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Table of Contents
Leadership on the OtherSide
Interview with Bill Easum
WHAT ARE SOME COMMON DENOMINATORS AMONG THRIVING CHURCHES?
EASUM: There are three transferable common denominators among thriving churches: First, they have a clear purpose and direction that is tied to the question, "What is it about my relationship with Jesus that the world can’t live without knowing?" The second common denominator is worship that is more indigenous. And the third is that the ministry is not done by paid staff. The various ministries in a church come out of the spiritual formation and the growing edges of the congregation. These are the big three in healthy congregations because they are the essence of the church.
In addition, church planting is a primary mission of thriving, local churches and denominations. A swell is developing among church-planting groups and coaches. More and more local congregations are planting churches. Three things are driving this trend: one, it is biblical; two, most churches in the United States are located in the wrong place today (the people have moved); three, it is easier to grow a new church than it is to transition a dying one.
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| It is sheer folly to think that the people who led us well during modernity can give us the same quality of leadership in the postmodern/pre-Christian world.—Easum |
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Finally, the area of values, identity, security, relationships, order, and purpose continue to be issues in thriving churches. Churches that know where they are going and why will do best. The only established churches that will survive are those that are culturally relevant and biblically sound.
HOW DO YOU VIEW THE FUTURE OF LAY MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH?
EASUM: Most of our churches have a centralized, center-out or top-down, controlling environment. People know that underlying everything is a system or methodology where ministry occurs either in the life of the clergy or on stage Sunday morning. We need a totally new view of what it means to be the church. We must eliminate the centralized, heavy-handed, domineering clergy mind-set, as well as eliminate the mind-set of laity who believe that to have ownership of the church, they need to be in on the decision-making process.
In most churches, the day-to-day decisions are made by a handful of people—generally paid staff—and lay-people primarily do the ministries of the church. But we need to end the idea that we have some people who decide what needs to be done, and then others do the work. We are, however, beginning to see a change in the way churches are planning and conducting ministry.
What we are beginning to see in some churches today is a reversal of roles. Ministries in these churches are not decided by a handful of people; rather, ministries are decided by God in the hearts of the people as they are growing in their relationship with Christ. The system is permission-giving, centered around clear, core values and an understanding of the church’s mission.
The priesthood of the believer hasn’t happened because clergy are controlling and laypeople are demanding to be served. Both need to become servants.
Most of the ministry in healthy churches is done by laity. Churches need to organize around a lay-mobilization system that focuses on harnessing and empowering people’s God-given abilities.
The biggest weakness today in many churches and denominations is the professionalism of the church. We’re hoping to disarm that quickly enough to make a shift toward lay-led ministry.
HOW CAN PASTORS, CHURCHES, AND DENOMINATIONS DISARM THIS TENDENCY?
EASUM: The church shouldn’t buy into modernity’s passion for top-down, controlling, machine-like organizations. Modernity has usurped any form of spirituality, the supernatural, or the miraculous.
We need to return to our roots. It’s the same way with most of the denominations and churches with which I work. If they would return to their roots, and separate themselves from the last 100 years of modernity, they would be in better shape.
HOW CAN PASTORS MAINTAIN THEIR PASSION FOR MINISTRY?
EASUM: Pastors must get back in touch with their call. The call is why God has placed me here—it is the purpose for my life. It is why I do what I do. A call is no different for the clergy or the laity.
What I have seen with many pastors is this: they came into ministry with great, wonderful, idealistic goals. Over 15, 20, or 30 years, they have forgotten their hopes and dreams. Instead, they have become domesticated housekeepers, store tenders, shopkeepers of an institution.
That isn’t what pastors are called to do. They are called to preach and bring people to Christ. They are to make a difference in the world. They aren’t called to be nursemaids to people who are never going to grow up.
Over a period of time, I have seen pastor after pastor lose his or her edge and give in to people’s demands that he or she take care of them. That’s what I mean by returning to the initial call—where it became clear what God wanted you to do—and you went out and believed you could change the world. That’s what we’ve got to return to.
SINCE SOME THINGS IN THE MINISTRY ARE OBLIGATORY, WHY DO YOU MAKE A DISTINCTION BETWEEN PASSION AND OBEDIENCE?
EASUM: Obedience and passion are like a two-sided coin. Both are needed, but to be obedient without passion will not get anybody’s attention. To be passionate without obedience, you will flame out, burn up, and mess up. Obedience and passion must go together.
Most pastors are obedient. But what I see in too many pastors is a sort of dead look in their eyes…I don’t see the fire. When I bring people into my organization, I ask them to describe their spiritual journey. What I want to hear is their fire and passion. If I don’t get these, I don’t go on with the interview.
TALK ABOUT THE EFFECTIVE CHURCH AND ITS PRIME DIRECTIVE.
