The season of fall is a big focus for all churches. It sets the tone for the rest of the year. It’s a time to set vision, make clear goals, find a rhythm, and invigorate the community. It is often one of the busiest times of the year, and without careful planning it can lead to burnout.
Burnout affects almost everyone in a leadership position at some point, often at multiple times during their ministry career. Many hard workers tend to shrug it off and attempt to push through periods of high stress, anxiety, and little rest. However, burnout can have serious ramifications. Prolonged stress and exhaustion can take a toll on your body, mind, and emotions. You are more prone to mistakes in your work and may judge yourself (and others) harshly. You can drive yourself to serious illness. Burnout will also eventually trickle into your personal life, affecting your relationships, sometimes even causing lasting damage.
What you can do to prevent burnout:
In Stephen Covey’s book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, he suggests prioritizing what is important and unimportant, urgent and not urgent using four quadrants.
Quadrant I. Urgent and important: Important deadlines and crises (Must do immediately)
Quadrant II. Not urgent but important – Long-term goals and plans (Prioritize next)
Quadrant III. Urgent but not important – Distractions with deadlines (Delegate or push back)
Quadrant IV. Not urgent and not important – Distractions (Eliminate from to-do list)
While Quadrant I is full of deadlines and crises that must be dealt with immediately, most of our time should be focused on Quadrant II. This is the quadrant that looks to the future, prevents crises, and organizes what must be done. If enough attention is paid to Quadrant II, then crises (such as burnout) will become less common. As the old idiom reminds us, “The best defense is a good offense.”
Here are some tips for keeping your focus in Quadrant II:
Keep clear boundaries
Have clear communication between staff
Take a weekly sabbath to rest and make time for activities that bring joy
Take care of physical health (eat well, sleep as needed, exercise)
Take care of emotional/mental health (check in on relationships and check in with self)
Prioritize urgent and important activities and let go what can be let go
Ask for help instead of taking on too much
Reflection questions to help you avoid burnout:
Which Quadrant(s) are you in right now?
What triggers do you need to be aware of that suggest you are reaching your limit?
What practices do you need to maintain to stay in a healthy space?
What new practices do you need to adopt?
What habits do you need to break?
How will you free up time and energy to focus on new initiatives?
Who are the key people to remind you to keep healthy margins?
See our Time Management Resources to leverage your most precious resource – time. See below:
Summer is almost over and for churches across the country, this means it’s time to kick things into gear! Fall is a natural time for a reboot within your church as over the summer people have been busy with traveling and summer activities. They may have missed services or felt out of touch with their church community and disengaged from their spiritual development. As fall rolls around, your leaders are ready to fall back into a routine. The last two blogs we discussed relational and spiritual reboots, but what does a leadership reboot look like?
Engaging Your Leaders
Do you have enough leaders to launch small groups, classes, youth ministries, etc.?
Has your volunteer pool dropped over the summer?
How are you encouraging your leaders to re-engage?
Create a Leadership Community
You may already have a gathering of leaders that meet regularly or you may have a group you have worked with in the past that has taken a break over summer. Right now is a great time to regroup and bring them together to cast vision for the fall. During these meetings, a great way to inspire and engage leaders is to carefully prepare and plan for a Leadership Community. There are three elements of an impactful Leadership Community that can be explained using the acrostic VHS:
VISION: Gather all your leaders together and share the larger vision and goals of your church for the near future. Lead off this portion of the Leadership Community with a time of worship to connect with God and set the tone – listening to God. Remind everyone the work that needs to be done and why it matters.
HUDDLE: Provide a meal and enjoy each other. Break down into smaller ministry teams to allow people to connect, care for each other, and pray together. This allows personal relationships to flourish.
SKILL: Spend time training your leaders in a new skill that will relate to everyone regardless of their context, like asking powerful questions. It does not need to be in depth or last too long. Make it doable and meaningful.
