Organizational culture. Are you satisfied with the default culture or have you created a preferred culture?

Every organization has a culture. In the vast majority of cases that culture is simply a default culture because leaders have not created a preferred culture.

Organizational culture is the combination of its people's attitudes, practices, relationships, leadership style and values. Think about the implications of those five areas. When healthy they reflect a good place to work but when unhealthy it can be toxic. Culture matters a lot.

Default cultures are highly problematic because they simply reflect the aggregate character and practices of those in it - good and bad. They reflect the habits of the organization. The problem is that while there may be many good things about the people and organization, there are also unaddressed habits that hurt the organization whether in attitudes, practices, relationships, leadership style or values.

Transformational leaders do not settle for a default culture. They intentionally create a culture that reflects the health they want to see. Organizational health is after all the key to organizational success in the long run. It is also the key to retaining and attracting the best people. By far, the culture a leader creates is an indication of their true leadership commitments.

My book, Leading From the Sandbox can help you think through how you create an intentional culture rather than settling for the default culture. Choose transformation over accidental when it comes to culture.

Pray for believers in Egypt

Once again, Christians are caught in the cross fire of conflict in the middle east. With the recent ouster of the Muslim Brotherhood from leadership in Egypt the Brotherhood has turned its wrath not only on the military and anti Brotherhood parties but against believers. Over one hundred churches have been destroyed and the businesses and homes of Christians have been targeted as well. And that is only what has been reported officially.

Unfortunately this simply displays the real agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood which is not "democracy" but the establishment of Sharia Law and the cleansing of Egypt of "infidel" believers. Just as there was an exodus of believers from Iraq in the aftermath of the war, many predict the same will happen in Egypt unless the Muslim Brotherhood is contained.

Egypt is a central country in the Middle East and the presence of Christians there is critical to a gospel witness in the entire region. Please pray for their safety and for peace and stability in Egypt for all people.

The difference between excellence and perfectionism in ministry

Have you ever considered the difference between excellence and perfectionism? There is one: a big one.

Excellence in ministry is something which we owe God. He is worthy of our very best and how we carry out our ministries is a reflection of Him. This applies to our ethics, our integrity, our truthfulness and our programming - it applies to all that we put our hands to. In fact, if a ministry cannot be done with excellence I question whether God is calling us to do it. Doing ministry with excellence is focusing on Him and wanting to throw a spotlight on Him.

But then there is perfectionism. Consider Wikipedia's definition of the word. "Perfectionism is a personality trait characterized by a person's striving for flawlessness and setting excessively high performance standards accompanied by overly critical self-evaluations and concerns regarding other's evaluations."

Everything about that definition screams that it is about me, not about God. It is wanting to look good, please others, live up to my own of others (perceived) standards and in the end to throw a spotlight on me rather than on God. That is why Christian leaders who demand perfectionism often show anger when something is not done to their standards. The anger comes from the fact that they (not God) have been let down. They have a need to look good and when it does not happen they show it.

When we demand perfection in ministry (an unattainable goal) who are we trying to spotlight? Excellence spotlights God. Perfectionism spotlights us. Something to consider.

We are here to throw a floodlight on God

For  all of us there is always the question as to who the floodlight is on. Us or God?

It is not as simple as it might seem because it is easy to think we are serving God while allowing the floodlight to fall on us and liking it. Even thinking that we deserve it. After all, cannot we be the star and let Jesus be the star too? Our celebrity culture in the church would think so as we willingly make heroes out of ministry leaders. 

Not so: We are here to throw a floodlight on God and Him alone. He is our creator, savior, redeemer, father, transformer, salvation, hope, counselor, empowerer and goal. All that we are is from Him and for Him. We owe everything to Him. There is nothing we are or have that does not emanate from Him. Therefore it is never about us and always about Him.

Jesus is the hope of the world and each of the seven billion souls on our planet. The more we throw a floodlight on Him, the more hope our world has. We are here to throw a floodlight on Him!

What is your congregation's spiritual Klout score?

Those who are tech savvy know about Klout. It is designed to rate your online clout by measuring your influence on things like Facebook  blogger, twitter and such. It is an interesting concept although I suspect that many with very high Klout scores may spend a bit much time on line.

But it got me to thinking about the spiritual Klout of congregations in their communities. How does a congregation deepen its influence for the Gospel and its influence with unbelievers? It is worth thinking about and perhaps reminding our people because the church exists in large part for those who are not yet in it as God's chosen instrument to reach our world.

What gives a congregation spiritual influence? First, the number of authentic relationships its people have with those not yet in God's family. Almost all conversions begin with authentic relationships so those congregations who place a significant priority on relationships with unbelievers find they have higher numbers of conversions.

