It’s safe to say that no one really saw this season of ministry coming. Church leaders pivoted to a brand-new way of ministry when the building doors were closed. The lessons we have learned can have a positive impact on the trajectory and future of our ministry if we allow them too. Regardless of whether they were happy surprises or hard-won battles from the trenches, they are all building blocks to developing thriving churches, teams and leaders. In my opinion, here are 10 lessons to remember from this season.
10 Lessons to Remember from this Season :
1. Leaders will not, please everyone.
Pressure and tension as leaders initiate re-opening plans is real. But pressure and tension for leaders is not something new.
As far as building re-openings are concerned, there is not a one-size fits all scenario. Regardless of whatever timeline and final plan a leader decides on, there will be people that disagree.
Discernment and wisdom are necessary as leaders make decisions. So is a grace-filled communication plan. The best we can do is to communicate clearly and then be supportive as individuals and families make the decisions they feel are wise for their families.
2. Fear competes with faith for our attention.
This lesson is not just for leaders. It is for the team you lead, the families you serve and the community where you are planted. We must prioritize wisdom & discernment over fear-based decision making. This means we have to sift through our own feelings and gently nudge our team and the families we serve to do so as well.
Which voice (fear or faith) will we listen too?
3. Church CAN happen in the absence of a building.
Not everyone will return to church buildings. Some will temporarily choose to worship at home while others will not ever return. Likewise, there will be people were never planning to visit a church building ever and have become consistent online church attenders. If the mission is to reach the community where we are planted, then for many churches, maintaining an engaging, connective online presence is equally as important as an engaging, connective physical presence.
4. People & Churches Thrive in Authentic Relationships.
How connected people truly are too personal, authentic relationships within the church was revealed in this season. Prior to the pandemic, many churches poured effort and resources into adult small groups. The data from this season, showing high numbers of of unengaged kids, students and families has proven that, in most cases, we have not been doing small groups effectively for kids and students.
When relational intentionality is absent, we leave authentic relationships up to chance. People, even the youngest people, matter so much to God so they need need to matter to us. Everyone needs to feel personally connected to someone.
What needs to change moving forward so that our leaders and teams are equipped and empowered to build authentic relationships with the next generation?
5.High-Capacity leaders are necessary.
Creativity, ability to learn new skills, discernment, vision, willingness to pivot and respond quickly to change are important tools for a high-capacity leaders toolbox. (Hopefully the face of someone on your team popped in your mind when you read that!)
Not all teams, however (both from a staff and volunteer standpoint) have leaders in place that can lead through significant challenge.
In my humble opinion, developing high-capacity leaders in family ministry has not always been a top-priority for churches. Truthfully, I believe having high-capacity leaders is CRITICAL even more for a next gen. team than it is for any other team on your campus (outside of the senior or executive leadership of course).
Next gen. teams are the most multi-faceted team on campus.
Think about it for just a minute. This one team requires the largest, most varying skillset. This team is responsible for developing leaders, running technology and production, greeting, worship, gifts of administration, teaching, preaching, praying and ministering to adults (parents) and kids and students.
The next generation team encompasses mini versions of just about every other team at your church.
What can you do now to ensure that there are high-capacity leaders, in the right positions, to equip your team for the future? And how do you ensure that this becomes something routinely evaluated as move forward?
Does your mission really matter? I’m guessing it does, which means you have to be willing to have difficult conversations to get the right people in the right leadership seats on your team if they are not already.
Who is serving on your team whose gifts, ability or passion are not in line with the expectations for their role? Perhaps it is someone you recruited in a season of desperation where you added any able-bodied person into roles because the needs were so great. Maybe it is someone who was, at the time, a great fit for the position, but now as you redefine the role (to get your team to the next level), they are no longer a great fit. (If you find yourself in this position, I get it. I have been there and have had to have the necessary conversations to lead through it.)
Sometimes, when we grow or enter new seasons, the position outgrows the person.
When this happens, be sympathetic and empathetic.
Don’t, however, sacrifice the mission of your organization out of fear of hurting feelings. God will provide opportunities for that individual and will lead you to the high-capacity leaders that your team needs to do ministry effectively. Make sure to read my article Leadership Ladder for some thoughts and specific questions to ask to help steer your decision-making.
