ARE WE A PEOPLE AT HALF TIME? - Leadership Network

The days of the “Lone Ranger”
leader are numbered. After all,
even the Lone Ranger had Tonto.
The shift from a single leader to a
leadership team is perhaps one of
the most difficult, yet necessary,
transitions for church leaders to
make in order to be effective in
the 21st Century. The story of
Brentwood Presbyterian Church’s
journey to becoming a teambased
congregation has many lessons
for church leaders. Leading
the Team-Based Church, a new
book by senior pastor George
Cladis, provides valuable insight
into the characteristics and
biblical foundations of creating a
church culture that fosters and
celebrates team. We thank the
staff of Brentwood for sharing
their story and Jossey-Bass
Publishers for the use of excerpts
from Leading the Team-
Based Church.
2 Gifts from the Top
Down
A PROFILE OF
TEAM LEADERSHIP
5 Leading the
Team-Based Church
by GEORGE CLADIS
7 LN Recommends
8 Large Church
NETWORKS
9 Young Leader
NETWORKS
10 Church Champions
NETWORK
11 Leadership
Training Network
V O L U M E 5 , N U M B E R 2 A P R I L • M A Y • J U N E , 1 9 9 9
One of the characteristics of effective
churches in today’s culture is their philosophy
and practice of team-based ministries
and the impact this has on their approach to
staffing and leadership development. The
specifics of structure and operationalizing this
approach vary according to the needs and
culture of each church.
Effective churches have at least the following
three key aspects in common.
Leadership is decentralized and
becomes a gift-based partnership
between pastor, staff and lay persons.
F R O M L E A D E R S H I P N E T W O R K
Effective Churches and Team Leadership
One of the important lessons
learned from decades and
even centuries of hierarchical
leadership is that it
tends to immobilize people.
Structure takes precedence
over mission and
highly centralized leadership
blocks the contribution of the gifts and talents
of people throughout organizations. Even
churches. Perhaps especially churches.
Making this transition in leadership does not
come naturally to a congregation. It requires
both intentionality and “spade work.” There
must be a conscious decision on the part of
the existing leaders to give their leadership
away and to literally push the ministry of the
church out the door and into the community.
It results in the mutual empowerment of people
in ministry but it also requires the hard
work of cultivating the soil of the congregation’s
culture to accept the changes.
Diffusing leadership throughout the congregation
through ministry teams often means that
the role of the staff changes. Rather than serving
as doers of ministry, they become equippers
of others in ministry and facilitators of
ministry teams. Many staff members find it
more difficult to adjust to this role shift than
the lay persons on their team because the staff
has been trained in a model of ministry that
emphasizes the “doing of ministry themselves”
rather than the “leadership of ministry
done by others.”
The leader’s abilities flow from an
authentic relationship with God.
This seems obvious, right One
cannot be an effective leader in
ministry without an authentic
relationship with God. Yet in
our professionally credentialed,
achievement-oriented
culture, it is possible to confuse
skills and competency with the inner
qualities of character, trust and integrity.
Unless leaders are connected to God in a
growing relationship sustained by spiritual
disciplines and accountability, their leadership
will ultimately prove hollow. Effective leaders
give attention to and nurture the inner side of
leadership.
The role of the pastor is determined
by their calling, gifts, needs of the
church, and the gifts of others on the
leadership team.
The leadership expectations
placed on pastors today are
often excessive. They are
expected to be all things to all
people. A shepherd. A teacher.
A CEO. A counselor. A spiritual
director. A vision-caster. A
preacher. And the list goes on and on. There
is little consideration for the calling and gifting
that is unique to each person or the particular
leadership needs of the specific
congregation. Effective churches are recognizing
that pastoral roles are best determined by
the calling and gifts of the leader in the context
of the entire leadership team and the
leadership needs of the congregation at that
time. For one pastor it might mean a teaching
role. For another, preaching or spiritual leadership
might be emphasized. With this
approach to ministry, all of the leadership
needs of the congregation are met through
the collective gifts and callings of the entire
team rather than the single leader. ■
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