The power of simply sticking at it

Will you still be here in 6 months?  A year?  2 years?  5 years?  10 years?  That is a question churches need to ask leaders and congregation as they plant and are planted, especially in less affluent areas.  In many working class and deprived areas people have been let down again and again by those who have promised commitment but then upped sticks and left when things got hard.  Social workers, GP's, teachers, other support and caring professionals are no longer rooted in a community and often move on (fairly frequently in the case of social workers) meaning that support changes, new relationships need to be built and often previous progress and shared history is lost.

The same has been happening with help offered to families from children's centres and the like.  The initial promise looked good but then the funding was cut, the case load piled up, promises were made and broken simply because there was so much to do.  And now many of these centres have shut with nothing realistically in their place within the locality.  Another promise of support that was no more than a promising castle quickly washed away by the tide.

The church must be different.  It must both launch, learn, and relaunch but also anchor itself within such communities and commit for the long term.  It must both change and adapt and yet stay and remain.  We must expect suspicion about how long we will last, we must be careful to promise no more than we can deliver, and we must commit to loving no matter the initial rejection (which so often is just a fear of being let down again when you move on).

Gospel ministry, especially in hard to reach or Yorkshire places, needs stability and that stability starts with the leadership.  Pastors are you called to ministry within that area or just to the ministry?  Will you still be here in 15 years or be off when a bigger church comes calling?  That's a question I would ask all pastors, not just planters.  Elders, are you committed to the area and the people?  Will you move here and commit your family to living in and among this community?  Will you turn down a promotion if it means a move across country away from the church or are you only here until something else comes along (if so I'm not sure how that fits with biblical eldership)?

I wonder if there is also something else we need to think through in terms of planting off the back of this.  If neighbourhood based communities need long term stickability I wonder if they need churches that are planted into permanent buildings rather than rented accommodation.  Rented accommodation does not say commitment and stability it says short term and changeable even if that is not what our plan is.  I wonder if, in those communities, having a building would go some way towards making a statement about commitment and perseverance?  Almost saying I'm all in.

So what does this mean for church planting?  It means we need to plant where we can into buildings. That raises the bar in terms of resourcing church plants if we need to buy a building or it means we ought to look for where existing gospel resources are.  Either revitalising an existing but dying church or entering into a coalition with us that gives us use of the building.  Both of those have their struggles and complexities but they also come with the bricks and mortar that offer opportunities and permanence.

Joy filler or killer, which are you?

Hebrews 13:17 is a fascinating verse.  "Obey your leader and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your soul, as those who will have to give an account.  Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you."

We have two choices when it comes to what sort of people we are in church, we are either burdensome making leadership hard and groan filled or we are a joy to lead.  But what does that look like?  How do I make leadership a joy for those in leadership in my church?  Let me make some suggestions:

1. Be there.  Your presence is a blessing and an encouragement.  It conveys commitment and that you appreciate all that they do and take your spiritual wellbeing as seriously as they do.  And that applies not just on Sunday's, endeavour to be part of a gospel or home group, be at prayer meetings.  As you do so you are inviting and enabling the leadership, and other people, to know you and care for you well.
2. Be engaged.  Engage with what the leaders are teaching from the Bible, ask them questions about it (leaders aren't afraid of this, they love it when people want to explore God's word, or even be clear in their minds on something that is just a bit vague after the sermon or bible study).  Engage with the direction the leadership are taking the church, question them about why they are making the decisions they are making and what they hope the outcome will be - convey that you have confidence in them but want to understand and support and get onboard.
3. Be Growing.  If you asked what leaders of churches want it is for people to be progressing in their faith, to be growing and changing as they wrestle to apply the gospel to every area of their lives.  If you want to make your leaders leadership a joy, to encourage them to keep going let them know where and when you are wrestling to apply God's word, or when it has encouraged you or challenged you and what you are praying the outcome would be.
4. Be giving.  Be giving financially to support the work of the church, the Bible calls us to do just that as an act of love in reasons to the gospel.  And not tight-fistedly but as generously as Christ has given to us.  Why not start with the tithe as a bare minimum and then challenges yourself to give more when you review it after 3 months?  Give of your time and gifts too, this shouldn't be done in lieu of financial support but alongside it.  Where can you serve, how can you be involved, how can you support, who can you encourage?  
5. Be fishing.  Be engaged with taking the gospel to your work colleagues, friends, family and neighbourhood.  Be that by starting an Uncover Bible study, bringing friends to services, serving the community in act of practical love or in any number of other ways.  But make Jesus mission your mission, not just the leaders.

