leadership in church – Page 2

7 Top Tips for growing Messy Church

It’s a common story. Regular guests at Messy Church are making little or no progress towards becoming more involved in the life of the whole church, and if a growing church is the aim – then Messy Church isn’t working. Many church leaders are now stuck with bacon sandwiches and crafts once a month and are desperately asking: what’s next?\r\n\r\nThere is a key mistake in the way we think of Messy Church.\r\n\r\nTo put it simply, we need to stop seeing Messy Church as an introductory church programme designed to bring people to another, more important programme called ‘Main Church’. And it follows that we need to stop treating guests as attendees in an organization and start treating them as family members in a family.\r\n\r\nWith that in mind, here are my seven top tips for taking Messy Church to the next level.\r\n\r\n1 Appoint a pastor. The pastor will be the focal point for developing a strong community within Messy Church. It may be a member of the clergy or it could be an experienced lay person. It might be a great role for an experienced couple. Whoever it is, the pastor needs lots of time to be the pastor and take responsibility for the welfare and concern of their flock, a flock which may be made up mainly of people who don’t go to church. A word on gender: the pastor could be male or female, but consideration should be given to how to engage the fathers and grandfathers who come with mothers and children and just read the papers. My observation is that fathers are usually much less comfortable at Messy Church.\r\n\r\n2 Localise the goals. As long as the goal is to move ‘attendees’ from one programmed event to another event of some perceived greater importance, then leading Messy Church will tend to be impersonal and remote. Instead, set growth goals local to the group. Are friendships growing across the group, do people know each other better this year than last, do they care for each other? What is the quality of community we are building? Have we pitched our worship at an appropriate level to move on their discipleship? Focus on growth that is possible within the group this year.\r\n\r\n3 Make it personal. Encourage community growth by creating opportunities for people to really get to know each other. Plan times where families can share BBQs, go for walks on Bank Holidays, babysit for each other, learn the names of each other’s children. We say it but don’t believe it: most people need to belong before they believe. In patient parish ministry we weave a community together over a long time, and the richness of this work depends on our ability to step outside the church walls. In this work Messy Church is a gift. It gives us an natural, fresh opportunity to deepen the quality of our community, but it only happens when people are in close proximity for extended periods of time.\r\n\r\n4 Be personally vulnerable. If Top Tip 3 is Make it Personal, the next has to be make it personal – to you. This is possibly the hardest thing do. In general church leaders want Messy Church to grow through organization and they really, really don’t want to commit to a new set of deep relationships. There simply isn’t time. But the reality is that the true cost of effective leadership is not in organizing a well run event – that’s easy. The real cost is in the time it takes to become friends. If you never allow people to cross your own personal thresholds then you can never grow a church of deep and high quality community. It’s tough. It’s not only time consuming, it places demands on the whole family, and it can be the source of personal pain and disappointment. But it is an important key to growing Messy Church. Pick leaders who will make leading Messy Church their sole ministry, and be clear about the sacrifice required – in personal time, friendships and church attendance.\r\n\r\n5 Be clear about identity. Rather than hoping to surreptitiously slide people from Messy Church to Main Church, be clear about the identity and limitations of Messy Church. Say up front that Messy Church is a great opportunity for whole families to take part in a simple act of worship, but that it’s only one small part of what mature Christ-followers do. Promote church events. Talk up teaching programmes being used across the church. Invite people to opportunities for deeper worship, for family ministry, for discipleship. Help people see that they belong (not just attend) to something with a clear identity, but which is part of something bigger and richer.\r\n\r\n6 Challenge personal growth. Also be clear about the call and expectations of every Messy Church member in the light of the gospel. Just as we would encourage every-member ministry in the Main Church, so we should create opportunities for personal growth at Messy Church. Ask people to read out loud, to invite their friends to special events, take part in service planning, even to pray in public. We have to create opportunities for the group to serve each other.\r\n\r\n7 Integrate with the whole church. A strong identity allows Messy Church to stand-alone so that people can belong, but we should then create clear opportunities to join and serve the larger church community. This may mean joining in significant acts of worship or other community events, or taking part in leading some aspect of whole-church life, perhaps helping organize a family day or the Christingle service or the summer fair. Plan integration carefully to make sure it happens.\r\n\r\nAll these tips come down to one main point about dedicated leadership in Messy Church:\r\n

Leading Messy Church should be the most important ministry for those that do it. It cannot be a clip-on ministry playing second fiddle to something more important.