Engage Your Staff
It is important to have a clear plan for the fall. Everyone on staff needs to understand the vision, know what will be the focus and the goal of the upcoming season and what their role will be in completing the goal(s). Use this opportunity to make certain everyone is pulling in the same direction. For example, it’s a good idea to meet with the entire staff at least once a quarter and to use this time to identify an area of focus with a goal behind each area, allowing that trickle down into the rest of the church.
Coaching Tip:
Challenge those leaders you coach to start and build gradually. One simple goal at the beginning will prove the value of a singular focus once real progress has been made. Once you have a successful experience, build on that and add a second goal, and a third when you are really building momentum, and perhaps a fourth after that. Beyond 3-4 goals, you risk becoming too scattered as a team and losing momentum.
A few points to keep in mind:
Take into consideration the ramp-up time for your staff staff to recruit, train and mobilize volunteers.
Establish coaching rhythms with staff (groups and individuals).
Incorporate regular opportunities to celebrate “wins”.
Practical Questions a leader could ask to reboot their team members:
When was the last time you met with your leaders to celebrate progress toward their goals?
What are the urgent areas that you need to address leading up to the fall within your leadership?
What is the best way to empower your specific leaders?
What can you do between now and the fall so that you launch strong?
Who are the most critical people you need to empower before the fall?
Who are the leaders you need to care for the most? (Who is out of the loop or struggling?
How can you celebrate the work that has been done and launch the leaders for the fall?
See our Leadership Coaching Resources to develop the leaders around you below:
It’s a full season of life for so many of us. Between work, vacations and frequent social gatherings, it’s common to feel less connected to God when our schedules are full. However, once life slows down and you find yourself back in your usual routines, it is easier to discover your spiritual rhythm as well. The more grace we can offer ourselves, the more we may find greater peace and joy when we come to the Lord.
How do you help your community reconnect to God?
3 Spaces help your people reboot their connection with God
Personal – time alone with God
Group – time together in a group
Crowd – one of many
Are all three spaces necessary all the time?
Not necessarily. In fact, there are seasons when you might do well to hit on one of these while the other two are non-existent. In the best of times, however, people need at least two of the three and in the worst of times – all three.
Rebooting the Church’s Corporate Spirituality
You are constantly thinking of ways to support and cultivate the spiritual growth within your congregation. Here are three ways to nurture the corporate gathering.
Engaging sermons that transform.
Inspiring worship that fosters connection with a loving Father.
Powerful prayer to seek the Spirit’s guidance, receive forgiveness and healing.
Rebooting Small Groups for Spiritual growth & nurture
If you drew a continuum for small group models – with a Bible Study on one end and on the other end a fellowship group – you would find that most all groups have some aspect of the following Love-Learn-Decide-Do.
Love – grow in love for God and your neighbor through the Holy Spirit
Learn – grow in your ability to discern the voice of the Holy Spirit
Decide – grow in your faith by making a commitment to apply what you learn
Do – grow in your obedience
Rebooting Your Personal Relationship with God
An individual’s relationship with God is the cornerstone of their spirituality. Without this, a person is simply going through the motions, likely with a feeling of obligation and guilt but without the love and trust that comes from a deep connection. There are two things you can do to reboot your connection with God: encourage those around you to nurture this connection, and secondly, nurture your own relationship with God.
Here are four ways to reboot your personal relationship with God:
Make time for God
You may want to spend meaningful time with God everyday, but this rarely happens naturally. Though it may feel forced at first, most people have to intentionally block out time for their spiritual formation. Whether it is three mornings a week, or thirty minutes before bed every evening… make sure you are setting aside specific time for God.
Make space for God
Some people feel closer to God outdoors. Some prefer a quiet room. Some want some gentle music. However you like to spend the time, make sure you have a place where you can focus without distractions.
Make a plan
To use this time well, most people prefer to have some sort of guide. It could be a book that directs you to daily readings and provides thought-provoking questions, or a faith based Bible reading app (Bible in One Year, You BIble, to name a few).
Make a friend
Find a person who is on the same journey as you (either in the same place or a step ahead). This can help you stay accountable and offers you both a confidante to share the joys and hardships of life and faith.