This season may have revealed to you the opposite truth as well. You have high-capacity leaders in front of you whose gifts ARE NOT being fully used. The person has outgrown the position. Do the work. Get people in the right seats and you will see your ministry go further, faster.
6. ‘Wins’ can’t be solely measured by attendance.
If weekend attendance was the only measurable that mattered, then churches would likely not have experienced such dramatic dips in engagement during the pandemic. Digital engagement would have more closely mirrored physical attendance.
Connection to the mission and authentic relationships = engagement.
How can we redefine the win for our team? What measurable(s) need to be put in place to represent authentic relationships (small group engagement) and connection to the mission (next steps in your organization)?
7. Leadership trickles down.
How well team leaders and volunteers care for people is directly correlated to how well THEY are being cared for. Leaders and volunteers tend to mimic what is modeled for them.
One example from this season jumps immediately to mind when I think about this ‘trickle down’ effect.
I talked to a leader recently whose church had, like many churches in this season, rolled out a strategy for weekly touch-points with their church family.
In this particular strategy, there seemed to be some gaping holes. No one that was leading above this individual was doing for them, what they were asked to be doing for others. Everyone needs a leader above them to model for them how it should be done.
Great strategies die quickly when they are not implemented from the top down.
If leaders are not modeling for their team, what it is they are being asked to do, it won’t be very long before the team is no longer doing it.
8. The safety of kids was & still is a parent’s top-priority.
How well an organization can ease parent’s concerns and create safe spaces will impact their timeline for return. Some churches have already opened their buildings and had lower initial attendance than they anticipated.
It some cases this is due to external factors. In other cases, it is due to something as simple as, needing to do a better job being safe, or communicating your safety measures.
Perception becomes a person’s reality. Do parents know the specific details and measures you are taking to ensure their child’s safety? There are parents who want to know every single detail:
- brand of hand sanitizer
- frequency bathrooms are disinfected
- quantity of people their child will have contact with
- will front-line workers be on the volunteer team with kids/students right now
- plan for notifying parents in event someone in contact with their child tests positive for a virus
Think about any perceived concerns a parent may have in this season. Blast out how you are addressing those concerns every way possible. (Video tour of your kids/student facility, email, social media, mailer, individual phone calls, etc.)
In what ways can your team shift your marketing (website, social media) in the future so that parents continue to be provided up-to date safety measures. First time guests ARE looking for this information when they look at your church website to decide whether or not to bring their family. Over-communicate your safety procedures. Which leads to the next lesson of the ten lessons to remember from this season…
9. Over-Communication is key.
Leaders & organizations providing MORE clarity grab the attention of people in a season of uncertainty. Clarity builds trust, eases concerns and helps gain positive, forward momentum.
Your volunteer team, families and first-time online guests need clarity from your organization. It will help them feel equipped and safe to return to your building.
This is not just a lesson for this season though. In any season, people desire clarity surrounding what you expect from them, what they should expect from you and what is coming next. If you don’t know, say, ‘we don’t know, but we are working on it.’
Right now, you probably will find that it saves you far more time to directly bring attention to the camp, VBS, conference, etc., that was on your church calendar than to answer 100 different emails from people inquiring about an update. It also builds trust by demonstrating to people that you are a reliable and timely source of information.
10. Inspect what you Expect.
If you are a leader, your team has had to pivot quickly as new strategies, methods and expectations have been rolled out in this season. How has implementation gone? Is what you believe to be happening per the last meeting, ACTUALLY taking place? The plan that you rolled out two months ago, is it still going strong?
Make sure to inspect what you expect. One way to lose credibility as a leader is to ‘say one thing’ while something different is actually happening. The challenge is to find a balance between micro-managing and being completely unaware of what is REALLY taking place. Ask the right questions.
“I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you.”
Psalm 32:8
My hope and prayer is that you have been open to whatever you can learn from this season. Lessons are going to continue to roll in as more and more buildings re-open. If you have learned something different or in addition to the 10 lessons that I listed, I would love to know. Feel free to leave me a comment below so we can learn from each other.