\r\nWill it work? I have grown house groups, Alpha courses, nurture groups, pastorates and churches, and all of the above tips have played a key part in every group that’s grown.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nWritten over two weeks in various places, finished in Neros Clifton

From Fisherman to Shepherd – Peter’s New Commission

In John chapter 21 the story is told of Peter fishing when he should have been waiting for Jesus. With the death of Jesus and the uncertain state of affairs Peter faced a key question: What was he meant to do with his life? Was he really meant to go back to fishing?\r\n\r\nJesus answered the question for him. Peter was to change vocation – from fisherman to shepherd.\r\n\r\nIt’s interesting that at the beginning of his ministry Jesus called Peter and said “you’re a fisherman, I’ll make you a fisher of men.”\r\n\r\nBy the end of his ministry Jesus said to Peter, “I’m a shepherd, now you be a shepherd.”\r\n\r\nIn the first case, Jesus, who wasn’t a fisherman, worked with what Peter could offer – his natural skills and training as an expert fisherman. That’s good leadership on Jesus’ part – recognising natural gifts and using them as an entry into ministry.\r\n\r\nBut Jesus didn’t leave him there.\r\n\r\nJesus offered Peter the opportunity to do something he had never done before, a new purpose in an area where Peter didn’t have outstanding natural abilities.\r\n\r\nThis time Jesus was the expert and Peter was the novice.\r\n\r\nIn the church we love people with expertise. We generally think that anyone with a natural ability will be able to keep using that skill to ‘keep the show on the road’. But Jesus’ doesn’t just want our expertise. He wants us to reach a point where he can say right, now take on something that’s not so natural, something you will have to grow into.\r\n\r\nIt might be praying for people to be healed. It might be developing a prophetic gift, or going out on a mission team. It might mean leaving the comfort of working in area where your natural competence brings you satisfaction and even recognition and the pride of a job well done. You never know, it might mean becoming a shepherd.\r\n\r\nThe abilities Peter needed to fulfil this new vocation were latent in him waiting to be developed (and quickly – the church was about to be born in a dramatic fashion) but he had the same three teachers that we have today to help him.\r\n

He had the model of Jesus to examine and reflect upon.

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He would also have the Holy Spirit within him guiding him.

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And he would have his fellow Christians to support and help him.

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\r\nSo, are you looking for new purpose or direction? Peter’s story reminds us that when Jesus gives us a new purpose we shouldn’t assume it’s something we know about or have done before.

A Measurement Scale of Achievement

I LOVE the crazy words of Tom Peters (sometimes? often? not sure) like this scale of 1 to 10 on the value of things we do,\r\n\r\nwhere 1 is pretty worthless\r\nand 10 is pretty extraordinary.\r\n\r\nIt goes like this:\r\n\r\nGive it a 1 – it pays the rent but nothing else\r\nGive it a 4 – we do something of value\r\nGive it a 7 – it’s pretty damn cool (and definitely subversive)\r\nGive it 10 – we aim to change the world.\r\n\r\nThe measure of success is: Does It Take Your Breath Away\r\n\r\nAs this is Tom Peters it’s backed up with a few poster sized quotations from stars:\r\n\r\n“Astonish me” said choreographer Seigei Diaghivev\r\n“Build Something Great” said Nintendo’s Hiroshi Yamanchi\r\n“Make It Immortal” said David Ogilvy\r\n\r\nHow to achieve it in others?\r\n\r\n“Reward Excellent Failures: Punish Mediocre Successes”\r\n… said Phil Davik in the Tom Peters Seminar

G.L.A.D. – A church near you?

At a conference I attended recently one of the speakers – going ‘off piste’ from his subject of The Environment – started musing openly about various facets of church life, increasing in confusion until he finished with ‘…but what is church anyway?’.

“For goodness sake, is it really that complicated?” I thought, as I do so often nowadays when people pontificate in confusion on this subject.

Anyway, I have my own mnemonic for the simple definition of an effective church, which is G.L.A.D. – being

G – gathered in worship, praise and prayer

L – learning together from experience and scripture

A – active in witness and service inside and outside the church

D – distinctive as a community – living well in difficult times.

So, how do you become an effective church leader?

Keep it simple and focus on these few key essentials of an effective church.

(… closely related to ‘The Big Four of Discipleship’)

Sowing and Reaping

Many of us experience times when we feel we are not sowing spiritual seeds for a future harvest.\r\n\r\nThis is not about times when we are resting, or when we have stepped out of our everyday routines to gain some perspective. During these times it’s right to hold back and find new energy and direction.\r\n\r\nInstead, this is about the times when we have energy, capacity, and capability … but no opportunity, usually to due to circumstances outside our control.\r\n\r\nLeaders in ministry often experience this, but the problem is not exclusive to leaders. In fact, leaders often have more opportunity and power to change and improve their own circumstances than most people.\r\n\r\nNo, this situation could apply to anyone of us.\r\n\r\nThe solution?\r\n\r\nThe best advice I’ve heard recently is from Pete Davies – church consultant and friend:\r\n

“When you can’t sow into your own field, then sow into someone else’s field\r\nand help them bear a harvest”

\r\n … and then you can do what Pete suggests:\r\n

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant”

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When pruning means cutting growth

We started a new ministry two years ago.

