Browsing Tag

church

Leadership

5 Counterintuitive leadership habits

confused

Leaders often struggle with questions of “Am I effective?” or “Why isn’t this working?” in the course of their leadership. Organizational leaders and pastors are often plagued with such questions because unlike their for-profit counterparts, non-profit leaders often work with very limited resources of people and money.

Forbes gives business leaders “5 Counterintuitive Habits Of Truly Authentic Leaders” that transfer easily to congregations. Maseena Zieglar writes:

We live in an era in which increasingly, leaders who are authentic, and who translate this into shared value for their people, whether shareholders or stakeholders, employees, customers or constituents, are the ones who have true and lasting impact – ultimately making the world a better place to live in. Striving for authenticity in leadership is the new kind of success to aspire to, and may well one day be the measure by which some aspects of performance are evaluated.

Zieglar states that the following five qualities are effective for authentic leaders:

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Leadership

Beware of the Backfire Effect

backfire

“Daddy long-leg spiders are one of the most poisonous spiders but their fangs are too short to bite humans.” “All vaccines are deadly to all children.”  You may heard those statements, but those statements are not true. Despite facts that disprove popular myths, some folks dig in further into their beliefs. That is called the Backfire Effect.

The term Backfire Effect was first used and documented by Brendan Nyhan and Jason Reifler. They sought to study the interaction of people’s false benefits with counter credible evidence, which in turn further solidifies their misguided belief.  Nyhan and Reifler tracked how corrections to false beliefs actually increase misconceptions among the group or person in question.

Often, the Backfire Effect is studied in the field of politics, but the Backfire Effect happens in the churches. Leadership in the local church need to be able to identify and respond to the Backfire Effect.

Churches experience the Backfire Effect when congregants assume facts or completely ignore the reality of a situation. In turn they label others as “wrong” or “right”. This in turn can create a culture of “us” versus “them”.

It is easy for church folk to assume nothing is happening in “this” committee or “that” ministry project is not moving in the right direction. This can enable that disgruntled congregant, who usually complains about everything, to slide further into their emotional hang-up concerning the church. When a leader sits down with the disgruntled congregant and calmly addresses their concerns with corrective facts, the Backfire Effect can occur: the disgruntled congregant rejects the facts and keeps believing that he/she is in the “right”.

Pastors and leaders need to understand where emotional opinions come from. There will always been those persons in the church who throw their hands up and say, “They don’t do evangelism” or “They don’t really care about people”. When in fact, those statements are not true. Such harsh comments usually come from some deep drama or past history that has not been addressed. People with anger management problems or prone to outbursts sometimes provide the worst Backfire Effect. 

Still, churches must create spaces and times for people to express their concerns. It is important to not let the Backfire Effect dominate a meeting or discussion. It is best to give the facts, listen and move on. Later, a one-one meeting will be necessarily.

The more you communicate the reality or correct message to your organization or church audience the better. The more people who have the correct information the better. Spend time planning how to best communicate the truth: word of mouth, print, digital, or all of the above. Finally, frequent reminders of information is helpful. Such practices can help reduce the Backfire Effect.

Churches

6 restorative practices for well-being

wellbeing

Leaders constantly give of themselves to those who serve. How can they recharge? Where can they find restorative practices for ministry that build up our well-being?

Today I’m attending the Lewis Fellows alumni gathering at Wesley Theological Seminary and we are engaging in reflecting and reviewing our role as young leaders in the church. This morning, Dr. Matt Bloom led us pastors in examining our well-being. Dr. Bloom and his team surveyed over 1,000 pastors in 8 different denominations in an attempt to learn:

  1. The characteristics of clergy well-being.
  2. What factors or impede well-being?
  3. How well-being changes over a life-span.

Dr. Bloom presented the following guidance for “recharging” our batteries for well-being:

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clergy burnout, pastor

Proof being a pastor is a tough job

pastor

As the pastor, I’m shaking hands with church goers after worship one Sunday, I talk with a congregant about meeting him during the week. His reply?

“I thought pastors only worked one day a week!”