Perhaps the negative is helpful.  How could I fill a leaders life with groaning?  Let me again make some suggestions:

1. Be sporadic.  Be infrequent never really committing so that no-one every really knows whether you are committed or not.  Be busy so that you dash in late and have to hurry away afterwards.  Be too busy to attend a home group and ensure that your children are so busy they can't really be involved or build good relationships.  That's bound to make your leaders nervous and concerned.
2. Be disinterested.  In part this will show in number 1.  But you can also be present but disinterested.  Approaching the pastor straight after the sermon finishes to ask him about his Fantasy football team, or to tell him of the interesting anecdote his first illustration made you think of is not encouraging.  Neither is texting, updating your status on Facebook, or playing clash of clans during his sermon.  Disinterest can also take the form of criticism or cynicism, that says no matter what you do I'm not inserted in following.
3. Be static.  Be totally uninterested in changing.  Show no interest in applying what you hear to life.  Or alternately if you are changing don't tell anyone or share what God is doing.
4. Be a consumer.  Don't support the church financial, or if you do make sure it's just a token offering.  Don't give anything whilst making the most of every opportunity you can to leech as much as you can from the church.  Give nothing by way of time and support.  Consume the teaching, send as many kids as you can to the youth work.  Criticise and tell the leaders of programmes other churches are running that fit just what you need and pressure them to start one just like that - though of course you're too busy to help with it.
5. Be insular.  Don't engage with the outside world.  Don't bring anyone to church ever.  Don't go along to support guest events let alone take anyone.  Don't be welcoming to visitors.  And if every you're asked let your leaders know evangelism is their job after all it's their church.

They are just a few ways we could encourage or discourage our leaders, I'd love to hear others if you have them.

The Problem with Pastors

I've been thinking about a number of things for a while but this week whilst reading Paul Tripp's brilliant 'Dangerous Calling' (a must for EVERYONE in ministry) some of those thoughts have become more crystallised.  I am increasingly convinced we set up our churches so that pastors have a significant chance of burnout and failure.  I am also convinced that pride and sin leads pastors to accept those opportunities to burn out and fail because we look for approval from others in our congregation rather than rooting out identity who we are in Jesus (I say that because I see it in my own heart).

Here are a number of things that were said to me when we entered the ministry 10 years ago by a variety of people; we were told that being in ministry was lonely, that we couldn't afford to have any friends because that would be perceived as favouritism, that we had to be careful how much of ourselves to reveal because then people wouldn't feel they could approach us with their problems.  Fundamentally they are all wrong because they all set the pastor up to be head of the church.  But a pastor is not the head of the church, the pastor is part of the body of which Christ is the head.

And as part of the body the pastor should be engaged in the full one anothering which takes place in the local church.  Those who work for the church are not immune to sin, they are not immune to spiritual blindness and hard heartedness, they do not come automatically plugged into a constant source of joy in the gospel, they are not hardy types who never need encouragement, or rebuke, or counsel, loving warning, or marital help.  Church leaders are people, sinners who have been saved by grace and are in need constantly, day-by-day, hour-by-hour, of that grace worked deeper and deeper into our lives.  Is that how we think of ourselves as church leaders in what ever position or ministry?  Is that how you think of your pastor or minister?  Is that how functionally churches treat their minister?