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
Fall is around the corner and with that comes a natural desire to revamp and reboot! How can you help your people get back into the rhythm of things? This usually begins with thinking about how to help people reconnect relationally after the summer.
Summer is a disruptive season for most congregations – people travel, families are in and out of town, others are simply too busy with work and the extra social events that the summer invites. In the midst of the fun, a person’s church participation and spiritual community can often suffer. Church attendance nearly always goes down in the summertime, small groups take a break, and events slow down. But it all picks back up in the fall!
Many churches are still recovering their numbers from the pandemic as people slowly make their way back to church. All this time away from the church can cause a person to question their place in the community. So how can you help people re-engage relationally? What do people need? What are they looking for from your church community?
People who want to re-engage with their church community are looking to discover the place where they belong and feel like they are part of something bigger than themselves. If they have children, they want to get their kids involved in some kind of Christian education. People are searching for meaningful ways to use their gifts and passions for the Kingdom of God through their church community.
Relaunch your church community and help people get off to a fresh start.
Events are a good way to get everyone together:
Movies in the park
Sports
Sharing meals together
This is a casual way to allow everyone to reconnect with friends and get to know visitors or other congregation members they haven’t spent much time with.
Small groups
Launch a small-group campaign: post important dates on the church calendar.
Make small groups visible – post with details about each group
Make small groups accessible – create an easy sign-up system
*Do the same for family ministries including children, youth, young adult, etc.
Service opportunities
Invite church members to take a spiritual gift assessment by appointment.
Communicate various ways to serve inside and outside the walls of the church.
Help people discover what they are passionate about and the best fit for them within the Body.
Your church will do things YOUR way. The size and environment of your church will change how you reach out, and what kind of services you offer.
3 important steps to engage your congregation:
Map out the process to involve people
Clearly communicate the vision
Make the sign up and onboarding process easy
Create a very healthy culture in all your teams and ministries so that people have an amazing experience
Share stories of how people’s lives are changed to the congregation
MOST IMPORTANT: Make sure that the people representing these events, ministries and groups are warm, welcoming and helpful!
How are YOU fostering new rhythms and relationships this fall? Share with us in the comment section!
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
One of the most important decisions you will make as a leader is who to bring onto your team. The wrong hire can cause conflict and inefficiency, whereas the right hire can multiply the fruit for your ministry!
How to make the right hire for your team
Be clear on your values
Be aware of what you are looking for in your team members
Be committed to what you don’t want
Be unwavering in your convictions of the essentials
Be patient
I have followed and studied football (American soccer) for the better part of four decades. Today the game is so sophisticated and the advent of sports science so evolved that they are able to track every move of the athletes. There are statistics on the number of kilometers run, the number of successful passess made, the number of tackles, and on and on. What interests me is when you have a player who is a high performer at one club, but is moved to another top club and does not excel like you might expect. They are not scoring like they have in the past, their movements are not in sync with their teammates, or their persona is not as confident.
How is it possible that a player will look out of place with one team and at ease in another team? The problem – poor analysis!
The decision-makers made a choice based on the data they collected, but likely without understanding how this player would interact with his/her teammates. Now they are now stuck with a player they probably paid a lot of money for that doesn’t work as well with the team. One of the highest paid athletes in the US is Loinel Messi who arrived in FC Miami for $60 million plus a percentage of sales on new Apple TV subscriptions and Adidas purchases. The point here – the team management took a bold step to bring in arguably the best player to ever walk on the planet and match his potential impact with a package that would be commensurate with the impact on the club. This was a very clear cut deal – if you get Messi, you win!
Any new hires you make will parallel this scenario on the scale at which you operate in your church or ministry. Finding the best talent for your team can be challenging and it often takes longer than you expect. But the effort is well worth the investment in time and resources.
Be objective when vetting prospective new hires; be really, really objective when hiring a friend or previous partner (be aware of your motivations, or feelings of obligations, when hiring any person)
Allow the information you collect to speak for itself; you might have a great match on skills while reading a resume, but once you interview in person, you see they have poor people skills
Do your homework before you start taking applications: have a clear job description, know the budget (or budget range) and be clear on qualifications.