Truth be told, we full-time (and part-time pastors) do not work one day a week. I work anywhere between 35 and 75 hours a week. My congregation expects a full-time, ordained, college educated, graduate school 90-credit hour trained, and spiritual pastor to lead the congregation. And so, I provide that. However, there are unspoken and unwritten expectations:  my wife and children share in the full life of the congregation, I give 10% (and more) of my income to church, I’m available 24/7, be an excellent preacher, sound teacher, be a chaplain, be a theologian, providing counseling, give financial leadership,  bring people to church, and sometimes even clean up a mess in a common area.

If you ask me or my colleagues, it’s tough being a pastor.

If you think I’m just complaining and think I have cushy job, don’t take my word for it. Take Forbes Magazine’s top 9 toughest leadership roles into consideration:

  • #9: CEO, lots of pressure for profit
  • #8: Congressman/Congresswoman, everyone (sometimes including your mother) hates you
  • #7: Newspaper editor, sorry that your job is almost extinct
  • #6: Mayor, “Unlike most politicians, you actually have to make sure that garbage gets collected, snow gets shoveled, and things get done.”
  • #5: Pastor/minister

Other than #1 on the list, Forbes collected the most cons of being a pastor:

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Christianity

Coalesce lava lamp Christianity

lava-lamp

I am not a word smith.  A friend of mine who helps me write better blogs reminds me often, less is more.  In other words, my writing is too wordy and too long. Authors and poets have a great gift for using just the right combination of words to create powerful images.  And they do so with very few words.  The trick is using words powerful enough to convey large concepts.

 I like words that can do that.  Words like; love, redemption, restoration, forgiveness, and Red Sox.  Each word carries with it weight and meaning, history and hope.  I came across a couple words recently that I am working on making into a concept for ministry.

Coalesce and disperse.

Coalesce means to come together to form one group or mass or to unite for a common end.  Disperse means to spread out over a wide area.  I like this idea for ministry.  The body of Christ comes together for a time to do a specific task with Christ, we serve, then we disperse to coalesce elsewhere and continue the work of Christ.

I like to use the image of a lava lamp for this.  Lava lamps work through the Archimedes principle.  Basically lava lamps are made with water and wax (lava).  Both have very similar densities, but the wax is more dense.  As a rule it should always sink.  However, when heated by the lamp or coil at the bottom, the wax’s molecules speed up and become less dense and become more buoyant and float to the top of the lamp.  Once there it cools and sinks again.  The cycle repeats itself over and over.

What does this have to do with coalesce and disperse?

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Associate Pastor

5 things associate pastors need to survive

survive

The work of an associate pastor often does not receive the high praise or support compared to their senior pastor. Associate pastors have the challenging task of supporting the mission and vision of the church under the leadership of their senior pastor. Often, in the course of this supportive role, associates experience disagreements and their frustration can undermine staff synergy.

Church leadership and senior pastors need to realize the unique nature of associate pastor ministry. In my book, The Work of the Associate Pastor“,  I write about how many fail to see one thing: the power dynamic in the analogy of “second chair” is fundamentally flawed. Associates often are forgotten in the work of the church. There are several key support mechanisms that need to be in place for associate pastors:

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Advent, blog

Advent devotional dropped to your inbox

advent1

Looking for a great, spiritual, and thought provoking Advent devotional dropped into your inbox daily?

Look no further than the folks at Blue Truck Publishing to give you what you want!  Each daily devotional are emailed daily. The daily devotionals draw from the rich Biblical texts surrounding the birth of Jesus, as well as the prophecy of his coming. Not only are the devotionals useful for personal growth but could also be used with:

  • Interesting opening to lead a class or small group.
  • Quick ideas for public speaking.
  • Sermon starter
  • Friends & family gifts

What’s great about Blue Truck content is that it is very affordable and usable. Blue Truck Publishing writers are leaders, speakers, pastors, and authors who specialize creating content and devotionals that address contemporary topics. This Advent devotional is only $1.99, which is delivered daily for the season of Advent. This is a great price for a devotional sent to you for the Advent season.