If we allow, or even worse encourage, pastors and leaders to think of themselves like that we cut them off from the grace we all recognise we need to grow in our faith, to keep going in our walk with Jesus by the Spirit.  And we should expect their to be casualties.  Is the fact the ministries keep on wrecking, that pastors only do short pastorates (less than 15 years), that moral lapse is not uncommon due to the way we set up and think about church leaders.

And pastors do we collaborate, maybe even welcome, that unhealthy set up.  Why?  Because essentially we want others to think well of us, to respect us, to look up to us, because well that's what a church needs in a pastor.  Maybe because that is what we perceive is the job, and because to do anything else may lead to unemployment.  But if we delve deep enough into our hearts it is because of sin; pride, self-reliance, a drift from the gospel that justifies.

What would a healthy model of pastoral ministry look like?  It would be a place where the pastor was viewed not just as a teacher but as someone needing to be taught, not just as a someone who does pastoral care but someone in need of pastoral care, where he was one anothered as others one another, not just someone in need of grace but needing grace, part of the body of Christ not above it or outside it.

The danger of prizing heroism but not durability

Joshua 1 is one of those passages that people often preach or talk about when focusing on leadership, the call to be strong and very courageous, to do great things for God.  To like Joshua stand up, or stand in the breach, and lead God's people into the land.  But I'm not sure that a lack of desire to be the hero is our problem.  Just think of the role you automatically cast yourself in when you watch a film, you automatically cast yourself as the hero, that is who you want to be like.  We do the same when we read the bible, we want to be like a Moses, or a Joshua, or a Gideon, or a Paul.

But I'm not convinced that we do ourselves any favours by focusing on that slant of the bibles teaching about leadership to the detriment of durability.  It's interesting to go on and read the rest of Joshua as I've been doing in a morning, Chapter 1 is just the beginning, Jericho has to be take, the Achan's sin dealt with, then there is the treachery of the Gibeonites, then there are kings to defeat, cities to conquer and land to divide up and lots of it.  Then there are cities of refuge to apportion, towns to give to the Levites, and the delicate situation with the Eastern tribes to resolve.  I have never heard anyone do a talk on leadership or a call to Christian ministry that used the chapters on dividing the land or apportioning cities, or even resolving the conflict with the Eastern tribes as its text.

Does that leave us thinking only heroic, courageous, throw yourself in front a bus leadership is valuable?  Does it leave us devaluing the more mundane everyday leadership that so much of ministry is about?  Do we want to do something significant, but define significant in terms of numbers or reach, or heroism?

I know for myself I tend to value the new, the exciting, the heroic, maybe that is why I was drawn to planting a new church, but how do I feel about the rest of it?  Do I prize durability as much?  If I don't then when the excitement wears off the and the call for enduring not heroic leadership comes, as it inevitably will, then I will find myself demotivated and devaluing it.  I will find myself longing for my next Joshua 1 rush rather than faithfully finishing what God has called me to do.  I will find myself bailing out of a ministry or an area of service after a year, or two or three.

Joshua endured, that is leadership, heroically doing all that God calls us to both the hair raising taking of new ground and the slow steady plod of settling, teaching and leading God's people in the day by day.

How to care for your Pastor

I was re-reading a book recently which contained this statistic: 44%of those in pastoral ministry for more than 15 years suffer from burn-out, mental breakdown or serious illness (and that doesn't include immorality or loss of faith). Whilst that alarming statistic is from Australia I don't imagine the UK is much different. I think in view of that we need to think about how we as churches and church leaders care for our pastors, how we facilitate their being in ministry long term. I’m going to suggest a number of things that I think are helpful:

1. Set Clear Expectations

• How many hours is he expected to work?
• How many hours he is actually working?
• How can we maintain a healthy balance here?

