Taking personal responsibility

On our recent flight to Austin, Texas to visit our son I read John Maxwell's book High Road Leadership. This is a book I would strongly recommend to anyone in a leadership position. The principles found in this book are pertinent to anyone in a leadership position whether that be in a church, a business, a non-profit or even a family. In one section of the book Maxwell writes about the importance of each person taking responsibility for themselves.

So many want to play the "blame game" and try to focus all their shortcomings onto others. A large section of our population see themselves as victims and spend enormous amounts of time feeling sorry for themselves and waiting for someone to come along and rescue them from their problems. Maxwell had the good fortune to have been raised by parents much like mine. Countless times growing up my parents reminded me that society owed me nothing. If I was to have anything, be anything or accomplish anything it would come because I earned it. It sounds like his parents taught him the same values.

He lists several areas of his life for which he had taken responsibility. Because he has taken personal responsibility in these areas he has enjoyed tremendous success as a speaker, a writer and a leader. I am convinced that anyone who assumes responsibility in these areas will also enjoy far more success in life than those who wait on someone to come in riding a white horse to rescue them. I share them here.

Attitude - Although we cannot control all the events of our lives, we can control our attitude. A positive attitude will defeat a negative one every day.

Time - Each of us are limited to the same number of hours each day. We must be responsible for how we use those hours and avoid distractions by lesser demands on our time.

Priorities - One way to maximize our time is to work as much as possible on the things we have identified as the most important every day. We cannot allow others to determine our priorities.

Potential - Only one person is responsible for your personal growth, and that is you. If you are not growing as an individual it's no one's fault but your own.

Passion - I have attended and benefitted from a number of motivational seminars, but motivation is an inside job. No one can truly motivate another person. The best they can do is to create a climate in which you can motivate yourself. It's up to us to maintain the passion we feel.

Calling - Each of us have unique gifts that are to be used to fulfill the calling God has on our lives. While it is appropriate to seek godly counsel regarding calling, this is something each person must decide for themselves. When we work in the areas for God has created us, we will enjoy much more success.

While the list is Maxwell's, the commentary following each item is mine. Taking responsibility for each of these areas every day is not easy. There are always going to be people who will try to take that responsibility from you. We cannot allow that to happen if we want to be people in leadership.

The pastor's family

When I began my pastoral ministry in 1981 I met with an older pastor in our association. He was telling me about some of his experiences in ministry. One that he struggled with was his relationship with his family. He said his children seldom came to see him because he had ignored them so much while doing ministry. He further admitted that his wife nearly had a nervous breakdown, and he wasn't even aware of it until later. His pastoral work took precedence over his family.

Sometime later I was sitting before an ordination council. This pastor was on that council. A question was asked about my ministry/family priorities, and I explained that my family would come first. He challenged that comment which was confusing to me. He had admitted several months earlier the decisions he had made concerning his family and the negative impact they had on his relationship with his family, and now he is suggesting I should make the same decisions!

Years ago pastors were often told by denominational leaders and others to focus on your ministry, and God would take care of your family. IMHO, that is one of the dumbest things I ever heard. Scripture is clear that if one does not provide for his family he is worse than an infidel. Nothing in that passage says anything about pastors being excluded.

Your church has probably had many pastors before you, and if the Lord tarries, it will likely have many pastors after you. But, you are the only husband or wife your spouse has. You are the only father or mother your children have. You have an obligation before God to meet the needs of your family. One statement I have often made to pastor groups and to churches is that I will not sacrifice my family on the altar of ministerial success.

Part of this is that I have never placed expectations on members of my family because I was a minister. When my kids were growing up I told them that they did not have behave a certain way because I was a pastor; they should do the right thing because it was the right thing. When one church commented that my wife would be the head of the church's mission circle, I told them she would not. My wife prefers to not be in leadership roles, and part of my responsibility is to protect her from the expectations of others. She is free to serve, or not to serve, in any area of church life she wants.