EASUM: The prime directive has to do with making disciples. The mission, vision, and values are the overall prime directive of a congregation. In a world of no rules, the church must be clearer than ever about its mission. The effective local church is organized around its prime directive. This prime directive replaces a church’s felt-need programming.
The mission of all churches is to grow disciples, who then grow other disciples. But how they do it is different for each church. The prime directive shapes the whole life of the congregation—how it spends money, hires staff, what it does, and what it doesn’t do—where it’s willing to draw the line in the sand and where it isn’t.
The prime directive begins with a deep passion and obedience to the call to make disciples who will make other disciples. "Feed my sheep" and "go make disciples" are two of the most important texts for our time. Out of that comes vision. How is a particular church going to make disciples? How is it going to feed the sheep? And then, what values are nonnegotiable in that church?
WHAT WILL CHARACTERIZE THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE?
EASUM: First, the clash between the old and the new will shape most of the first two decades of the 21st century. Radical changes in society will lead to turbulent and trying times in society and for established organizations, including the church. This will be made even more difficult by the fact that the U.S. is getting older and younger at the same time. Each of the two generations following the boomers rival it in size. These societal characteristics will most certainly have an impact on the future of the church.
Second, churches will become smaller, more intimate, and will have higher commitment. The number of deeply committed Christians will become more numerous while nominal, cultural church members will continue to decrease.
Third, multiple sites will become the norm because the place will not be important in the 21st century. Technological advances such as the Internet have the potential to make location irrelevant. Cyber churches will also become some of the largest churches and may be the new form of megachurch. The electronic church is already with us. The rapid growth of E-mail and the Internet is unprecedented in history.
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Two things separate spiritual giants from the wanna-be’s. The first is, "Do you have a call that is bigger than your own life…." The second is, "Are you able to be flexible in everything else?"—Easum
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Fourth, multitrack churches will also become the norm among healthy, established churches. Many churches will find that established patterns of worship, education, pastoral care, and nurture will still be necessary to reach people.
Fifth, worship will continue to become more high tech. The issue is no longer contemporary versus traditional worship. Spirited, traditional worship is growing churches and making disciples.
Sixth, more and more Protestant pastors will be women. We are already seeing Protestant seminary enrollment reflect the growing role of women.
Finally, each individual church will look like and do exactly what it needs to look like and do in order to carry out its prime directive. The church will take on more varied shapes than it has in the past.
THAT FRUSTRATES SOME PEOPLE BECAUSE THEY WANT TO FIND A…
EASUM: Cookie cutter?
YES, A COOKIE CUTTER. IF WE DO THIS, THEN WE’LL LOOK LIKE THAT CHURCH.
EASUM: That’s modernity—one-size-fits-all. The more passionate and obedient a congregation is to God’s plan for them, the more faithful and passionate a congregation will be to its mission. It will do or become whatever it needs to become or do to carry out that mission. If it has outlived its location, it will move. If it still has a viable ministry where it is, but it’s out of room, it will either plant a new church or graft itself into another part of the community and become the same church in two locations. If the traditional worship is not reaching the majority of the people in the area, it will transition into a two-track congregation where it has traditional and contemporary worship.
When you get away from the top-down, or machine mind-set, and you begin to think indigenous, organic, bottom-up, and decentralized, all kinds of possibilities emerge, because it’s not coming from just a handful of people. We’re listening to the call. First Corinthians 9:22 says, "I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some" (NIV).
This is where the church breaks from modernity—we don’t all need to look alike. But there are a few things that are nonnegotiable. One of those is, "What do you believe about Jesus?"
But the goal of the church’s prime directive is to make disciples of Jesus Christ—not to make good people—not to change society. It is to bring people to an understanding of what Jesus Christ can and will do in their lives.
IS THERE HOPE FOR EXISTING DENOMINATIONAL STRUCTURES TO MAKE THE SHIFT AND BEGIN TO RESOURCE PRIME DIRECTIVE-FOCUSED CHURCHES?
EASUM: This depends on how passionate and obedient denominations are. When denominational officials start talking about change, I ask, "Why are you talking about change? Is it out of a hope to survive and to keep your denomination alive, or is it because of your prime directive? Are you, in fact, rediscovering the prime directive and deciding with Paul that nothing else matters except ‘Christ and Him crucified?’" That’s what’s been missing within denominational structures.
At one time my denomination practiced the priesthood of believers with lay-led ministry. A preacher came to a community and preached. He then got on his horse and left for the next community. The day-to-day ministry was done by the people in the church. I see how far my denomination has drifted in 100 to 150 years. With our circuit riders, we put a church in every town in the country over a 100-year period. Now we’re centralized and top-down. But if my denomination will go back to its roots, this is where its future lies. Its past is what made it great.
Your denomination is the same. Ask yourselves, "What made us great?" That’s what you need to recover.