2. Help him avoid distraction from gospel work

• What are our expectations of him in his duties?
• What priorities do we want him to have?
• What other things might occupy his time?
• What distracts him from his primary tasks?
• How can we help him enjoy his work?

3. Help him keep on growing in his faith

• Is he reading and praying for himself?
• How can we encourage this even more if it is the case?
• Or facilitate it if it isn’t?
• Should we put in place a mentor system to ensure this is happening?
• If not how else do we pastor the pastor?

4. Resource him

• Are we encouraging him to continue being trained?
• Are we resourcing this with time and money and necessary changes to expectations?
• Is there a budget for conferences, books, etc... and if so is it sufficient?

5. Friendship

• Who is he spending time with outside of ministry?
• How will we encourage close friendships with those in the church?
• How will we facilitate time spent with other ministers?

6. Encourage him
It strikes me that we Brits never like to encourage someone in case it goes to his head and yet we are quick to challenge and even criticise, this can be incredibly damaging.  It is not that we must never criticise or question that would be equally wrong, but we also need to see the value of encouraging.

• How can we share with him what has helped or challenged us?
• How can we help him labour for the long term and not become disheartened by the often slow pace of change?

7. Provide for his family

• How generous can we be in providing financially?
• What will we provide by way of holiday/days-off?
• Will we check he takes it?
• How can we protect his day off with his family?
• How do we convey this to the church family?

8. Partner with him
Loneliness is one of the prime defeaters of ministry, it saps and sucks passion and energy.

• How can we share in vision setting and reaching that goal?
• How do we convey that an eldership is a team and we are partners together in this ministry?
• How do we build that team?

Fruitful Leaders

One of the big bottlenecks in the growth of anything is leadership.  The church needs leaders but where do we get them from, how do we grow them, what ought to we teach them?  It was thinking about questions such as these that lead me to buy and start reading 'Fruitful Leaders' by Marcus Honeysett.  I'm 4 chapters in so far and really enjoying it though I do have a number of questions about it.

The book starts off by reminding us of the love of God for the church.  He also reminds us that churches are communities for making disciples who impact the world with the good news of God's grace.  Marcus then moves on to look at what Spiritual Leadership is (servanthood among God's people whose goal is for Jesus sake) and how we can clear, dig and nurture leaders in the church.  Chapter 4 then turns to asking key questions of those in spiritual leadership because we can't nurture other leaders unless we ourselves are being fed and nourished by God and increasingly desire God.  Appendix 1 with its questions for self examination are absolutely brilliant and very thought provoking, it would be well worth using them for a time of reflection as an eldership or PCC.

However, I'm left with a few question so far.  Fundamental to Marcus book is the belief that God gives us leaders in our congregations because God wants to us our churches.  But interestingly I don't see this model happening - normally we get leaders from outside of our existing congregations.  And increasingly in the UK, as I've blogged before, Christianity is strong in university towns and cities and weak in other parts of the country.  This also applies to potential leaders - university churches often have a wealth of potential leaders whilst churches in other towns are struggling.

The answer is for us to be reaching the lost and from those we see come to Christ developing new leaders.  But I wonder if hand in hand with that we need a missionary mentality from our well resourced and potential leadership rich churches.  A mentality that trains leaders specifically to send to towns and churches which have fewer potential leaders.

Marcus' book is well worth reading for a local church.  We need to be developing and resourcing leaders.  But I think nationally and certainly regionally we need to be looking at leadership as wider than our own congregations.

How to sap your leaders joy in leading

In looking at Hebrews 13 on Sunday we were looking at how you make leadership a joy for those leading you. However sometimes seeing the negative, how we can make it a burden is also instructive as it highlights tendencies and drifts in us. How can you discourage your leaders? Here's my top ten:

1. Don't be changed by the bible as it is taught
2. Don't have your bible open or with you as the bible is taught
3. Don't listen and make it obvious that you are not (snoring loudly on back row is never encouraging, nor is rushing straight up after the service to talk to them about something that has clearly occupied your thoughts the whole time)
4. Drift from the gospel, growing increasingly cold or hard hearted
5. Don't meet with God's people regularly
6. Apply whatever God is saying to everyone else but you ('I'm glad so and so was here, they really needed that')
7. Snipe at others; refusing to forgive or apply the balm of the gospel
8. Don't develop meaningful gospel and discipling relationships
9. Stay on the fringe of everything
10. Put your leaders on a pedestal

Are we making it a joy or a burden for our leaders?