Have an exit strategy in mind if this doesn’t work out. Communicate clearly about what you wish to see after they are hired. It’s often wise to have a 90-day trial before committing to hiring someone.
Be upfront with the disqualifiers; talk about what happens if lines are crossed, etc.
Questions for reflection:
What are the lessons you’ve learned in the past when I’ve hired well?
What lessons have you learned when you haven’t hired well?
Who do you know that has hired well you could learn from?
What changes do you need to make to your hiring process?
What tools can you utilize to assess prospective new employees?
Here is a tool that might help you hire well in the future – CLICK HERE
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
Have you ever heard an athlete or an actor publicly declare that they are retiring – only to change their mind? “Just kidding!” Suddenly they are back in their field, as if nothing ever happened. This happens quite often, and this fickle attitude is confusing and frustrating for the fans, even though it doesn’t affect them personally. However, a sudden change of career plans is not a practice isolated to the athletic or entertainment industries; it also happens frequently in ministry…and the results have a great impact on the congregation.
You may have worked with a church whose beloved pastor gave an inclination that a change is in the near future or a date is set for retirement, and then they change their mind. There can be panic, confusion, joy, etc. from the church body! I hate when a leader announces their plan prematurely because it can wreak havoc for the leadership, the church body, and ultimately the pastor and his/her family. “Why?” – you might ask; “Isn’t honesty the best policy!”
I grew-up in a church that did succession planning really, really well! (Read Skyline Wesleyan’s Story here.) Each pastor served for a season – a particular stage in the life-cycle of the church for which they were uniquely suited. Not surprisingly, Skyline continues to thrive today. During my time there I experienced one transition from the founding pastor to that pastor’s successor. What I remember most was how the successor honored the previous pastor’s leadership. Every year on the church’s anniversary was a highlight for me. Periodically I still visit Skyline (my dad served on the board for the first three of the four pastorates during its 80-year history). Each pastor was brought up one-by-one to the stage and honored by the congregation as they greeted each other with a big smile and embrace, stood side-by-side as they applauded their successor and worshiped God for His faithfulness. When a pastor realized it was time to move to a new mission, it was always handled with great care and never announced before the pastor was certain it was the right move, and they were ready to take the leap.
Unfortunately, this is not always how pastoral transitions occur. A plan to leave a church can easily be derailed or second-guessed, leading to much confusion. Here are some ways for you to coach a pastor if they are contemplating moving on:
Here is a common scenario:
Pre-Transition: The first stage of a transition is really about making the decision. Do they really want to (or feel led to) leave, or is it a pattern of dissatisfaction every few years, only for the feeling to dissipate after a while? A good indicator of whether the pastor is seriously considering moving on if they have told, or are thinking of telling, their family and the church board. Who should they speak to first? Who should they refrain from speaking to until the wheels are in motion? As soon as they make their declaration public, the transition has begun.
Transition: The board, the staff, and the decision makers have been informed. As soon as this happens, minds are moving in the direction of, “Now what?” They are now focused on the future. This is a good time to bring in a successor. An overlap of three to nine months can be a helpful transition phase to ease the successor into their position before the pastor leaves. Most importantly, it’s essential to understand that there is an exit plan for both the pastor and the church.
Post-Transition: As a coach, you want to make sure that your client is ready for what happens after they leave their occupation. There are a few things to consider with your client: 1) Can they provide for their family immediately? 2) Are they going to find a place where they can maximize their gifts? A move this serious should be a lateral move, if not a move closer to their mission/passion. Your client might also need support through a transition to a new job or phase of life. Sometimes a change is expected to yield immediate results, and when it doesn’t there is a knee-jerk reaction to return to a comfortable status-quo. However, all changes require adjustments and time.
Things to avoid:
Emotional Reactions: Some clients will want to inform their board, but it might be far too early or before they are set in their decision.