It was popular. It was reasonably well attended.

But after one year we cut the programme.

Why? Because although it had grown, our detailed analysis revealed some interesting facts.

First, although the event had grown its growth was mainly due to people who would have gone to any number of events that were reasonably accessible, reasonably competently run, and populated with people they knew.

Second, it was an inclusive, welcoming environment, and people of all ages and abilities came and worked together on great projects. However, that highlighted the difficulty of bringing established congregation members into something they perceived as too creative and out of the ordinary.

Consequently, and third, the church in which this event was hosted never got behind the programme. In other words (or in our words) the event was not renewing the people we wanted to renew.

So our event was inclusive, and welcoming, and creative, and accessible, and, to an extent, growing. But it was unsustainable. And it was taking a considerable amount of our available leadership resources.

And so we cut it when it seemed to be in its prime. It was sad, but we needed the resources for something more effective.

Anyone who’s pruned roses knows the problem. Roses need pruning in the spring to prepare for growth, and then fast growing suckers need to be removed once the growth starts so energy isn’t drained form the main plant, and they need dead-heading, and they need pruning at the end of the season. All this if they are to reach their best.

In other words, to get a beautiful rose all season the plants need to be pruned surgically and often, from before the beginning until after the end of the growing season.

The only time roses aren’t pruned is in the winter when everything is dead.

And that’s probably true of some churches too.

Creativity – the No1 Skill of the Future

The graphic below was taken from the IBM 2012 Global CEO Study (for the full page on Creativity check it out here or download the study itself here).

The graphic speaks for itself.

Perhaps those of us who have clipped other skills on to our core skill of Creativity will find it easier to move forward in the increasingly compressed and difficult world ahead?

Embrace Creativity if you have it. Get it if you don’t. Or get near people who have it if you can’t get it.

Connected blog … here

Graphic taken from the IBM 2012 Global CEO Study

Six Words for a Simple Plan

It’s great to hear a church leader speak confidently and clearly about the aims of their denomination.\r\n\r\nSo it was this morning, when Chris James, Pastor of Vintage Community Church in Portishead, Bristol and Weston-Super-Mare, told us about the aims of the Assemblies of God churches in Britain.\r\n\r\n”We are Apostolically Led, Relationally Connected and Missionally Focused.” he said.\r\n\r\nThat’s it.\r\n\r\nSix words giving a simple and yet dynamic purpose for 600 churches.\r\n\r\nMemorable. Transferable. Legible.\r\n\r\nDefined but with enough scope to allow freedom of thought.\r\n\r\nIs that your church?\r\n\r\nIs that you?\r\n\r\nIf not, try it. Write a six word, memorable, legible, dynamic purpose for yourself or your church.

Desktop Leadership

Reading a book on leadership doesn’t make you a leader any more than reading a book on painting makes you a painter.\r\nIt’s all worked out in the doing.\r\n\r\nLearning to paint is a good analogy. At first its slow going with many disappointments. This blue doesn’t go with that red, this paint doesn’t sit easily on that paper. And when the first painting is finished it can be an embarrassment. It’s hard to believe that one day a beautiful painting will be possible.\r\n\r\nIsn’t that like the beginnings of an inexperienced leader? Launching into a new situation with plenty of theory under the belt but not enough experience, or the wrong sort, can lead to embarrassing situations and missed opportunities.\r\n\r\nWhat’s lacking is the intuitive element that grows through experience, the confidence to handle new situations not found in books.\r\n\r\nIt’s not wrong to be as prepared as possible. Only don’t think that all the information gained from a desktop study can be a substitute for facing the matter head on.\r\n\r\nSo. Inexperienced. Exposed. Inadequate. At sea. Embarrassed?\r\n\r\nBe thankful! For that’s experience, and that’s where intuitive leadership comes from.

A Robust Strategy for Youth Work

After nearly four years of trying and not succeeding to establish a strong youth work we need a new direction.\r\n\r\nCollaboration across churches is the way forward, but it’s hard enough trying to work with a handful of leaders in one church let alone twenty or more leaders across six churches in four parishes. Recognising the need doesn’t always overcome parochial interests.\r\n\r\nWhat’s needed is a clear structure that limits uncertainty and allows, even compels, leaders to buy into it because it’s so possible and so obvious it would be churlish not to.\r\n\r\nThe key words to describe it will probably have to include simple, multi-level, accessible, empowering, flexible yet strong.\r\n\r\nThis is my offering. let’s see how it goes down tonight!\r\n\r\nTo zoom in further click here\r\n\r\n