Avoiding drop-off

What would happen to your church if your pastor was diagnosed with an incurable illness tomorrow and could not preach for the foreseeable future? Or to your home group or ladies group or youth group if the leader were similarly diagnosed?

Would there be others who could step into the pulpit or lead? Perhaps more pertinently would there be others from within your own congregation who could do so for that time?

I'm still musing on the importance of training and equipping others in the church not only to ensure succession but also to enable us to plant new ministries in the future. Churches need to be developing preachers, home group leaders, women's group leaders, children's leaders etc... But we also need to be potential spotting new people who are gifted in these areas.

If we don't effective gospel teaching ministry will drop off. When the home group leader leaves without a natural trained replacement from within the group then the group will suffer, even parachuting someone in will compromise the effectiveness of that group for a time as new relationships are developed. When a pastor leaves the same thing happens, an interregnum is rarely a time of growth - just ask any church which has just been through one.

The remedy to this leaderless vacuum on whatever level is for us as churches to be training and mentoring others consistently and organically. Yet we fail to do so. You only have to look at the number of adverts for pastorates because the pastor has or is leaving - how much better would it be if there was a ready made trained replacement. So why doesn't this happen?

1. There is a lack of willing volunteers.
As someone who struggled for a while with the sheer biblical magnitude and accountability before God of the task of church leading I can understand an element of this. There are few people looking to take on pastorates, or even significant roles within churches.

2. There is an inertia at work in churches.
It is always easier to recognise the new comers gifts than the gifts that we have seen develop slowly under our noses. I wonder if this is one reason why churches rarely promote from within. We just don't recognise the potential and gifting someone may have because 'Why that's just little Johnie and I've known him since he used to wipe his nose on the back of his sleeve.' And so instead we pass over those relationally equipped and whose gifting has been developing in favour of someone new.

3. There is a lack of discipleship in churches.
If our response is 'That's OK for you but what about us where we have no suitable leaders to step up.' Then I think we have to examine how church is functioning. This indicates that something vital is missing in our church - discipleship. If we are not developing new leaders we need to be asking big questions: are the leaders in the church mentoring anyone? have suitable people been spotted, watched and invested in? Are the relationships among church members conducive to discipleship? How will you change that?

4. There are verses we have chopped out of our bibles
You may have reacted to that last statement - I am not questioning the bible you read but I am questioning our reading of that Bible. We would never physically take bits out but functionally we ignore some bits. Here are two I think we have cut out of our bibles:
"Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God." Titus 2v3-5

"You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others." 2 Tim 2v1-2

It is our failure to sufficiently examine and act on these verses that lead us to a situation where leaders leave and there is no one to replace them, where young mums crave the support of an older more experienced head but do not receive it, where new Christians are left to muddle through, where potential leadership material is not developed and where in short we are relationally and discipleship weak.

We need to be discipling churches it will help us for God's glory avoid the drop off.

Tim Challies posted this news story he came across, it is a sober reminder of the danger of neglecting the responsibility of a shepherd.

ISTANBUL: Hundreds of sheep followed their leader off a cliff in eastern Turkey, plunging to their deaths this week while shepherds looked on in dismay. Four hundred sheep fell 15 metres to their deaths in a ravine in Van province near Iran but broke the fall of another 1,100 animals who survived, newspaper reports said yesterday. Shepherds from Ikizler village neglected the flock while eating breakfast, leaving the sheep to roam free, the Radikal daily said. The loss to local farmers was estimated at $74,000.

