Three Empowering Keys to Church Fitness

The definition of health reveals two things. First is the lack of or being free of disease or ailment. The second thing is that health implies soundness and vigor.

The first aspect of health is the absence of any disease or ailment. No church is perfect, but if you have been a part of the Christian church for any length of time, you have more than likely seen churches that are sick because of a debilitating sickness. When I look at churches, I tend to look at the positive things and do not dwell upon the negative. There are, however, some churches that are obviously sick. Some church sicknesses are controlling factions, adversarial people who criticize and hinder things they do not agree with, conflicting relationships, poor leadership, and lack of vision and direction.

These are just a few of the potential sicknesses that can afflict a church. Being free from any of these or other major sicknesses does not mean that the church is a healthy church. The second part of our definition of health is that health implies wholeness and vitality. These two are separate but related. Wholeness is more than the body without a debilitating disease—there must be vitality. Vitality means that the body has all of its parts functioning properly and significant observable signs of life. As a nurse takes the vital signs of a patient--primarily blood pressure and temperature—we can also examine the church body for vital (or vitality) signs. Church leaders should be concerned about the health and vitality of their church, but how to determine church health and vitality is not always easy.

Let's look at the head, heart, hands, and feet of the body and their impact on vitality.

To determine the vitality of the church body, the head must be examined. The head of the church represents the leadership. Church leadership cannot be overestimated. I have often said that a church is what it is because of the leadership and it is not what it is not because of the leadership. That places a lot of responsibility upon the leader (usually the pastor) of the church. You may be thinking, "Yes, but what about our adversary the devil and his demons that are out to destroy the church?" Yes, we do have an enemy that is out to destroy and hinder our efforts, but have we not the promise that the gates of hell will not prevail against us (Mt. 16:18)? If this is true—and it is—then church leaders must admit to themselves that they may be the weakness of the church.

[Caveat: Church Health is not measured by attendance, membership, or money in the bank. As one pastor put it, "Church Health is not measured by butts and bucks."]

The leadership must become students of church health and vitality. I did not know about colic until I became a new father and we could not get our daughter to stop crying. Every time that our kids come down with a sickness, we have to become knowledgeable enough about the ailment to know how to respond. Poor attendance and lack of resources can be a symptom of a greater problem. Just like I had to learn to help my colicky child, pastors must learn how to treat their colicky church. Most of the time the church leaders are too close to the problem to identify it. Pastors do themselves and their churches a favor by getting someone who is familiar with church vitality to help diagnose their vitality.

Next is the heart of the body. The heart represents the spiritual vitality of the body. The spiritual heart is diagnosed by Mark 12:30-31, to love God with all of your heart, soul, mind and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself. In the churches that I work with, this seems to be a strong area. After all, that is what church is all about--loving God and loving others. Most churches have leaders and a core group that truly love God and show love toward others. I have had pastors of small churches point to their love of God and each other as proof of their health in spite of their size. Regardless of the atmosphere of love, acceptance, and forgiveness that exists in your church, this has to be nurtured or it will die. We make sure that our children have plenty of nutritious food. Pastors must make sure that their church has a healthy diet. Spiritual vitality is very important to the church, but it is only one organ of the body that impacts its vitality.

Next are the hands of the body. Hands represents what the church does. The hands are the functions of the church. Being active is a part of life. Ecclesiastes 9:10 says, " Whatever you do, do it with all your heart. For when you go to the grave, there will be no work or planning or knowledge or wisdom." Many church health experts assess church health by assessing the functions of the church. There are two aspects of the Christian life and by extension the church: being and doing. God is first interested in the "being"--who we are. Every Christian should be aware of who they are, but what we do is also important because it reflects who we are. We show our love of God by our worship and obedience--by how we respond to God's love. Being and doing are almost inseparable because they impact each other in profound ways. A coin has two sides regardless how thin or thick it is. If one side of the coin ceases to exist, then the coin itself ceases to exist. You cannot have a coin with only one side. This is equally true with "being" and "doing" as Christians. James makes a similar argument about faith and doing when he says, "Show me your faith without doing and I will show you my faith by what I do" (James 2:18). As with the head and heart, the hands represents only one aspect of church vitality.

Finally we examine the feet of the body. The feet represents evangelism. Isaiah 52:7 says, "How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, 'Your God reigns!'" While most churches are busy "doing", many are inadequate in outreach. Outreach can be measured by the impact they are having on their community and the reputation they have in their area. Sadly, many churches are making very little impact on their community. It is logical to assume that God planted each church strategically so that they could influence and help people they come into contact with. It is also a fact that many communities are unaware of the churches in their area. It is safe to say that the churches that are known are also the churches that are making a difference in their communities. A vital church implies that they are busy working in God's fields either planting or harvesting. A vital church looks outward into their community as we as upward toward God and inward toward their spiritual family.

Church vitality can be measured by examining the head (efficient leadership), the heart (spiritual vitality), the hands (godly behaviors), and the feet (community impact) of the body.

I invite you to enter into the conversation about church health. I have been a part of several groups that dialogue and try to find solutions for ailing churches. I have noticed that church members and lay leaders have not typically been part of the dialogue. I believe that the solution for revitalizing the church will not come from pastors and leaders alone. The solution will come from every member of the body working together.

Please jump into the conversation about the state of the Church in America and leave a comment below.

Thank you for contributing your opinion.

