Tag Archive - church

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Tearing Down Imaginary Fences

Sunday, July 30, 2017

Have you ever thought to yourself or even said out loud, “we could never do that,” at our church? Maybe you don’t think your denomination would allow it, or your pastor wouldn’t allow it, or your church board wouldn’t allow it. Maybe you feel as though there are too many road blocks to change and you feel helpless or hopeless.

What I’ve found is that many church leaders are living within imaginary fences that they’ve constructed in their minds through either assuming the worst or building an entire reality in their minds based on one (or a couple) of bad experiences.

The truth is, you probably have more leeway to implement change at your church than you think. Here’s how…

Find the Yes

Stop looking for the no…find the yes. It’s easy to go negative and keep your eyes and mind on everything you can’t do. Anyone can to that, it takes no work, energy or leadership. Being solution oriented on the other hand is rare. I guess that’s why real leadership is rare too. You’ll find what you’re looking for.

Focus on Growth Not Change

Every change you make is a criticism of the past, and no one likes to be criticized. So, focusing on or even talk about change in an anti-change environment is a recipe for disaster. Instead focus on growth, helping people spiritually grow and join Jesus on His mission to help people know Him and follow Him. You cannot follow Jesus and stay where you are. This is true personally and organizationally. So focus on growth and change will happen.

Assume the Best and Clarify

What if instead of assuming the worst about your denomination, your pastor or your church board you assumed the best and then clarified? What if you changed all of that self-talk and chose to believe that these were all people who cared about people meeting Jesus and following Jesus?

Stop talking about what’s Wrong

Words create worlds. Language builds culture. You may have a negative culture on your church team because you’ve been speaking negatively about your denomination, pastor or church board. Take personal ownership for your attitude and your words, and how they’ve contributed to the problem. And…you actually may have some sin to confess in there somewhere.

Promote the Gospel not a Method

Stop worrying about a particular ministry program, method or approach you want to take and start focusing on the Gospel. Your ministry program or method isn’t going to change the world, Jesus will. And all of us know that methods come and go. That method you love today is going to be stale in the future and someone is going to feel the same way about it that you do about old methods you’re trying to change.

Want to learn more about changing your church? Here’s a couple of posts will help you:

Posted in Leadership

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The Power of Showing Up

Tuesday, July 25, 2017

There is incredible power in simply showing up. This is true in parenting, it’s true in coaching, it’s true in teaching, and it’s true in leadership. Over the years I’ve observed many church leaders who overestimate the potential of a pivotal moment and underestimate the power of faithfully showing up every day. When you show up daily, your leadership ends up showing up over time.

While there are some moments in leadership that matter more than others, one of the things that separates good leaders from great leaders is that they show up and approach every moment with the same vigor. So here are 5 principles of how great leaders show up every day:

Moments are more important than a Moment

Your most meaningful relationships, trust, culture, and influence. While all of them can be destroyed in a moment, none of them are built in a moment but in a series of moments over an extended period of time.

Follow Through

Never underestimate the power of following through and doing what you said you were going to do. Delivering on time and on target on mundane everyday deliverables will take you further than you think.

Missed Opportunities

Leadership can be a lot like sports and life; you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. Most opportunities are missed in life because people don’t show up and take them.

The Next Right Thing

Sometimes you need to stop worrying about the next big thing and just do the next right thing. It may be less glamorous, it may seem like it won’t get you as far as fast as you want to go, but it will help you build the necessary character, discipline, and practices that will get you there.

Faithfulness

Be faithful with what you’ve been given and you’ll probably be given more. If you’re familiar with the Bible you’re probably familiar with this principle. Don’t underestimate the power and faithfulness that comes from showing up every day.

Posted in Leadership, Spiritual Formation, Staffing

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7 Lessons from a Sr. Pastor Succession Plan that Worked

Sunday, July 23, 2017

In 2014, I had a front row seat to the handoff of senior leadership of a multi-mega church from one Lead Pastor to another. Serving on the Executive Team at that time I had the privilege of having a behind the scenes view to the whole thing, start to finish.

Scott Ridout, who now serves as the President of Converge Worldwide a movement of over 1,300 churches that have joined together to start and strengthen churches, served in leadership at Sun Valley Community Church for 16 years before handing it off to Chad Moore who now serves as the Lead Pastor.

Both are fantastic leaders and even better men. Now a couple of years removed from leading through that transition with them there are a few things that stand out to me that made the transition successful. If your church will be going through a leadership transition in the future you may want to keep these principles in mind.

Hired from the Inside

Chad had joined the staff at Sun Valley back in 2004 and had already been on the team for 10 years when this transition happened. When you like the culture that you have you hire from the inside, when you want to change the culture you hire from the outside.