Churches can place unrealistic expectations on the families of their pastors. We cannot allow that to happen. When beginning a new ministry, the minister needs to make it very clear to the church the roles his or her family will play in the church. 

Your church isn't big enough

In the late 1970s I was privileged to attend the Billy Graham School of Evangelism in Indianapolis. For five days we sat under the teaching of some of the best Christian leaders in America, and each night we attended the Billy Graham Crusade. One of those leaders was D. James Kennedy. He was the pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida from 1960 until his death in 2007. He was also the creator of Evangelism Explosion, an evangelism tool that was very popular for many years.

He told of speaking in a church. After the service ended an individual approached him and told him that their church was big enough and didn't need to grow. He disagreed with the individual. After some discussion he explained to the person that his mother lived in that city and was not a Christian. He said no church in that city was big enough until it had reached his mother with the gospel.

Churches know they have been charged with the Great Commission which is to reach the world for Christ. We talk about evangelism far more than we actually do it. Many of us open our doors each Sunday and hope some unsaved persons will walk in asking how to be saved. Jesus told us to go, but we wait for people to come. And they don't come. Frankly, it doesn't bother us too much because we forget that these are people for whom Jesus Christ gave His life. We forget that they are somebody's mother, or father, or child, or grandparent. We seldom stop to think that they are the sweet, older lady next door who brings us cookies for Christmas or the young single mother who checks us out at the supermarket. Because we don't see them as individuals with a face, and a soul, we don't think about what will happen to them if they die without Christ.

We spend so much time focusing on trivial things. We worry about the color of the carpet in the sanctuary. We argue over clothing styles and make-up. Many churches will spend more time discussing how much of a raise, if any, the pastor should get than they will discuss how they can more effectively reach people for Christ. We will sit in a business meeting and discuss a $10.00 line item in the budget longer than we will talk about how to improve our ministry to young people.

Many churches will talk about how they want to grow. Most churches will say they want a pastor who will grow the church when they are seeking new pastoral leadership, but what they don't say is that they want a pastor who will grow the church without changing anything in the church or neglecting them in the process. I've worked with too many churches over the years helping them find pastors who were told to grow the church only to see the church slam on the brakes about the time he or she actually starting doing anything that might bring more people to Christ and the church.

Like Kennedy, I've had people in churches tell me they didn't want to see their church get any bigger. They liked the fellowship they had with the ones who were there and feared new people might upset that fellowship. I usually told them the story of Kennedy and his mother, but I doubt I got through to any of them. Like someone once said, reason can't take something out of a person's mind that it didn't put there in the first place.

Your church isn't big enough because there are lost people who live in your community. You are responsible to reach out to them with the gospel. If they die apart from Christ, they will spend eternity in hell. That should matter more than the color of your carpet or if someone is wearing too much lipstick. It's time the church took the Great Commission seriously and began to find creative ways to reach out to our communities. Someone's mother lives there who needs Jesus Christ.

Bivocational ministry and time

Without exception, in every bivocational ministry conference I've led, the number one challenge those attending voiced was how to properly manage their time. Many bivocational ministers feel overwhelmed by the expectations that are placed upon them by their families, their employers and their churches. I used to joke that I often waved at myself when I passed me on the road, but I'm not the only one who feels that way.

There is a simple reason we so often feel overwhelmed. It's because we are. It's not easy trying to meet everyone's expectations. There are only so many hours in a day, and many of those days contain a lot more things to do than time in which to do them. I offer a workshop on Time Management for Ministers so let me share some of the information I give those who attend this workshop.

• You have to set priorities for what is important to you. Bivocational ministers will have at least these five.

