|
|
Friends and Colleagues,
Calvin and Hobbes last cartoon was on December 31,
1995. Calvin and his tiger friend Hobbes
carry a toboggan across a beautiful snowy landscape.
Calvin begins:
"Wow, it really snowed last night. It's really wonderful."
Hobbes: "Everything familiar has
disappeared. The world looks brand
new."
Calvin: "A new year.
A clean fresh start."
Hobbes: "It's like having a big white sheet of paper to
draw on."
Calvin: "A day full of possibilities. It's a magical world, Hobbes, old buddy!"
Off they slide - and Calvin concludes "Let's go
exploring."
As we enter the new year, in one sense it's the same old,
same old. Yet we follow a Lord who
declares that "I make all things new!"
My question to you is "how is God renewing you? What opportunities and challenges do you
face? How might you change and
grow? What do you envision for your
church? your self? your family?
friends? How does life seem to be
beckoning you? What doors seem to be
opening?
I would welcome the opportunity to help you sort through
such questions and make new commitments and develop a plan to go exploring in
the wonderful world we have been given.
Please think of friends who you think might benefit from this newsletter and send it to them using the "Forward to a Friend" button on the newsletter.
Have a blessed Christmas and a new year that is full of new
opportunities!
Peace,
Bob
|
|
How Are You Doing? Part 2 - More reflection on Appraisals - the importance of mutuality
Last month I wrote about the importance of having a good
appraisal system in your church. After reading it, a
friend and mentor, Ed White, Senior Consultant with Alban Institute, called and
waved a yellow flag.
"Bob," he said, "I have seen and worked with pastors who
have been badly hurt by arbitrary appraisals in their churches. Appraisals need to be of the whole system,
not just the pastor as a hired hand." He
described how sometimes a lay leader on a personnel committee would do a simple
adaptation of an appraisal instrument from a company. Such an instrument rarely applies to a
pastor and church.
He's right, of course.
In my article, I intended to emphasize the importance of having an
appraisal system that is mutually developed and based on being in a community
of faith. Such an appraisal needs to be
guided by the church's mission and vision, its sense of God's unique call for
that church.
Coupled with this is a norm that lay leaders bear
responsibility to grow in their own spiritual life and learn to be spiritual
leaders. A leadership quality that
serves a leader in a secular field might not be particularly helpful for a
church leader. I recall a trial attorney
who used skills that worked well in the courtroom as he tried to lead fellow
church members; these skills were counterproductive.
A generation ago, many (perhaps most) churches could count on having
a number of wise elders who understood what it meant to lead a church. I think of any number of such leaders in
congregations I served in the late '60's and into the '80's. But no more.
Many churches have leaders who are new to that congregation, perhaps
even new to faith.
So who will lead and train them to become spiritual
leaders? I contend that the pastor is
the primary person to do this. If the
pastor doesn't lead, then a church is in trouble. And so the pastor will also lead the lay
leaders in their understanding of respective roles and responsibilities.
There are many resources that help a pastor do this. There are many ways. What's important is that the pastor shape the
process, drawing out the best from the lay leaders.
One such resource is How
to Get Along with Your Pastor - Creating Partnership for Doing Ministry, by
George B. Thompson, Jr. He does a good
job of helping leaders think about the not so obvious adaptive problems that
require systemic changes in attitude and perception. I describe another one below.
If you would like help in reflecting on your church's
system, its leaders, and its possibilities, I'd be glad to coach you. Get in touch.
|
Resources - a new column - books and other resources that have been helpful
Five Practices of
Fruitful Congregations by Robert Schnase.
Robert Schnase, Bishop of the United Methodist Church's Missouri
Conference, has done a terrific job of condensing a lot of the research on
church vitality into this slim volume (144 pages).
The practices are:
Intentional faith
development
Risk-taking mission and
service
The book is short enough that most officers and leaders will readily read it. I have used it with Mission Study teams. A pastor friend used it over several weeks,
preaching on each practice and organizing small group study on the practices
over successive weeks.
It's a really
good introduction to what helps make for vital congregations. Old timers are challenged. New members are pressed to grow beyond
whatever drew them to their particular congregation to a bigger picture.
Use your internet search engine and you'll find any number
of supplementary resources that go with this.
Enjoy! Grow your leadership and
church!
What books or resources have you found especially helpful? I'd be glad (with available space) to share your suggestions.
|
|
Future Issues (monthly)
- A Do-It-Yourself 360 Feedback Approach
- Discerning a Mission and Vision
- Using a Coaching Approach in Leading
|
|
I hope you have found this newsletter informative and helpful. Please subscribe to continue receiving it (or unsubscribe to stop). If you'd like to explore coaching, please email or call me.
If you have found it helpful, please forward it to friends who you think would appreciate it. (And please use the forward button on the newsletter itself.) For every friend who subscribes to the newsletter, I'll give you 45 minutes of free phone coaching.
|
Bob
Robert Harris
Harris Coaching and Consulting
|
|
|
