freedom is always a threat to legalism. It questions the premises of rules, regulations, expectations, that some like to place around themselves and others. Christian freedom means we have choices to make and many legalists don't like either that freedom or responsibility. The freedom Jesus lived in was highly irritating to the Pharisees whose rules He broke with regularity.

I chooses to live on the side of Christian freedom. It may be a threat to my fellow legalists but their legalism is never a threat to my freedom. In fact it reminds me often of the joy of freedom.

Handling stress in a healthy manner

Stress is debilitating condition. It robs us of joy, sleep, peace, concentration, causes changes in our body that can affect our health and is strong enough to lead to a shortened life! Many of us live unnecessarily with high levels of stress - especially in ministry.

Stress has many causes but at its core it is caused by something or somebody which is a danger to our well-being, to the well being of something or someone we care about.

For instance, because I love my organization or church, a threat to their health can be a cause of stress. If there is a danger to someone I love (disease, a marriage coming apart and so on) I can equally live with a level of stress.

By itself, stress is a good thing in that it can be an early warning system to us that something is not right and needs attention. However, if not managed well it can lead to inappropriate responses on our part, anger, depression and any number of negative responses.

I want to deal specifically here with stress that is caused by a threat to us individually. It could be someone who is angry with us and wants our hide, a supervisor who is unhappy with our performance, a staff member who has gone negative, or a perceived threat to our well being. As you read this think about the stresses you currently face.

Stress will be with us as long as we are alive but there are tools that we can develop and practice which can help us manage it. Below are some of the tools I have found to be helpful.

First, it is helpful when faced by a threat that causes anxiety to ask the question, what is my part of the equation? If someone wants your hide, is there a way that you have contributed to the others anger? Is there a piece of you that has contributed to their anger? If so, can you de-escalate their emotions by a conversation and trying to come to an understanding. We always have the choice with other people to escalate or de-escalate the passions.

Second, perceived threats tend to loom larger in our minds than they should. It is the fear mechanism that kicks in. Ask yourself, "what is the worst thing that could happen in this situation? Usually the worst thing that could happen is not as bad as our emotions would paint it.

Third, consciously work to "keep anxiety low." I actually say that to myself from time to time. The truth is that the worst that could happen is rarely as bad as what we think. Further, why worry about something that could happen when it has not happened? Keeping our anxiety low is critical because in a state of high anxiety our own responses are likely to be less than healthy in a stressful situation.

Often the worst that will happen is that someone will not like us or will speak ill of us. Unfortunately this is a fact of life - even in ministry. The truth is, however, that our reputation is ultimately in the hands of God. Not us. I don't know anyone who has accomplished something in ministry who does not have their detractors. Ultimately we play to an audience of one: God. If we are motivated by the applause of others we have the wrong audience in mind

Fourth, find counsel. When under stress, our own perspective or response is often not as dispassionate and level as it could be. Bringing a trusted wise adviser into the equation is exceedingly helpful. This is not about lobbying others to take our side or to "get back" at whoever is causing us anxiety. It is quiet, confidential, Godly counsel from someone who can give us perspective and counsel.

Fifth, don't go defensive with the one who is unhappy with you. Defensiveness is never a helpful response. You may not agree with what someone says but a defensive posture is really an attempt to protect oneself, keeps us from listening and is a barrier to communication. Healthy individuals deal with conflict from a non-defensive posture with an attitude of 'nothing to prove, nothing to lose."

What if there is some truth in the accusations against you? Own them. It's OK, none of us respond perfectly. Your willingness to take a non defensive posture will significantly lower the level of anger against you because it is an unexpected response which says, "I am not going to do battle with you."

A non-defensive response, even when accusations are not true from your perspective significantly lowers the level of the conflict and can lead to a conversation with a more dispassionate tone. Even though it is a normal human emotion, defensiveness rarely if ever helps, only hurts.

A non-defensive response can be as simple as "tell me more" about why you feel that way? Or, "share with me what you would have done?"

Sixth, intentionally give the situation to God. The older I get the more I appreciate the sovereignty of God. He ultimately has control of my job, my reputation and the circumstances I face. In fact, many years ago I went through a difficult period when many untrue things about me were intentionally spread. God used that to bring me to where I am now. He has the ability to take even the worst and unfair situations and redeem them for his purposes.

Stress and anxiety are really a test of our faith. Do we believe God is sovereign, that He is good, that He has our best in mind and that even if the worst happened (above) He will still be on the throne and look out for us? Stress asks the question, "Do I really believe what I preach and teach or believe?"