1. God
2. Family
3. Church
4. Other Employment
5. Self-care

• Once you have determined your priorities you have to own and control your calendar. Begin to write in your calendar what you need to accomplish in each of these five area to remain healthy and live a more balanced life. Certain things are a given such as if you work a 40 hour week those hours are probably not optional.
• If you want a date night with your spouse you need to put it in the calendar. (I'll help you with this one...you do want a date night.) Put it in your calendar as an important appointment and keep it.
• Make sure there is time for your own self-care. You need time to exercise, to enjoy a hobby, or to just rest.
• Do not fill your calendar with things to do. Build margin in your life so when true emergencies happen you will have available time to respond to them. A full calendar isn't impressive; it just reflects a life that is too busy and out of control.
• Do not allow others to rob you of your time. You may have noticed that people who have nothing to do want to do it with you! That's because you let them.

I cover this, and many other challenges ministers face, in my book The Healthy Pastor: Easing the Pressures of Ministry. Bivocational ministers will always face time pressures, but there are ways to help alleviate them. I've only shared a few of those in this space.

Bivocational Ministry for the 21st Century

This past Saturday I had the privilege of leading a seminar for Church of the Nazarene pastors in Michigan. The morning session was "Bivocational Ministry for the 21st Century." That afternoon I spoke on "Time Management for Ministers." These are two of the seminars I offer, and either of them can be a half-day or day-long session. The DS there asked me to present each of them in the half-day session.

We had a great turnout of pastors who were very appreciative of the material we covered. They asked a lot of questions throughout the day including a number of more private questions they asked me during our breaks. Not only were these individuals appreciative of the material, but they were appreciative of their District for hosting this event specifically for the bivocational ministers serving there.

One of the things I try to ensure is that the bivocational ministers who attend these seminars understand how much I appreciate their ministry and that they are not alone in their work. As a bivocational pastor for 20 years I understand how easy it is to feel that you alone are doing this work. It helps to know there are many, many others with this same call on their lives who are faithfully serving their congregations.

In every seminar I've led for bivocational ministers time management has been identified as their greatest challenge. As we ended the morning session on bivocational ministry, it was a very easy lead in to the afternoon session on time management.

As these pastors learned, time management is really life management and priority management. As one identifies his or her priorities in life and ministry it becomes much easier to identify the best uses of one's time. Then it's a matter of getting those things on the calendar and saying no to those things that are not priorities. These are often not easy, but they are essential if you want to better manage your time and ensure you take care of the highest priority items in your life.

This was my last seminar scheduled for 2016. I've traveled to several states and worked with a number of denominational groups this year and enjoyed every one of them. The feedback continues to be strong from both the sponsors and those attending. If you are interested in scheduling me to present one of my seminars to your pastors and church leaders in 2017 please feel free to contact me as early as possible to make sure we can get your event on my calendar. I am currently serving as a transitional pastor so I will be limited on the number of events I can lead in 2017 so it's best to get me on your schedule as soon as possible. In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy being home!

Time management for ministers

This week I received an e-mail from a bivocational pastor telling me he will likely be voted in as pastor of a church this Sunday. This will be his third church, and while he's excited about it he's also concerned. He admitted he has always struggled with time management since entering the ministry. He wanted to know what he should do.

Of course, I suggested he buy two of my books! The Healthy Pastor: Easing the Pressures of Ministry and The Art and Practice of Bivocational Ministry: A Pastor's Guide both address the problem of time management for bivocational and fully-funded pastors.

All pastors struggle with managing their time well. The bivocational pastor has the added pressures of another job that complicates it even more, but the problem certainly isn't limited to bivocational ministers. What are some initial steps we need to take to better manage our time?

