‘How do we make good leaders & keep them going?’  It’s hard to get statistics on the ‘survival rates’ of voluntary church leaders, but statistics on those paid to lead in churches are disturbing: ‘44% of all pastors who have been involved in ministry for more than 15 years suffer from ‘burn out’, or mental breakdown or serious illness. And that doesn’t include those who fail to continue in active ministry for other reasons, such as immorality or loss of faith.’  Ensuring good leadership in churches is not easy.  In God’s grace, he preserves His church & His gospel over the generations: In part, through a pincer movement of both ‘top-down’ & ‘grassroots’ action.
‘Top-down’, God expects those already in leadership to faithfully equip others.  Amidst a flurry of metaphors about warfare, racing & farming, the Apostle Paul gives this advice to Timothy: ‘You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also’. (2 Timothy 2:1-2)

Timothy was Paul’s protégé.  After serving underneath Paul, Timothy was expected to do the same for others.  He needed to teach & model godly leadership, in the same way he had witnessed it.  At points, it meant correcting people in their ungodliness & denouncing errors.  More positively, it meant lovingly sharing his life & knowledge.

If our church is to have good leadership, those already in leadership need to be faithfully entrusting it to others.  Not just by faithful preaching & teaching by the paid staff.  Connect leaders need to prepare others to take their place, should they leave.  Kids Church teachers need to draw others alongside to continue the faithful teaching to the next generation.  If you lead now, take a moment & consider: ‘who are you entrusting the gospel to?’
At the ‘Grassroots’ level, God has what might seem strange advice to ensure good leadership: Submit! Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you. (Hebrews 13:17) Submission is placing yourself under another’s authority, but it is not a ‘warm’ word in our culture.  It’s disliked for some good reasons.  The call to obey authorities has been wrongly used over the centuries to justify abuse in homes (domestic violence); churches (cults); & even nations (apartheid).
Yet Biblical Submission is good – within God’s own relationships, the Son & Spirit submit to the Father.  If it is good for God, it is good for us.  It’s voluntary – it can’t be forced or coerced, The Bible gives it as an instruction to the ones who should submit, not to those in authority to ‘make others obey’.  Submission is complex – we exist in a web of relationships, not a simple ‘chain of command’.  The challenge is to hold together submission to our connect leader, at the same time as the government, at the same time as our husband, at the same time as our boss!  Submission is Christ-like – in 1 Peter 2, we see one key to discipleship is a willingness to be wronged by authorities (as Jesus was), without resorting to ungodly retaliation.  Therefore, it is hard - simply going along with leaders when they suggest what you already intended to do isn’t submission!  Obedience requires humility to take on someone’s ‘bad’ idea as your action.  But in all that, submission is effective – it makes leaders work a joy as Hebrews 13 says.
We can all be involved in ensuring good leadership at church.  We all need to take a moment & consider: ‘When was the last time you wholeheartedly went with a decision you disagreed with at church without grumbling?’
From top down & up from the grassroots, let’s pray God gives us strength to make it happen.

Mark Smith
Assistant Pastor