Temporary Urges: Some clients are reacting to a season of frustration, anger or destitution (the frustration of Covid, for example, had many pastors wondering if it was their time to move on).
Avoid asserting your agenda: This goes for your client and their next steps. As a coach, you are there to guide and advise, but you are not there to dictate their next move.
Principles to Guide the Succession Conversation
Succession is a process, not an event. Decisions of this magnitude have ramifications for a lot of people, and it will have a myriad of responses. Be prepared for the blow back and surprises that come out of this. For example, some people might even be happy the pastor is leaving, which your client might not have expected. When preparing, consider all the possibilities and how to prepare for them.
Questions for Your Reflection as the Coach
How does this fit with what you believe God is doing in your client’s life and ministry?
What has contributed to this decision?
In your mind, is this a wise move?
What does God want to do through you?
Questions to process with your client
How long have you been sitting on this?
Who have you shared this with and what was their reaction?
Have you shared it with your spouse? What was their reaction?
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
If you stay in the coaching game long enough, at some point you will coach leaders on how to deal with controversy, division in the body, and disciplinary issues. It can be a sad state of affairs when these issues hit the fan, but these issues are a part of life. As a coach, you have an opportunity to help leaders rise above the problem and take the higher ground.
Conflict in churches can range between problems with specific people or with specific ideas to clashes in philosophy of ministry to schisms between entire congregations. Some issues will be fairly black and white while many more are complex and nuanced. It is the job of a coach to see through the conflict, the tempers and the pride, to the best path forward.
As an example: imagine working with a church and a scandal takes place; a volunteer youth leader has been caught having inappropriate relationships with various members of the congregation. The news is already spreading. You receive a call from the lead pastor asking for wisdom handling the situation. The church has already called in a lawyer and has spoken with the volunteer youth leader, but the lead pastor also knows that the volunteer youth leader was beloved by the congregation, and there will be a messy fall-out of people who feel hurt and betrayed and, perhaps, even some that will come to the volunteer youth leader’s defense.
In this case, the church acted quickly and had a clear procedure to follow, which makes your job easier. However, the lead pastor and the volunteer youth leader have already exchanged a lot of angry words, before involving you, that they cannot take back. Ideally, the lead pastor would have set a boundary, refusing to relay anything but necessary information to the volunteer youth leader, while they searched for a mediator. Now, your client is seeking wisdom to undo damage that has been done, find the most peaceful resolution possible, and help the church handle the blowback.
This is when you call on your “inner coach” (or the Holy Spirit) to help you remain anchored in Him and share your wisdom through listening and asking questions. A coach does not need to respond to the impulse to give input unless explicitly asked (and only after the client has exhausted all of their resources and are at the end of their tether).
At the same time, you are invested in the life of this leader. You are empathetic. And you are concerned. What can you do and what should you avoid doing as a coach?
Principles to follow when vetting a church discipline situation:
Help your client process their emotional toll booth
Help your client gather the facts
Help your client stay anchored in Christ
Help your client find the truth
Help your client create a game plan & clarify next steps
Help your client identify people to communicate with
Help your client discern what to communicate
Help your client identify who NOT to communicate with
Help your client take responsibility
Help your client to release control
Key Questions to ask:
What is the nature of the offense?
To what degree will this have on the church community?
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
What is the right revitalization strategy for your church?
When you hear the phrase “church revitalization,” different ideas may come to mind. You might imagine new events to bolster church attendance or new programs to reinvigorate the spiritual lives of the congregation. Often, this is what is done when a church is stagnant or in decline. Events and programs are wonderful, and certainly can help reignite passion within a congregation, But they are often band-aid solutions and rarely will save a church that is truly in decline.
I want to offer four revitalization strategies that provide long-term change. Approximately 80% of congregations in the US are in need of revitalization. These churches will require more energy, are more complex, and demand more time in contrast to events or programs; but in the long run, this will serve the local congregation and its members as they pursue the mission to love God, love neighbor, and make disciples.