DESCRIBE WHAT PASTORAL LEADERSHIP SHOULD LOOK LIKE FOR EFFECTIVE 21ST-CENTURY MINISTRY.
EASUM: By far, the greatest challenge in the early part of the 21st century is the need to raise up leaders who can function in a world of speed, blur, and flux. Every discipline, including the church, is running out of world-class leaders. It is sheer folly to think that the people who led us well during modernity can give us the same quality of leadership in the postmodern/pre-Christian world. Churches need to pour more time, energy, and money into training than they do construction.
Leaders are obedient to a call greater than their own lives. A leader does what has to be done to achieve the mission. Mission dictates action. This is the all-consuming passion.
Leaders are passionate about Jesus Christ and are flexible about most other things. One of the passionate core issues is always changing lives, not merely taking care of people. This passion overcomes a host of inadequate skills. Because of this passion to change lives, leaders can remain focused on the core issues regardless of the distractions.
Leaders have a different set of life metaphors. Life metaphors are the unwritten and mostly unconscious assumptions, rules, and prejudices that form the basis of how we feel, think and act. Today’s leaders feel, think and act differently from leaders of the past. They’re gripped by a different view of reality.
Leaders approach life intuitively as if led by the Holy Spirit. These leaders pray: "God put us in the flow of what You are doing in this world."
Leaders innovate on the fly. This means they are living at the messy edge of chaos without becoming part of the chaos. Leaders test the edges of life. They don’t just tolerate change, they build it into the fabric of their ministry.
Leaders know how to share Jesus with unbelievers. Leaders have a radical faith in and obedience to Jesus Christ. This is not a liberal or conservative issue—this is the heart of our faith—our relationship with Jesus Christ.
Leaders sense that the genetic code of the church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ, not to take care of people. The reason churches are declining is that they have forgotten what business they are in. Leaders assist congregations in discovering and articulating their prime directive—why they exist, defining their values, how they will achieve their mission.
Leaders function as spiritual directors as opposed to expert teachers. Spiritual directors join with fellow travelers on their journey in personally experiencing God’s direction. They help the other person interpret his own story in light of the biblical story. They are interpreters of experience, not experts who deliver information. Spiritual directors help others identify the right path for their lives. They direct mentorees to the needed spiritual disciplines.
Leaders think and feel like apostles. The 21st century requires apostles who spread the Kingdom, not pastors who take care of churches and tend to the machinery of the church. They think spiritual, not institutional. They force the church to look outward. Apostles are theologians with a clear message—the redemptive power of Jesus Christ and the sustaining power of the Holy Spirit.
Leaders are permission-givers. They see in others what God sees in them and help them discover their gifts, and then let them minister with these God-given gifts. Spiritual wallflowers blossom as a result of their leader’s relationship with them.
Leaders make sure people are discipled before placing them in leadership. One of the biggest mistakes church leaders make today is trying to get people involved in church activities or on a committee instead of ensuring they have a solid, spiritual foundation from which to grow through serving others.
Leaders know that most ministries throughout the church occur best in a team-based environment. Teams, unlike committees, are put together by a leader who casts a vision for a particular ministry and then fills the team with compatible people with complementary gifts. Many of the leaders of the new world will be women.
Developing solid community is at the heart of team-based ministries. Multiple leaders will replace the heroic leader model. Triad leadership at the core will be the most effective form of leadership. Multiple lead pastors will replace the Lone Ranger of modernity.
Twenty-first-century leaders will serve Jesus Christ in the midst of the congregation instead of serving the congregation. This distinction is crucial. It keeps pastors focused more on the historic function of the church rather than doing the bidding of the congregation—to merely take care of them.
Leaders are servants of Jesus Christ, not professionals who serve a church. Leaders represent Christ by modeling faith for others to see. They find fulfillment not in what they accomplish but in what they help others accomplish. They follow Ephesians 4:11,12.
Leaders are real people with passion and emotions and aren’t concerned with being nice (neither was Jesus, Mark 10:17).
Leaders need to be able to shift through the junk data to find the crucial, new, timely information and share it with other leaders. They need to be able to help others distinguish between reality and fiction. Leaders will also need a clear sense of what it means to be human. Machines will continue to become more human and humans will continue to become more machine-like.
Finally, 21st-century leaders are willing to change their life metaphors in order to carry on the mission. The ability to change depends on the level of your passion for the mission—how badly do you want to be in the midst of what God is about in this world?
DO YOU HAVE ANY FINAL THOUGHTS FOR OUR PASTORS?
EASUM: Two things separate spiritual giants from the wanna-be’s. The first is, "Do you have a call that is bigger than your own life—are you willing to die for it, and does that call focus in Jesus Christ?" And the second is, "Are you able to be flexible in everything else?" That’s what is separating spiritual giants who are emerging all over the world. It’s a passion and an obedience to the call to make disciples. Like Paul said all that matters is Christ and Him crucified.
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