 

 

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Empowering Leaders do not Micro-manage

A few months ago during a training session for church staff members, an assistant pastor was complaining that his boss, the lead pastor, was a micro-manager.  My response to the staff person was not what they wanted to hear. The other trainer sensed their frustration and affirmed their feelings and stated that leaders should allow their staff members enough freedom and latitude to "do their job". The assistant pastor left the meeting with their feelings toward their pastor legitimized. 

It is true that leaders should allow their subordinates the freedom to accomplish things on their own providing they are in line with the organizations goals. However, this assumes that the subordinated is competent and does not have motives that undermine the organization's mission.

Micro-managing leadership can also be called directing. Directing is a legitimate leadership technique depending upon the skill of the employee and the difficulty of the task.  Four leadership styles have been identified: Directing, Coaching, Supporting and Delegating. Two things determine which leadership style is the best: (1) the skill of the employee and (2) the difficulty of the task. These four styles can be thought of as points on a continuum with total control by the leader at one end and the total freedom of the employee at the other end. Each method of leadership is legitimate depending upon the skill and experience of the employee and the difficulty of the task. A less skilled employee will require more hands-on directive leadership, whereas the more skilled employee can be trusted to do the task with little or no supervision. The second determiner is the difficulty of the task. It is obvious that designing an organization's network is more difficult than picking up trash in the parking lot. Employee skill is not the only determiner, the leader must consider the two determinates together.

Four leadership styles:

Directing is when a leader gives instructions about what and how goals are to be achieved by the subordinates and then supervises them carefully.

Coaching is where the leader involve himself with subordinates by giving encouragement and soliciting subordinate input. However, coaching still requires that the leader make the final decision on the what and how of goal accomplishment.

Supporting is where the leader does not focus exclusively on goals but uses supportive behaviors that bring out the employees' skills around the task to be accomplished. The supportive style includes listening, praising, asking for input, and giving feedback. A leader using this style gives subordinates control of day-to-day decisions but remains available to facilitate problem solving. The leader is quick to give recognition and social support to subordinates.

Delegating is when the leader offers less task input and social support while facilitating employees' confidence and motivation in reference to the task. The delegative leader lessens his involvement in planning, control of details, and goal clarification. After the group agrees on what they are to do, this style lets subordinates take responsibility for getting the job done the way they see fit. A leader gives control to subordinates and refrains from intervening with unnecessary social support.

It is important for the leader to understand the nuances of this leadership matrix. I have made the mistake of assuming that employees could be effective with little or no support. The result was ineffective tasks. Lack of confidence in the employee by the leader and a decrease in feelings of self-efficacy in the employee can result. On the other hand, the tendency to micro-manage comes from the leader unable or unwilling to trust their employees with organizational tasks.

Be an Executioner

The fourth grade class was given an assignment to go home and ask their fathers what they did for a living and give an oral report the next day for a grade in social studies. The next day one of the boys reported to the class that his father was an executioner. The teacher questioned the boy, "Your father is an executioner, are you sure?" The boy confidently answered, "Yes, my dad said that he makes plans and executes them!'

The old saying goes: " There are three kinds of people, those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those that wonder what happened.”

Organizations have realized that there are two kinds of people--thinkers and doers and they prefer to hire doers. Jim Collins famously uses the illustration of the bus. If you have the right people on the bus the problem of how to motivate and manage people goes away. Organizations usually prefer "doers" over "thinkers." Leaders like to have people around them that can get the job done. A great vision without the right people is irrelevant. Some organizations hire the smartest and most gifted people but if they are not doers, they usually have difficulty starting and finishing tasks.

IT IS EASIER TO EDUCATE DOERS THAN TO ACTIVATE THINKERS.

But is there an alternative to doers and thinkers?

While I was going to graduate school, I worked as a supervisor for a janitorial firm. As a supervisor, one of my jobs was to make sure jobs were done to the satisfaction of the customer. One job was without a regular custodian, so myself and another supervisor was called upon to clean a building until a regular employee was hired. The other supervisor and I showed up to do the job. The other supervisor was the ultimate doer and immediately began to work before we had even looked at the layout of the building. I followed his lead and immediately began to work. It was a large building and upon inspecting our work after completion we found things that were missed and had to re-do some of our work. My preferred method of work was to walk the job and get familiar with the setting and develop a plan of action in my head then get to work. After I discovered that the other supervisor was a doer, I made sure that we had a plan first whenever we worked together.

By nature I am a planner and organizations need planners, but I don't like to wait long before executing my plan. What is the distinction between doers, thinkers, and planners? Planners are doers with direction and thinkers are planners that are slower to action (the problem with thinkers is that they are usually slow to action). What planners need to be weary of is prolonging the wait before "doing." Some might argue that planners and thinkers are the same, but in my estimation a planner is a doer that follows a specific course of action.

The bottom line for leaders and managers is getting the job done. "Doing" without a clear course of action and "planning" without doing is ineffective and wastes time and resources.

BUILD ACTION INTO YOUR PLAN

Plans without action are useless. Every plan should  be broken down into action steps. The entire plan and each action step should be put on a time-table. The completion date of each of the action steps are "milestones."

10 STEPS TO DEVELOPING ACTION PLANS

1. Determine the ultimate goal

2. Examine options

3. Consider potential obstacles and results

4. Decide upon a plan of action

5. Establish a desired date for completing the goal

6. Break the plan into action steps

7. Assign a completion date for each action step (milestone)

8. Allocate resources

9. Start working toward first milestone

10. Celebrate completion of each milestone as a victory

KEYS TO SUCCESS

1. Be proactive - don't wait for perfect circumstances

2. Be flexible--plans usually change along the way

3. Be determined

4. Don't fear failure

5. Never give up