Before we look at what these strategies entail, however, it’s important to know where your church is in its life cycle. The life cycle of a church can be identified in 5 stages as follows:
Birth: years 1-5
Maturity: years 6-15
Plateau or Refocus to new birth and growth: years 15-50
Decline and Drop Out: years 60-80
Death or Restart: years 80+
A church life-cycle assessment you might find helpful is found in the book “Legacy Churches” in Appendix III – CLICK HERE.
Wherever a church finds itself in the life cycle stage, one constant remains: the longer a church exists, preparing for the next stage is increasingly important. If, for instance, your church is in its “maturing years” you will want to anticipate the inertia of plateaus and stimulate new ministries to reach more people, or potentially consider launching a new campus or church plant. This is easier said than done! The reality is, the vast majority of congregations have not navigated this transition well, as indicated by the statistic above.
4 Mission Critical Church Revitalization Strategies:
Reverse the Non-Growth trend – the longer the downward trend, the more complicated the solution, and the more courage, grit and perseverance are required. If a church has been in decline for a year, it will be easier to reverse the non-growth trend versus reversing the damage of a church that has been in decline for ten years. Taking action as early as possible is always preferred.
Replant to Multiply – This is an aggressive mission but offers great hope. A replant is a total overhaul of a church and requires shutting the doors to focus on revitalization before reopening. Changes may require a new pastor or a new building or a change in the way the church has systematically operated in the past.
Legacy – The most difficult part of revitalization is when a church has the honesty and humility to see that their church is in decline and recognizes that it’s time to let go. This is often true with older churches. However, this is an opportunity to gift the remaining assets to a new campus or a new church plant, paying it forward for the next generation.
Interim – This option may be especially necessary if a separation is needed between the founder and the next lead pastor(s), or if the current pastor has been in the role for a decade or more. An interim pastor can greatly assist with church transition, helping the congregation process the grief that comes with change before looking ahead to find a new lead pastor.
Before launching into a decision of this magnitude, the leadership team would benefit from seeking Christ-inspired wisdom to discern what the Holy Spirit wants them to do.
Three simple steps to understanding which strategy is right for you:
Invite the key leaders into a time of focused prayer.
Process some of the questions listed below.
Discern the best option and create an action plan.
Questions for coaching decision-makers:
How long has the church been stagnant or in decline?
What do you discern are the contributing factors causing the decline?
What do you sense God is preparing to do in this church in the near future?
Who else needs to be part of the leadership team to discern the future?
What are the risks if nothing is done?
If you are coaching a church that is considering one of the four strategies above you might find the Transition Church Coaching Guide with Storyboard a useful tool – CLICK HERE.
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
If you have ever been in a ministry leadership position, you know the impact that your board has on your mission. The board is who you turn to when decisions need to be made. They are who you rely on when you are in times of crisis or uncertainty. A board is able to provide perspective outside of your own experience. They should challenge you, inspire you, and provide valuable insight into all essential matters. Putting together and leading a board well may be the factor that accelerates or impairs your mission.
I am so grateful for my InFocus board! The complexion of our board has morphed over the last thirty years; initially, my board was extremely diverse. Over time, it became more culturally homogeneous, and has since evolved once again to be more diverse. I’ve spent a lot of time and care finding the right members for my board based on the specific mission of InFocus and, today, I want to offer some tips to help you do the same.
Clarify the purpose of your board
For the InFocus board, I have three main purposes:
Guard the Vision – I wanted people who knew and understood my vision. I needed them to support and encourage this vision and keep the mission on track. The collaboration of well-chosen people will make the vision stronger.
Wise Counsel – Even the wisest leader will have stumbling blocks and blind spots. We need the wisdom of others who can see what we miss or have experiences and skills we lack.
Financial Oversight – It is always advisable to have other eyes on the finances of a ministry. Finances may not feel like part of the mission/vision, but the mission cannot happen without smart financial decisions–and the smartest decisions happen through collaboration.
Understanding and respecting the purpose of your board will help keep the time you spend together efficient and productive. Without a clear purpose, the board, and the mission, will lack direction and can easily fall apart. So before forming a board, consider what roles the board will play in the mission.