Be strong and courageous

In one of those God determined happenings I started reading Joshua 1 the other morning and then discovered in the evening in our Bible readings as a couple that we were reading through Joshua 1 too. What struck me in both was the repetition of the little phrase or command to Joshua "Be strong and courageous", twice God tells him to lead like that because he is with him as he was with Moses. Then at the end of the chapter the officers of the people repeat that phrase to Joshua as they commit to following his leadership under God.

It made me think; is that an expectation we have of our leaders, do we expect leaders to be strong and courageous, to boldly go? How do we react to courageous leadership which may at times seem risky? Am I bold and courageous in my leadership? Are we bold enough in our discipleship?

Praying for your leaders

Having spent last week studying Malachi it raised a useful list of things to pray for leaders of the church and those who preach and teach:

1. That their service of God is always viewed as a privilege, never a burden.
2. That they enjoy and develop their own relationship with God, never take it for granted.
3. That they are newly amazed at the grace God shows in the gospel daily.
4. That they teach the truth and instruct the people.
5. That they do not become populists but honour God's name.
6. That their studies and love for God is seen in an every more Godly lifestyle.
7. That their ministry and leadership turns many from sin.

Marks of a good leader(s)

Studying Malachi 2:1-9 this week it is striking the marks it gives as those of a good priest:

"My covenant was with him, a covenant of life and peace, and I gave that them to him; this called for reverence and he revered me and stood in awe of my name. True instruction was found on his lips. He walked with me in peace and uprightness, and turned many from sin."

It is a telling passage to weigh ministry and leadership by.

We need leaders who will lead

Leadership is a big task, it is one we should aspire to but as we have studied Malachi we have been reminded that it is one we should not take lightly. In Malachi the shock is that God says they would be better off shutting the temple doors and stopping all the sacrifices. Basically close the doors of the church and pack up your home group. Why?

Because the leaders do not honour God's name they treat it with contempt. They would never say they do, their words and theology would be orthodox, but their actions are anything but. They allow manky offerings, anything goes, you can bring God your left overs they say to the people and that is exactly what the people do. The contempt of the priests is quickly transferred to the people.

It is a challenge for those of us in leadership how personally am I treating God with contempt? Have I begun to doubt God loves me or that he is almighty? If so I need to deal with it and wrestle with God's word and in prayer before that infects my ministry. Because the attitude and actions of the leaders will be transmitted to the people who follow.

It lays bare all our failings: failings of thought, heart, word and deed. Father forgive, Father remind us, and Father equip us to lead your people we pray.

A Few Good Men

Was looking at 1 Timothy yesterday and the discussion turned to the first verse of ch3, "Here is a trustworthy saying: whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task." Now it struck me that is the verse that gives the Bible balance to this issue of leadership.

I think I and others have been too quick to teach eldership and the pastorate in a negative way without adding this important balance. So often I have heard others talk about the challenge of becoming an elder, the responsibilities, that it is not to be entered upon lightly, that those who teach will be judged more severely quoting James. Even people saying only do it if there is nothing else God will allow you to do. And I want to say it is a responsibility but I TIM 3:1 makes clear that it is a great thing.

That becoming an elder is something to be aspired to, to want to do not to be avoided, that teaching God's people is a privilege not a chore. I need to live my life in the light of that realisation.

I can't help thinking that is why we as churches in Britain struggle to find male leaders, we struggle to find elders - because it is not something to be aspired to, it is instead treated as something which you do if you have to. It is the same reason we struggle with men filling the empty pulpits in England - it is a privilege to be called to preach the Bible to God's people.

We need to deconstruct this idea of a mythical call too. For me the call consisted of having a gift others identified and a ministry they suggested and then recognising a need and agreement with the elders that God had and would enable me to take on that task.

