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Changing Churches- Moving from mediocraty to significance.



Here is an extract from my next book;  I am looking at the idea of what is good relational leadership and how this will help us restructure or re-engineer a change process in a church. Enjoy and please feel free to comment.

 The management of pastoral ministry verses the senior leadership paradox.

Over the last few centuries the church has produced literally thousands upon thousands of Pastors. People who look after the flock, control the finances, organise meetings, people who control the ebb and flow of church life and solve every problem. Pastors are the people who maintain and manage the stability and consistency needed in the church. Over the last twenty years there has been a great deal of talk about leadership but little emphasis however has been put on good relational leadership.
 Leadership is in fact the thing that created the organisation in the first place. Leadership establishes direction, puts the right people in the right place for the right time. Leadership motivates and inspires. Leaders are in fact the people who produce change, often this change is dramatic and it creates new approaches to the message that has been so constant for the last two thousand years. For every one highly successful relational senior church leader there are hundreds of able, consistent managing pastors.

However, there has grown up in the church in the west a paradox and suspicion between those who see their gifting as pastoral and those that see their gifting as leadership. This has led to what I refer to as the paranoid dark side of pastoral ministry. The paranoia that creates the arrogant attitude that there is no need for a change process, that the pastoral ministry is the only thing needed for the church to grow and succeed. The paranoia that says " I am the pastor in this church I have been put here by God!"  This dark side is inwardly focused,  it creates a bureaucracy at denominational level that only the few are privy to how things really work and constantly  over values its own potential. The preference for pastoral ministry over good relational leadership leaves nothing inside a church to be able to break free of the morass of mediocrity and a mentality that is closed to new ideas. To be the success you want to be you need both great visionary leadership and able and willing pastoral help.

The future of the changing church.

When we look around it is hard to believe that our homes have been radically transformed from what they were 20 or 30 years ago. Homes with the latest type of heat retention glazing and double thick loft insulation  Homes that have microwave ovens and smart kitchen appliances. Espresso coffee making machines, surround sound music systems and Flat screen 3D televisions. Pressure is also being put on us through the mediums of advertising and marketing, to change our laptops and our 3rd generation iPhone for the 6th generation version. Or for us to download the latest App to see what our calorie intake is and how many paces we have taken throughout the day. It is part of our normal everyday lives to change the things we have and the way we do things.

Churches are our spiritual homes and these too must change with the times. The most successful churches have  acknowledged these changes and seen the trends and movements in our societies and communities. They have learnt to develop what is needed to create successful change and entered into the change process with enthusiasm. The result of this has seen churches grow and become significant in their communities. It is my contention that this process can be learnt and passed on to all churches so that they too can succeed and be significant, what is needed is an understanding of the change process.

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