Reflection questions to narrow your focus:
What is the function or role the board will play?
What are your primary goals for the board right now?
What long-term goals do you have for the organization?
What is your role in relation to the board?
What kind of people do you want on your board?
Observe another leader interact with the sort of board you aspire to lead
This step is super important! By observing other leaders with their boards, you will notice things you want to adopt, other things you want to avoid, and questions you will need to answer. I remember observing a friend I shared office space with lead his board. It was such an impressive, organized, and effective board meeting. I left that meeting thinking that I needed to implement what I saw. However, when I got back to my ministry it was noticeable how differently we were structured. He had a working board that met monthly so that they could help him deliver regular training events, which kept each of the 12 board members engaged and active. I tried this for a season but quickly realized the rhythms and expectations I had for my board members were different – not better or worse, just different! This was a helpful exercise to discern what I wanted my board to do and what the board was not expected to do.
Find the right people for your board
Now that you know the purpose of your board, what sort of people will help achieve your goals and stay true to your vision? What skills and experiences are needed? Some leaders may want a board to offer support and encouragement; they might seek like-minded thinkers. Others might thrive on being challenged by people they respect and will look for people who will push back and offer different opinions. I have found that the most effective board for InFocus has diversity.
When looking for diversity in your board, here are some things to consider:
Age, background and culture – My current board now consists of men and women ranging in age, ethnicity and cultural background: Dr. S has diverse professional background in technology and ministry and speaks four languages; Traco Matthews is a social justice activist; and Willita Sanguma is the Founder and Executive Director for The Lobiko Initiative, a nonprofit organization that identifies, invests, and partners with individuals and grassroots organizations in economically marginalized communities. If you want to learn more about the InFocus Board – CLICK HERE.
Theological orientation – This will depend on the purpose of the board and the goals of the mission. If you are creating a board for the ministry in the community in which you serve, it makes sense to have a board representative of that demographic. Are you working in a community with diverse ideologies? You may want to recruit a board from multiple denominations and philosophies to speak for the people of this community. However, if you are strictly working with a single denominational group, you will probably want a majority of your board members who belong to this denomination.
Skill sets / Experience – I have had so many incredible people on my board that have offered unique skills. Just a few examples: Linda Miller has experience coaching in the corporate world; Jeff Spout is a school superintendent; Steve Hart is an accountant by training. All of these people have brought their specific skills to help support and grow InFocus into what it is today.
Personality types – When creating a board, it is helpful to understand how each individual operates and what they offer personally. Are they a peace-maker or a challenger? Are they open-minded or close-minded? Are they an idealist or a pragmatist? Do they think in terms of the big picture or are they detail-oriented? A board filled with stubborn challengers will struggle to accomplish anything when they disagree. Conversely, a board may become stagnant without anyone to challenge ideas.
Expertise – One of the areas I wanted to grow in my leadership was to initiate and grow an affiliate status with like-minded leaders who wanted to grow their coaching and training platforms. With that in mind, I approached a previous client who had done this in a previous ministry. David McDaniel is the founder of the Northpoint Partnership Group and helped me create InFocus Affiliates in a way that honors the mission of the organization while serving the affiliate. David had unique experience that I gleaned and helped me advance the vision I had for affiliates.
Deciding on the Degree of Board Involvement
This is perhaps the most important decision you need to make about your board. Among the five board types below, which does your board align with most along a continuum of least to most involved?
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
There will always be voices that rise above the din in Christianity and those voices will attract large congregations. The larger the influence the more likely a coach is involved.
A current opinion in American Christian circles is that the age of the megachurch is waning or even over. With the platform growing beyond the pulpit and onto streaming and social media, the truth is there will always be a megachurch and chances are it will go global.
Should ‘Megachurch’ be the goal? No. The work of making disciples is personal. For every Mega Pastor there are thousands of men and women in the trenches making huge contributions to the Kingdom on a seemingly small stage.