Do you see a need? Do you have a gift that can meet that need? Then our default setting should be that God has called me to meet that need. Do you see how that flips our thinking?

It is a privilege to be called to serve God in his church as a pastor or an elder, it is something we should aspire to.

Finding Leaders

There are 4 stages before someone becomes a leader:
a. Identify – They should have a compassion for people and want others to know God’s grace as well as conforming to Biblical criteria where given. From this basic starting point you then train them in discipleship.
b. Mentor – You share the lead with them in ministry, looking at whether they are, gifted, capable and faithful? Whilst doing this you look for ways, both informal and formal to provide feedback and continued discipleship.
c. Apprenticeship – The person now exhibits gospel confidence, love for others, godliness and has a desire to lead alongside you. Further opportunities need to be provided with continued feedback, discipleship and pointing towards training opportunities. Training in potential situations faced.
d. Leadership – The individual now has the respect and confidence of the group, be it a home group, young peoples group or a church, they are gifted, developing and growing in faith and godliness. As they take on leadership, launch a new ministry, plant a church they need continued help, involvement and training by the leader.

Growing Leaders

Leadership is always an issue in churches be it looking for people to lead the youth work, Sunday school teachers, deacons, elders or whatever. We have been very blessed by God as we have started up to have people asking to be involved and determined to serve at SDCC.

However given the need for leaders we have this last year run the FIEC's Learn 2 Lead course on Sunday evenings, which we will complete as a church next year. It has been good training for leaders in Biblical understanding and leadership. We ended thinking about growing more leaders.

What struck me as I prepared was that apprenticeship is not glimpsed in the New Testament it runs throughout it.

What does Jesus do when starting his mission, gather around him a group of followers who watch, listen and learn from his ministry, they then pick up his baton. Paul similarly trains others - Timothy, Mark, Onesimus, Archippus, Philemon and so on... Yet we singularly fail to do this.

Leaders lead until they stop leading at which point we tend to look around for someones to step into their shoes, it is no way to build sustainable ministry, it is also poor shepherding. The question is who am I training?

Leaders as a barrier

Leadership in the church is both an immense privilege and a great responsibility, as the pastoral letters and James makes very clear. So can leaders be a barrier to growth?

I think the answer is yes, and they can do so in a number of ways, but one of teh most fundamental is this. Tim 2:2 calls on leaders to be training up other leaders; "And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others." In other words Timothy train up new leaders, make yourself dispensible.

I'm not sure that we readily buy into that model of leadership. How many people are you working alongside to train up to replace you in what you are doing? As a youth leader are you training up someone to entrust the gospel and youth ministry to? As a pastor am I training up others to share the responsibility of teaching God's word to others? As home group leaders are we training up other leaders to take some of the group to plant a new group?

There are all sorts of excuses not to do it; I'm too busy to train someone up, there is nobody capable (isn't that the nature of training provided they have the character) and so on...

You can evaluate someones leadership on what they leave behind them. If it is a yawning chasm then they haven't done a very good job, if the transition is seemless then they have been a good leader.

Whilst on the subject it may be worth saying that I'm not sure our transient society helps with church growth. It takes years to build meaningful relationships which are capable of gospel purposes both in the church and outside the church. Yet so often we aren't around years. Would churches grow more if their pastor and other leaders were to serve there twenty years, or a whole ministry rather than 3-7 years? What if its members were to take the same approach - this is where God has called me and I am here until he calls me to another situation?

As leaders am I barrier to long term growth? Am I training up others to lead?

Leadership

What does a good leader look like? Is a good business leader a good church leader? Does success in whatever sphere an individual works in mean they will make a successful church leader? What does successful church leadership look like?

One of the barriers to church growth is leadership and how we answer the questions posed above as well as others will determine whether we have, or are leaders, who are a barrier to growth.

In the Bible leadership is seen in many individuals whether it is Moses, Joshua, Elijah, David, Ezra and Nehemiah or in the New Testament Jesus, Peter, or Paul. All of them have one thing in common. They all lead under God. In otherwords it is not what they think or how they evaluate success that matters, it is what God says that matters.