1. Determine your priorities. If you don't, others will, and most of the time their priorities for your time will not be what you would have selected. There are five areas of life a bivocational minister must keep in balance: our relationship with God, our relationship with our family, our ministry, our other job, and our own self-care. You must set priorities for each of these.
2. Know your strengths and work in those areas as much as possible. I want to work in areas where I am weak as little as possible. My primary gifts are in preaching, teaching, and leadership. When I work in those areas I am most effective. While it's not always possible to avoid working in areas of weakness, it's best to avoid it as much as possible. Find others who are strong in those areas and delegate.
3. Own your calendar. There are some things that must go on there to pay the rent, but much of your calendar is discretionary. If you do not determine what goes on there, others will. Years ago my wife and I decided to have a Friday evening date every week. I put that on my calendar so if someone asked me to do something on Friday I could honestly tell them I already had an appointment.
4. Learn to delegate. It may be easier to do it yourself, but that doesn't mean you should. As church leaders it's our responsibility to equip the saints to do ministry, not to do all the ministry. Part of the equipping process is letting others actually do the work.
5. Take time off. That's part of the self-care mentioned earlier. The church is not going to fall apart if you take a week's vacation, and if it does you haven't done a very good job as a leader anyway. You and your family need to get away and enjoy life. Ministry is not a sprint; it's a long distance event, and you need to rest and refresh yourself along the way.

Realize that you may be following a pastor who did not do a good job of setting boundaries around his or her time. As Dr. Phil says, "We teach people how to treat us." You may be in a church that has been taught by previous pastors that it was OK to not respect their private time. In that case, you will have to retrain them about boundaries. You may be their pastor 24/7, but that does not mean you have to jump every time someone calls. You have other responsibilities, such as your family, that you need to consider as you work to balance out the many demands on your time.

Managing our time well is the responsibility of each of us in leadership. No one can do it for us, and if we struggle in this effort it's our fault. Having said that, there will always be a tension between the various demands on our time, and we will constantly be figuring out how to manage that tension. We won't always get it right, but if we begin to get it right more often than not, we will begin to enjoy greater productivity and greater joy in our ministries and our lives.

Good leadership comes from developing good habits

Yesterday I began reading H3 Leadership: Be Humble. Stay Hungry. Always Hustle. by Brad Lomenick. I did not get out of the introduction before I began highlighting passages that were jumping off the page.

The first line I highlighted was "Leadership is more than hard work; it is habitual work...When you rise in the morning, nearly half of your day will be determined by the patterns you've either intentionally created or passively allowed." That is a powerful thought that I had never considered before, but it is absolutely true.

About eighteen months after starting as a bivocational pastor I decided to attend a nearby Bible college to further my education. In the first semester one of the assignments in a class was to record everything we did for one week. We were to do this in fifteen minute segments. The instructor questioned whether my life could be as structured as the form indicated. I assured him it was as that level of structure was the only way I could accomplish everything I needed to do.

Whether you are a church leader or a leader in another organization, the habits you ingrain into your life will play a large part on how successful you will be. Failing to build the right habits in your life will cause you to be very sloppy in your leadership. Setting priorities and building habits to achieve those priorities leads to greater success.

Think back to the above quote. Nearly one-half of your day will be determined by the patterns or habits you've built into your life. Those habits may be intentionally created or you may have passively allowed them to become habits in your life, but in either case they are the way you govern your life.

Any time you do not intentionally build good habits in your life you are drifting, and drifting almost always leads to a negative situation. Few people drift into success.

It's true that you cannot control everything that occurs in your day, but with the right habits you will control nearly half of what happens in your day. The structure that results from those habits will enable you to accomplish the most important things every day. Not only will that make your leadership more effective, it will also provide you more time to deal with the unexpected things that will demand your attention.

What habits define your life and work? Are they habits that you've built into your life, or are they habits that just seemed to show up? Are there new habits that you need to develop to become a more effective leader? What do you need to do to develop those new habits?

Manage your time as a bivocational minister

There are so many things that demand the time of a bivocational minister, and its easy to lose track of the more important things to attend to lesser things that scream for our attention. Early in my years as a bivocational pastor I tended to focus on the squeaky wheel and failed to make sure I addressed all the important areas of my life. It ended up costing me dearly.

There are five areas of life a bivocational minister must ensure to keep in balance.