Second, the commitment to prayer for our unsaved friends, relatives, neighbors and co-workers. It is the Holy Spirit that causes hearts to turn toward God and the commitment of our people to pray regularly for their unbelieving friends is deeply significant.

Third, the desire of our people to live out the Gospel in the venues where they live, work, play and relate. Small acts of kindness, concern for others, authentic conversations - just being like Jesus with those around us in an intentional way.

Fourth: Finding ways to bless our communities with acts of service for which we receive nothing in return. Serving the needy and praying for and working to bless the communities in which we live. This includes programming that speaks to the needs of families, those in recovery and other felt needs.

Spiritual influence (Klout) does not happen by mistake. It is an intentional commitment to influence those around us with the magnetic, compelling, healing love of Jesus. It is a discussion worth having in your congregation for the advancement of God's Kingdom in your community.

Church boards and church culture

From the archives

I do not believe that most church boards understand the direct correlation between the health of their relationships and practices as a board and the health of relationships and practices within the congregation. Generally speaking, there is an almost one to one correlation between how a board does relationships and behaves and what happens in the congregation itself. To put it directly: The congregation takes its cues as to what is acceptable behavior from its leadership.

I once worked with a board that was not unified over an important decision – even though the board had made a decision. Because this board did not have a covenant of behavior, several board members who didn't agree with the decision continued to bring their issues up at the board level. And, they shared their views outside the board meeting so the lack of unity on the board spilled over to a lack of unity as a congregation – a situation that could caused the congregation great pain in days that followed.

Here are some issues for boards to consider that directly impact the congregation as a whole.

• Do we encourage candid discussion in board meetings but once a decision is made all support that decision in all settings?

• Do we keep board discussions confidential?

• Do we resolve personal differences quickly and biblically? 
• Do we have a covenant of how we work and relate to one another and deal with board members who violate the terms of that board covenant?

• Are we able to set personal agenda’s aside for the health of the church and are we able to set our pride aside and support the decision of the group even when it is not the one we would have made?

• Do we have a culture of spiritual dependence in our deliberations?

Boards must understand that their commitments and behaviors will be mirrored in the congregation as a whole. To the extent that they are healthy they are likely to have a healthy congregation – or the opposite if unhealthy. The health of your church is directly related to the health of your board.

If you serve on an unhealthy church board I would encourage you to speak up and name the elephant in the room. Don't simply accept poor board behavior because in doing so you are hurting the very church that you are called to lead. There is too much silence in too many church boards over too much problematic behavior that directly impacts the spiritual health of the congregation.

Grace can be irritating and inconvenient

We all love grace when we need it, and we need a lot of it. At the same time, there are times when we are called to extend grace in difficult circumstances where we would rather wash our hands of a mess that someone has created and be done with it. Certainly society can be very unforgiving – and the workplace the same.

Christian organizations and the church dance to the tune of a grace filled Lord which means that there are times when we are called to clean up messed up lives and give people a way toward greater health when they have made a mess of them. It is often not our first choice, it is often thankless work and we do it for one reason only: God extended grace to us and we are to extend grace to another.

It is easy to abandon people who find themselves in trouble of their own making. After all they created the mess, why should we help them get out of it. That line of thinking works until we realize that Jesus stepped into our mess when we didn’t deserve it. He did the hard thing of joining us in our mess and dying to redeem us and our mess. Not one person would be in relationship with God without Him doing the inconvenient and paying the ultimate cost.

This does not mean that grace is easy. It is not easy for those who extend it. And for those who need to receive it there must also be truth (Jesus was full of grace and truth). Truth requires those in trouble to take ownership of their sin and situation, be honest with themselves and others and do what they need to do to see inner healing and restitution where necessary.

In fact, part of the burden of grace extenders is that they also must help individuals who often don’t want to face the full burden of their mess to see what is true and confront what is in their hearts. These are hard conversations and there are many who fight the process, want to circumvent the full truth and simply move on. Grace extenders must be truth tellers and willing to go back and back and back if necessary and insist on transparency.

Not everyone responds to the combination of grace and truth but grace without truth is hollow and truth without grace is harsh. Only the one who needs grace can decide whether they will take it. We cannot force it. They must decide to embrace it – along with the path toward wholeness and restoration. To run from grace is foolish but to face the truth one must humble themself – a bridge too far for those whose pride is larger than their willingness to face truth.

Extending grace can be irritating (why did they do what they did?), inconvenient (Now I must deal with someone else’s mess), difficult (I must confront and hold another accountable) and time consuming (there is never a good time for a mess). But in the end it is far less than what Jesus did and does for us and that is the reason we extend the unmerited, undeserved favor of grace.