Check a sample:

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social media

Using social media during crisis

Churches and organizations will face an opportunity where social media can greatly impact how you respond to a crisis. Whether the crisis is a natural disaster, community problem, or an internal church conflict, how a message is crafted can produce positive results if done correctly.

During the recent #chsocm chat that I moderated, our church social media group discussed the best practices for using social media during a crisis. Here are my 4 topic/questions that we discussed:

  • T1: Name a crisis that emerged in a ministry community and how could it have been improved by social media? Could be your church or another.
  • T2: What tools or strategies can churches use during a crisis to improve communication & trust?
  • T3: How should an external community crisis be handled differently than an internal church crisis via social media?
  • T4: What can be shared via social media from a crisis that reveals a greater truth about God?

Here were some good ideas and responses to the topic of using social media during crisis:

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blog, social media

I’m moderating #chsocm tonight

I’m moderating #chsocm on Twitter tonight @ 9:00 p.m. If you are a church-ie social media type, just join in on Twitter with the search and hashtag #chsocm. It’s pretty easy to join in. Just keep #chsocm in your search on Twitter and follow the conversation.

My topic tonight will be centered around handling crisis within the church using social media. 

A lot of you are wondering, “What the heck is #chsom?” It’s Church socialmedia. #ChSocM (ch-sock-em) is a weekly Twitter-based chat about using social media to build church and faith. Welcoming, informative, ecumenical. Tuesdays, 9PM, ET. Commentary, interviews, transcripts, and fun stuff on the blog.

My good Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest friend Meredith Gould started the Twitter chat topic/community about 2 years ago. Since then, it has grown into a weekly meet up for lay people, pastors, seminarians, and social media church geeks (that includes me).

Don’t be a non-participate observer! Join in! (I loath the word “Lurker” or “lurking” for social media listening. It’s too creep-stalker-ish. See you tonight on #chsocm!

blog, social media

FREE EthicsDaily.com netcast for small churches

Tomorrow, EthicsDaily.com will host a free netcast on their website focusing on small-church expectations of pastors, avoiding burnout in the small-church pastorate, and advice for those ministers working in a small-church environment. The streaming netcast  Oct. 22 begins at 11 a.m. ET.

Zach Dawes, former small-church pastor and now managing editor of EthicsDaily.com, and Chuck Warnock, pastor of Chatham Baptist Church in Chatham, Va., will join EthicsDaily.com’s media producer, Cliff Vaughn, online for the conversation. Using  Google Hangouts, EthicsDaily.com will broadcast live on their site.

Anyone can watch the netcast on the main page of EthicsDaily.com, in the video hub (near the bottom-right of the page). After the netcast, the content will be available as a recorded video.

Ethics Daily now features 60 Skype interviews on their Vimeo channel. The expert discussions feature topics like prison ministry, beauty pageants, the Korean church, Thomas Jefferson, the church and technology, and much more.

 

faith

How N.T. Wright changed my faith

Greg Mamula is an ordained minister and the Associate Executive Minister of American Baptist Churches of Nebraska.

“Despite what many people think, within the Christian family and outside it, the point of Christianity isn’t ‘to go to heaven when you die.'”

–Simply Christian,  N.T. Wright

I did not grow up going to church on a regular basis, but went often enough to catch the same glimpses of faith many people see with only a cursory glance at Christianity.  Like many people I was taught that Jesus was my personal helper in time of need and the gate keeper into heaven. So when I prayed for something like my dad not to leave for months on end for work or to not have to move over and over again and God didn’t deliver I questioned his power and existence.

I believed that the Christian faith was ultimately about going to some ethereal heaven someday.  I believed I had to intellectually assent to the reality that Jesus died only for my individual sins, and simply admit that I was a worthless sinner and ask for forgiveness. I struggled with the purpose of Christianity even as I felt a call into vocational ministry. What is the point of belief in God if he seems to be a failed helper?  Is the only purpose of Christ to get us into heaven so I don’t burn in hell?  That seemed like a very unfulfilling and vindictive God.

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