Their leadership is counter cultural because it is leadership that is dependent upon God. It is also counter cultural because it is a leadership that is about serving.

Mark Dever in his book has a mnemonic 'Boss' to help remember 4 aspects of Christ's leadership.
Boss - commands, makes decisions, takes responsibility, Out front - takes initiative and sets the example, Supply - equipping people with the tools needed to go out themselves, Serve - giving of oneself for those we lead.

Character before competence?

Which do you look for most in a leader? Character or competence? I know we'd ideally like both, but which most important? Which can you train and develop and which rarely changes?

I've been looking again at Mark Dever's book 'The Deliberate Church', as I've been musing over the results of the survey I mentioned yesterday. Its a great book on the church and has some good chapters on leaders, specifically elders. He gives a helpful list of what a Biblical elder is not:

• simply an older male.
• simply a successful businessman.
• simply an involved community member.
• simply a "good ol' boy."
• female (1 Tim 3:1-7 and Titus 1:5-9 assume male leadership).
• a politician.

This is then followed by what an elder is, I've picked out the following highlights. An elder is:

• a man of exemplary, Christlike character.
• a man who loves Christ and displays that love in his service of others.
• a man who holds firmly to the truths of the Bible and will stand for them.
• a man with a good reputation in the community.
• able to lead God's people by teaching them God's Word profitably.
• committed to private prayer and Bible study
• living a holy life whilst engaged with society.

A good leader is known by his character and character is vital because the elder models godliness for others. Just as Israels spiritual health rarely rose above the level of its leader so it is with the church and its leaders.

A growing concern

According to a study undertaken in Britain and published in the last 12 months 65% of free church pastors/ministers are 55 years old or over. Now that is quite a worrying statistic, even if most of those pastors delayed retiring until they were 68 or 70 that would mean that in 12-15 years time 65% of free churches would be pastor less. Now I know that there are those at the moment who are off and being trained to take on those roles, but that statistic is only for current pastors, not total number of churches. And there are a significant number of churches who are pastor-less at the moment and looking for a godly gifted man. The number being trained will not fill both gaps.

In short there is something of a leadership crisis looming in evangelical Britain. Now I am not saying that churches have to have a pastor - pastors are after all only servant leaders. Others can preach and teach better, often those within our own congregations. But I still think there are benefits of having a pastor who is set aside and provided for by the congregation so that he can devote himself to teaching God's word, pastor the people and leading the church. I know for myself I have benefited immensely from that privilege and I hope in turn my preaching of God's word has improved and been used by God for his glory in the lives of those who listen.

But the looming leadership crisis may not be just in terms of pastors. I wonder if a study on elders would yield similar results? Certainly from the churches I can think of with whom I have close contact there are not many elders under 50, and most are 60 or over. Now I am not saying we need young men instead and should oust the older leaders, we benefit greatly from the wisdom and godliness that these leaders have acquired over the course of their lives. But how do we train up young men to take their place of leadership?

Are these young men not present in our churches or is it that we do not give them enough opportunities to grow and develop? The Bible seems to teach that you will be able to recognise men already qualified and doing the work of an elder in your congregation (1 Tim 3:1-7, 5:24-25). Lifestyle and character are the key, passion, commitment and love for others and Christ are identifying marks.

Is the question where have all the young men gone? Or is it have we given young men godly examples to follow, have we sought to mould them by praying with them and studying the Bible with them?

God's word develops character as we see what the calling of discipleship truly is, as we see what the love Christ has done for us and as that knowledge compels us to live lives that glorify him and the God we serve. As we teach and preach the gospel to people and pray for their transformation through the spirit applying that word we will see evidence of those characteristics God says denotes a leader.

The statistics that worry us should cause us to fall back on our only recourse - God, his word and prayer.