Perspective on Global Church Growth
The top 10 largest churches globally range from 65,000 in worship attendance and peak at 480,000 (Yoido Full Gospel Church in South Korea). It is fascinating that with all the sophistication of the American church, not one is located in the US. The top 10 largest congregations are located in Nigeria, India, Indonesia, Korea, and the Philippines.
For perspective, the largest church in America is North Point at 35,000 in Apharetta, GA.
What do you know about really large churches in America?
0.5% – While almost 10% of Protestant church goers attend a megachurch (2,000+ in weekly worship attendance), these churches represent only about half of one percent of the roughly 320,000 Protestant churches that exist in the United States.
Why do American churches hit a lower attendance ceiling?
This is obviously a loaded question. The answer would involve a grocery list of complex issues. However, one issue stands out that negatively impacts the health of the church in America. Based on research from Natural Church Development America, the #1 health restricting area is Empowering Leadership.
How many leadership books do you have on your bookshelf? It is ironic that we have so much information and knowledge on leadership yet the American church trails the rest of the world in church growth. We can justify this with very reasonable explanations but the fact remains – our largest churches are a fraction of the size when compared to the global landscape.
Considerations when coaching really large church pastors:
When coaching a large church lead pastor there are some unique considerations that are worth investing time and energy into if you are motivated to coach clients in this arena.
Know yourself
This might seem obvious. You have a certain comfort level. If you are comfortable working with clients who lead 500-member churches and you are content; keep working with leaders of this caliber. If you aspire to work with larger churches then you might want to consider the following.
Consider the type of church leader you gravitate towards. The leaders might be of a certain theological persuasion, a particular context, or style. The clearer you are on who you are uniquely gifted to coach the more aware you will be when you encounter leaders of your tribe.
Key Question:
What are the common denominators that cause you to gravitate towards certain leaders?
Become a subject expert
What are the common needs really large churches share? Based on the NCD research, Empowering Leadership is an issue that creates a ceiling for the majority of congregations in the US. The question then for you is, how can you increase your ability to coach leaders in this area?
Consider doing a deep dive on an aspect of leadership development. For really large churches, hiring the right staff member is mission critical. So much is on the line – time, money, opportunity. One resource that helps in the hiring process is the Harrison Assessment. You probably have your own “go-to” resources. Become well-versed in that area and be ready to offer your services in your area of expertise.
Key Question:
What leadership topics do large churches face that you resonate with and have expertise?
Specializations for coaching really large churches:
Leadership Development
Staffing
Supervision
Change Management
Succession planning
FInd opportunities to connect
Really large church pastors flock together. Like the statistics reveal, the median church in the U.S. has 75 regular participants in worship. Currently there are 1,750 megachurches in the United States, according to church lists compiled by Leadership Network.
Therefore, the leader of a church of 2,000 or more in weekly worship attendance is a unicorn in the American church landscape.
“Excellence, choices, openness to change, low pressure seeker environments, being multicultural, creating a full-service family support system, church planting, faith-based holistic ministries and providing R&D to the broader church” are distinctives that draw like-minded leaders of very large churches together and forge bonds.
It makes sense and is a not-well-kept secret that large church pastors network with other large church pastors.
Key Question:
How and where do lead pastors of really large churches gather?
10 myths to debunk about very large churches:
Bigger is Better
Driven by the lead pastor’s ego
Hyper-focused on numbers
Building-centric
Should be the goal of every leader
Autonomous to a fault
Water-down the gospel
Run like a corporation
Get’s all the attention
Big dog!
Reflection questions to grow your ability to coach very large church pastors
How can you build your track record to gain credibility?
How are you growing in your knowledge of large church culture?
Who do you know that coaches pastors of very large churches?
How can you connect with the kind of leaders you want to coach?
Historically, what size church are you comfortable coaching?
Which phase of the growth cycle are you most authentically effective?
Do you want to take your team on the disciple-making journey together? The Discipleship Collective helps you mobilize other disciple makers. Take the Disciple Maker Quiz to discover the habits in which you are excelling and the growth points on which you need to focus. Then invite other members of your team to join you. It’s FREE and you can use it as often as you like!
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