Pastor Jim Graff once said in conversation, “If you don’t raise up good leaders, you’re going to have great thoughts, you’re going to have great intentions, but it’s leaders who fuel and sustain momentum in the life of the church.” That’s a perspective that we, as pastors, need to adopt. Raising up good future leaders will directly impact the momentum our churches gain.
So how do we continually raise up and develop future leaders in the life of a church? Let’s look at five things we can do and how they will work for us.
- Successful leaders exhibit what brings trust. John Maxwell talks about the five levels of leadership. Before a person will ever follow you because of production, they’ll follow you because of permission. That means they follow you because they like you. They need to have a little bit of fun with you before they get things done with you.
When my wife Jenny and I took over our church, we spent three nights a week with about four couples. We invited them into our home to have dinner with us. It was exhausting. I don’t want to repeat that season ever again, but it was critical for them to get to know us, to know our hearts, see our home, like us, and so on so that they would be willing to follow us into battle.
I understand that not everyone is extroverted like me (and to be honest, this season pushed me to my limit as well!). But my wife is introverted, and it exhausted her. It took energy because there was so much that needed to be done in those initial moments. It was an unhealthy rhythm at first, but we had a plan from God that had to be accomplished. We needed those people who were long-time members of the church to be on board with the changes we were going to be proposing to make the church healthy and lead it to grow again. In hindsight, would I do it all over again? Absolutely I would. It was worth it.
- Successful leaders engage the right leaders. We have to ask questions and learn about the prospective leader’s calling, competence, character, chemistry, and charisma. Will they motivate those around them, or will people feel like they just have to put up with them? John Maxwell always says that everything rises and falls on leadership. I think you could also say that everything rises and falls on integrity.
For us, I’ve been very blessed to be around a lot of great churches. The problem I’ve seen with churches in general is that we’ve elevated giftedness at the expense of righteousness many times. Our culture loves to worship talent. There are twenty-seven different shows on television right now that celebrate how good a person can sing. The church is supposed to worship the Giver of talent, not those who God gave the talent to. I’m watching as the church continues to elevate, as we continue to adopt the world’s culture of celebrating talent. For us at Cornerstone Church, I’m looking for people whose yes is yes and whose no is no. Our leadership pipeline is rigorous. It’s not meant for those who are teetering. We want to make sure our volunteers are people of integrity before we elevate them into positions of leadership.
One of my favorite little sayings is, “If it fails to inspire, it’ll surely expire.” When I look for future leaders, I look for people who have the zeal of the Lord, that run on joy. The joy of the Lord is our strength. If they have those qualities, it marks them as rare. Think about it: Gen Alpha, Gen Z—they’re kind of mopey. They can be a little bit sad and low-key. In their language, things are “mid.” So when I find someone who is excited and passionate for the things of God and what He is doing in their lives and the world, that’s powerful. Charisma is powerful. Why? People are more likely to catch your mood than to catch a virus.
- Successful leaders enthuse hearts. People aren’t robots. You may be able to be transactional with your truck, but you can’t with people. They have feelings. You must make sure that you’re not just posting mission statements, vision statements, and value statements on your walls. These need to be ideals that are lived loudly and consistently.
Dissemination of information enables transformation. As leaders, we need to be constantly keeping these ideals in front of the people. How are you transmitting your values? Your mission? Your vision? Is it spoken from the stage? Is it in a pre-service video? What do you stand for? Where are you going, and who are the kinds of people going with you? Think critically about how you can transmit this to your people so that they’re more than a curated phrase that has no organizational teeth.
What does this look like in practical application? Well, if being joyful is part of your value statement and Bill is always mopey, Bill doesn’t fit the culture. He needs to get off the bus. That way, he’s not taking the seat of somebody joyful who needs to be sitting there. If you’re not willing to fight for your values, then people won’t follow you in adopting them.
A side note I think every pastor should be aware of. The Boomer generation is estimated to work roughly six jobs in their entire adult life. It is estimated that Gen Z will work between twenty and forty jobs! This is critical for us to understand because we need to capture the momentum, the heart, the zeal and the goodness inside this generation. We’ve got to consistently help them remember why they’re here with us, why they came in the first place, why they joined this team so that they’ll stay. Otherwise, they’ll disappear.
- Successful leaders establish plans. I heard it said that a leader’s job is to help people know what to do, how to do it, why they should do it, and the obstacles that will be in their way to getting the job done. For our leadership pipeline, it’s become tricky because we have about 1,800 people gathering for four different churches in twelve different services across more than a 200-mile radius. And with only twelve full-time staff members, we do almost everything through these dream teams. We have to be strategic.
Right now, we’re in the process of digitizing everything so that it can be more scalable. Like Habakkuk 2 says, “Write down the vision and inscribe it clearly on tablets so that one who reads it may run.” We have a great team that’s highly motivated. I love that we can use technology, like Planning Center, as the checks and balances to make sure things are being done on time and in order. One of the technologies we use is Google Classroom. That is how we hold our Cornerstone Leadership University, in which we hit our values, the eight things we look for in a church leader, and how our volunteers can use those qualities outside the church.
Planning like this also allows us to rotate the church around our volunteer leaders’ worlds instead of forcing them to rotate around us. It gives them the ability to do some things at their own pace without gathering once a week around a class time. It allows us to continue to grow them into leaders so that they can help us in turn grow the church.
- Successful leaders exit their positions well. As Pastor Jim says, “Fathers don’t compete with their sons.” If you’re a father competing with your son, there’s something wrong with that. Fathers are supposed to cheer their sons on, hoping and influencing them to be better than they ever could be.
Pastor, you know the mission is not about you. Jocko Willink wrote a book a while ago called Extreme Ownership. It’s a worldly take on a biblical principle that I would call “extreme stewardship.” We’ve got to be built on a mission—not on a personality, not on us. When we build our churches on a mission, we replicate ourselves. We replicate those who are on the same mission as us. Then, God forbid, if a bus falls out of a plane and hits our car as we’re driving down the road, the church will be success whether we’re there or not.
John Maxwell says, “Success without a successor is ultimately failure.” I believe that every good organization is built on that principle. If this is something you struggle with, I encourage you to read Multipliers by Liz Weissman. It’s a hard book for me to read. It’s aspirational. I have a shot clock now on my staff meetings. I don’t get to talk for more than fifteen minutes in a two-hour meeting. I shut up more than I talk these days because I don’t want to be the lid on our organization. I don’t think you do either.
You can raise up good future leaders who will take the baton and run with it. It just takes intentionality on your part and a commitment to living by, and holding others accountable, to the values, vision, and mission of your church. Will you consider making this a top priority this year?
This blog was created using content from the webinar Raising Up Future Leaders.
