One of the best things we can do in raising up leaders is get to know people and spend time with them. Watch how they react, watch what they do in different situations, then give them little things to do and keep an eye on them. I did that. I made a ton of mistakes with people. I put them in leadership positions too quickly. There weren’t a lot of people to choose from, I couldn’t afford to bring someone in, so I just looked for qualities and then put people in positions and coached them as I went. I made a lot of mistakes, but it worked. I built some teams that way.
Today, I want to talk with you about protecting your church from toxic leaders. But before I point the finger at others, let me say I had to deal with being toxic myself in some ways. I was quite a control freak when I was in my twenties, and I was insecure. I’d deal with folks who were toxic, but I’d deal with them in the wrong way. I would verbally push them into a corner and be pretty aggressive as I tried to deal with the problem. A lot of times, they’d quit or step down. I look back now and think, “Wow.” I could have coached them up if I knew then what I know now. So I had to deal with that toxicity within myself.
God’s dream for our church can’t be fulfilled without leaders. The leaders of yesterday are aging out, and we must be prepared to bring new leaders up, to work with them and coach them as we go. We are to look for the flaws, but we shouldn’t speak to the flaws. We speak to their potential. We can coach most people up in those areas of their life that are displaying toxicity.
I think it’s so important, and I love the fact that we have leaders in position who are still coming up. We have a young team. A lot of our sub-teams come up through the creative team, and it’s amazing! While their serving in the creative, we see the potential for other things and begin to coach them up to where we see possibility. Pastor Joe Jr. oversees all of that, so he often comes and tells me to watch this person or that person. It’s been a great feeder ministry for us.
Now, sometimes it wasn’t me who put a person in a position they shouldn’t have been in. It was my leadership staff. This happened quite a few times. Once they’re out there, it’s hard to pull them back because the person’s hopes are already up and they’re excited. We have it now to where our leaders know the process, and they know we make decisions in teams. Having a good process in place prevents out leadership team from putting someone in a lead position before they’re ready to be a leader.
Blind trust brings regret. Having the wrong person in a leadership role is going to cost your church in money, problems, and potentially people. It’s important to slow down and truly evaluate as a team whether an individual is ready for the responsibility they will carry as a leader in the church.
Our goal is to make disciples. We want to be a multiplying movement of disciples making disciples. I love what Jesus said, that we have to deny ourselves, pick up our cross, and follow Him. We have to be willing to die to self. That’s picking up our cross. It’s a concept we want to get into our people early on. We want them to know this is our goal. We want them to find out what the Bible says and put it into practice. We want them to say no to themselves. We want them to love God’s people. We want them to ask, “What can I do to be a servant leader to people?” When we see that mindset in our prospective leaders, we know they have character and they’re capable. Then we can see what gifts and callings God has on their life that we can help grow to the next level.
Every one of our prospects also needs to show that they see the potential in people—not that they ignore serious flaws but that they’re actively looking for potential. They’re looking for ways to pull that potential out of them and bring them up to the level God’s created them to walk in.
When I think specifically about our Millennials, I think some of them need to be reparented. There are certain things they didn’t learn at home mainly because their parents were trying to be their friends. Our team comes alongside these young men and women and helps them learn soft skills and hard skills. We help them with their work ethics and character development. Thirty years ago I didn’t have to reparent anyone. They came already parented! This is why pastors must step back, analyze the generation they’re trying to reach, and adapt their processes to fit their needs.
Trusting leaders without testing leaders brings regret. Not every position can be hired from within or brought up from within, but we strive to develop our people for leadership positions. I know sometimes you have to hire and bring someone in. That’s tough because they’re going to be on their best behavior in your interviews, and there’s no way to tell if they’re going to buy into your church culture. You have to work on them to pick up your culture.
Marriage experts tell people not to get married right away. Instead, date for at least one year. Watch that person in every circumstance, how they react under pressure, how they treat their family. Now, these are secular guys, but I like the idea. I connect it to raising someone up from our church because, as we raise them up, we can watch them in other situations and give them things to do before we give them titles.
One of my greatest joys is bringing up leaders from within and watching them flourish. We have a transition right now coming up with our worship leader, who happens to be my daughter. She’s pregnant with her third child. She let me know a year ago that she wanted to step down for a few years and then come back as a volunteer. She’s a great musician, beautiful voice, great leader. We’ve been working on who is going to take over for her. We could have hired from outside, but we had someone leading our student worship that we really liked. They had proven to be faithful, so we brought them into the adults and gave them some things to do. We kept an eye on them, and now we’re going to transition them to be our adult worship leader. It’s neat to be able to do that!
Giving people responsibility without requiring humility brings regret. Humility is so important. When I met Jim Graff, I was looking for a tribe. I heard Jim teach on casting vision. Then we went to a pirates game. I went home after and told my wife, “You’ve got to meet Jim. He was humble in how he taught but so bold. He has authority. And he was the same person at the game.” That’s why I joined Significant Church. I found somebody I could serve and help and be part of a family.
I’ll close with something Pastor Jim says that resonates on this topic. He says it takes grace to build a church. That’s why leadership development is so important. We shouldn’t blindly trust people. We need to learn to test them, and we need to require humility before we give them responsibility. If we don’t require humility of our leaders, it won’t be long before they become toxic. As the leader of my church, I model this humility by sharing with my congregation things like, “I did not agree with this part of the Bible for a long time. I had a lot of debate with God in prayer. Then one day I accepted that it’s in there and I’m just gonna humble myself and follow God. Now I’m gonna teach on it, and if you don’t agree with me, that’s okay. I want you to pray, “God, if Pastor Joe’s wrong, show him, but if I’m wrong, show me.” If we model that kind of humility from the pulpit and in our one on-one meetings, our leaders will begin to pick it up and model it to those they lead.
Pastor, your church can be protected from toxic leaders, but it will take you fighting the rush to promote, putting systems in place to test your prospective leaders, and requiring their humility before you give them a title. You can do it, and your church will be stronger because of it.
This blog was created using content from the webinar Protecting Your Church from Toxic Leaders.