Public and Private Trust

As a result of leading together up close and over time trust had been built with 4 unique and important audiences. The church body, the staff, the board, and of course trust had been built between Chad and Scott. That public buy-in and private trust provided a foundation for the transition to succeed.

Reflection of our Culture

Due to his tenure at Sun Valley, Chad embodied the culture we were trying to create. If we had hired someone from the outside it would have marked a change in culture and with it a period of turmoil.

A High Capacity Leader is Essential

While both men are fantastic leaders, they are different leaders. But they are both high capacity leaders. While gifted uniquely they both have a high capacity. When there’s a new leader you don’t want people hoping that they’ll grow into the role. We didn’t have to worry about that in this case.

The Right Timing

The best time to make a baton handoff is at full speed. The best time to make change in a church is when you have momentum. Sun Valley had just gone multisite 3 years prior to this succession and was (and still is today) experiencing new growth.

A Clear Next Step for the Exiting Pastor

Scott had a very clear calling in all of this to become the next President of Converge. Without a clear next step for the exiting Sr. Pastor this would have gone completely different.

Humility

I could have easily led with this one. Humility was the chief characteristic that provided the right environment for the transition to be as successful as it was. Both men chose to do what was best for the church at every juncture in the process rather than grasp for power, prestige, preference or position.

If you want to learn more about succession planning for Sr. Pastors or need help with one at your church, I’d recommend my friend William Vanderbloemen to you. To learn more you can check out an interview I did with him about his book Next: Pastoral Succession that Works

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

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New Coaching Networks from the Unstuck Group

Tuesday, July 18, 2017

One thing is true of strong church leaders: they fight for healthy growth.

Are you willing to explore beyond your ministry routines to discover the strategies that will help you lead your church at a higher level?

This fall, we invite you to take your next steps with a community of like-minded church leaders. In our new Leadership Coaching Networks, you’ll learn best practices from healthy, growing churches and begin applying them in your church environment from day one.

In October, Tony Morgan and ministry consultants from The Unstuck Group will host 3 coaching networks designed to help you engage the strategies you will need to fight for healthy growth within your church:

The Unstuck Church: Reaching 1,000 Coaching Network

Clarify what’s working and what’s not to define the best action plan to support health. This network is designed to help you move from reaching hundreds to reaching 1,000 in attendance by clarifying what’s working and what’s wrong, defining an action plan for next steps, and establishing a staffing and ministry structure that supports growth and health.

The Unstuck Church: Growing Beyond 2,000 Coaching Network

Discover how to address leadership development,discipleship and more through healthy growth engines. This network will help you develop strategies to tackle the unique challenges of larger churches including leadership development, staffing, communications, discipleship and establishing healthy growth engines.

Multisite Leadership Coaching Network

Learn the best strategies for leading and growing a multisite church. This experience will set you up to more effectively lead a growing, multisite church. We will help you navigate Common Pitfalls in Multisite, Refining Your Model, Clarifying How You Structure and Operate, Best Practices for Launching a Campus, Managing the Tension (Central vs Campus), and more!

We have space for just 7 churches in each network — and, we’re offering $1,000 off registration to the first 4 churches who register for each! Check out the details to decide if this is the right next step for you.

Posted in Leadership

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How to Fund the Strategic Plan at your Church

Tuesday, July 11, 2017

Talking with the leadership team at your church about money can be tough. Changing the way you spend it is even harder.

If you have a strategic plan you’re working with your leadership team to implement, it’s important to start a healthy conversation about finances to effectively navigate this touchy subject together.

Every day, you and your team make decisions about how to allocate your funds. You decide which aspects of your ministry are critical to your growth, and which can be cut. Your church’s future–and the fate of your strategic plan–will be greatly influenced by how you direct your resources.

It isn’t unusual for a church to create a strategic plan, then fall short of actually funding it. The leadership team might work together beautifully to create a strong plan and commit to working it, but too often, they find themselves locked into ineffective or foolish budgeting patterns. Eventually, they might find that their vision is only partially funded…or they might set it aside altogether.

That’s why at the Unstuck Group we’ve created Funding Your Strategic Plan, a practical guide full of insights and conversations that will help you and your team assess your church’s budget with a critical eye,  develop an effective, vision-minded budget around your growth engines, and change the way you and your staff direct your available resources.

Funding Your Strategic Plan will help you dissect the types of expenses in your plan, identify missing links and hidden dollars, and learn the difference between wise and foolish budgeting. We’ll teach you the ropes of Zero-Based Budgeting and show you how to utilize your existing assets to generate extra income for your church. You’ll also learn how to talk about money to your congregation, increase their generosity, and get started with a capital campaign.

Ready to dig in? You can get a copy of Funding Your Strategic Plan in the TonyMorganLive.com store,

Posted in Leadership
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