1. God
2. Family
3. Church
4. Work
5. Self

If any of these are ignored while too much focus in given to others it will cause your life to become unbalanced. The neglected areas will suffer, and eventually it will bring pain in your life.

We often talk about time management, but time management is really all about life management. When I address this in my seminars I talk about the importance of setting priorities in life. Priorities flow out of the vision you have for your life. What do you want to accomplish in life? What means the most to you? Where do you want to be in five years? What do you want your family relationships to look like? What vision do you have for your church and ministry? Where do you want to be financially, physically, and spiritually?

Achieving the vision you may have for your life seldom happens accidentally. It requires that you are intentional in each of these various areas, and the way to achieve that intentionality is to determine priorities for each of them. Those priorities should then be reflected in your planning calendar and your personal budget.

For example, clergy families sometimes suffer when ministry continuously takes priority over family activities. More than one pastor has been divorced because the spouse could not compete with the pastor's mistress, the church. You'll notice that family is listed above ahead of church, and this is done because I intentionally made the decision that I would not sacrifice my family on the altar of ministerial success. Since family was one of my priorities, how did that show up in my planning?

During my pastoral ministry my wife and I had a date set aside for every Friday evening. We would go out for a nice dinner, maybe do some shopping or something else, and grab a Starbucks for the ride back home. It was normally nothing elaborate, but the nice thing is that we went to a city an hour from our home. Sometimes the best part of the evening was the two hour drive we had on those dates when we could talk without fear of interruption. (This means you turn your cell phone off!) We also did other things together that we both enjoyed, but this Friday date was sacred to us. To ensure nothing interfered, her name was in my planning calendar so if anyone asked me to do something on Friday evenings I could legitimately tell them I had a previous appointment.

Both our children were involved in school sports, and we rarely missed any of their events. As soon as their sports schedules came out I put the dates down in my calendar and planned around them. Sometimes at an away track meet we might be the only parents from our school in attendance, but we were there.

You can manage your time only if you learn to manage your life. You might have to say no to some things that will interfere with your priorities. But, if you've not determined those priorities, others will determine them for you, and you may not be happy with the priorities they choose for you. Develop a personal vision for your life and determine the priorities you will need to achieve that vision. You'll find your life will be better balanced and much more enjoyable.

Time with family

We spent the past few days visiting our son and his family in Philadelphia. Living some distance from them means we don't get to see them often enough, but it's always exciting when we are able to make the trip.

Shortly after accepting the call to pastor the church where I spent twenty years of pastoral ministry I visited one of the senior pastors in our association. He told me during that visit how his wife and children had suffered due to his ministry. His wife maintained a pastor's spouse demeanor on the outside, but inside she experienced a lot of emotional pain. This pastor confessed that his adult children seldom visited since he had little time for them when they were growing up.

His story confirmed a vow I had made when I entered ministry: I would not sacrifice my family on the altar of ministerial success. Yes, God had called me to ministry, but He had also called me to provide for my family. I always took that to mean more than financial provision. I also have an obligation to tend to their emotional and spiritual needs as well

I was the pastor of a church, but I was also the pastor of my wife and children. More than that, I was a husband to my wife and a father to our children. I made sure our church understood the priority I gave to my family, and I was blessed that they honored that priority.

It's easy to allow other things to interfere with time spent with family, but we must not allow that to happen. Even when I had the most demands on my time I still made the time to coach our son's little league and pony league baseball teams. We made time to attend our daughter's junior high and high school track events and our son's high school baseball games. I can count on one hand the number of track meets and baseball games I missed.

One of the most important things a family can do is to create memories that will last when members of that family are no longer around. My parents have both been gone for several years, but there are some memories I have of them that always keeps them close to me. We've tried to create the same kind of memories with our children.

The people in your church needs you, but so does your family. Keep your family a priority in your life. Take the time to create wonderful memories that your children will be able to share with their children.