Finally, it is helpful to separate the conflict from who you are. My identity is not in my job (if I feel it is in jeopardy), it is not my reputation (I cannot fully control that), but it is my identity in Christ. Conflict and difficult situations come and go, but my core identity as a member of God's family does not. No one can take that from me - ever.

Stress is an opportunity to trust God, act wisely, de-escalate passions, leave our reputation in God's hands and remember that no one can take away our core identity. If people or life is unfair, God is not. He is good all that time and he is sovereign forever.

Accidental Pharisees

This book will challenge you, irritate you, perhaps make you mad in places but it will certainly cause you to think and evaluate. I highly recommend Larry Osborn's new book. Accidental Pharisees: Avoiding Pride, Exclusivity, and the Other Dangers of Overzealous Faith.

Change and its effect on people

We often wonder why there is such resistance to change. The answer lies in how people are made, and how they are influenced by others in regard to change. In general, people are change-resistant rather than change-friendly.

Those who introduce change are called innovators. Innovators are those who dream up new ways of doing things (2.5% of the population). Those who embrace change first are the early adapters - they see a good idea and adopt it (13.5% of the population). 34% of our population are called the early majority. They are more deliberate in thinking through the innovation but, after consideration, will adapt. Then there are the late majority individuals (also 34%) who will be skeptical of the innovation but eventually respond after seeing the benefits. Finally there are the laggards (traditionalists) who will probably never respond. For Laggards (16%) innovation is a bad thing.

Notice that the percentage of folks who can be labeled as "change-friendly" (innovators and early adapters) is only 16 percent: those who could be labeled as "change-cautious but open" equal 34 percent (early majority); and those who are change-skeptical or change averse equal 50 percent (late majority and laggards). This explains why even the best ideas will be met with caution, skepticism or negativity by the majority of any group.

There is nothing inherently "good or bad" about how people respond to change; it is how they are wired. A lot of obstinate behavior we see regarding change does not come from bad attitudes (although some does) but rather from how people are hard-wired to respond to change.

This illustrates the challenge for leaders to help people move in new directions, knowing that the majority of their people are not in the innovator or early adapter category. Almost any major change you can make is going to be greeted by these responses, at least in the beginning.

The statistics on change come from the groundbreaking work of Everett M. Rogers in his book Diffusion of Innovations, a must read for those who are change agents.

Handing over the keys to ministry

Handing over the keys of ministry to others is one of the hardest things we do whether it is in the development of young leaders, in church ministry or in missions.

A frustration of young leaders the world over is the time it takes for someone to trust them enough to give them significant ministry responsibility. Those of us who are blessed with ministry responsibility often think that our younger leaders are not ready - and we wait - often too long to give them the ministry keys.

In local churches the issue is often whether to hand over ministry responsibility to volunteers. In missions, it is whether to hand over ministry to our national partners. In both cases we are far too slow compared to what happened in the early church.

The result of our caution is often that qualified leaders become disheartened and discouraged while we leave ministry opportunity on the table. In the early church the workers were the new converts who were quickly given appropriate ministry responsibility. After all there was not much of a bench available.

However, the model went back to Christ himself who after three years with His disciples was willing to trust His most precious possession, that which He died for, His church to eleven disciples who were the most improbable individuals from the worlds (or our) point of view.

Jesus was willing to trust the Holy Spirit and these twelve men, knowing that they would screw up from time to time, which they did. Paul did the same thing. He found faithful men and women, built into them while he was in a city and then turned the ministry over to them - trusting them and the Holy Spirit.

One of the principles I have observed in both the local church and on the mission field is that the longer we refuse to turn over the ministry keys, the less likely it is that there will be a successful transition. Our lack of trust fosters an attitude of dependency on the part of those who we lead. The longer we lead the more that dependency grows - unless our younger counterparts break away in frustration to get in the game.

Given the example by Christ and in the early church our reluctance to share ministry responsibility and turn it over to others is an indictment on ourselves. Especially in light of the theology of Ephesians 4:12 where the responsibility of church leaders is to equip others for ministry and to then deploy them.

We can all cite instances when handing over ministry was premature. The key is to start handing over responsibility and see how it is handled. As people prove to be capable and faithful, we hand over more.

The fact that they make mistakes should not deter us. Most of the Epistles in the New Testament are meant to clean up one mess or another, but that did not deter Paul from handing over ministry. Sure stuff happens. But that is the way we learn and leaders grow. That is how we learned and grew! We learn from experience and mistakes along with a few victories.

The best leaders and mentors I know follow the example of Christ and Paul. They find good people, give them responsibility and take a risk. It is always risky but Jesus took a risk with us! Lets be willing to take that risk with others.