July 2008
Understanding Men by David Murrow 
(excerpts from the book "Why Men Hate Going to Church")
Leadership and the Masculine Spirit - Part 2
We continue this month with more of Murrow's thoughts on church leadership.
Adopt the Leading Pastor - Teaching Pastor Model
God has given people different gifts. Some are great teachers. Others are great leaders. Yet our modern model of church demands tha a pastor be good at both, and that's a relatively rare combination. Only 5 percent of senior pastors claim to be gifted in the area of leadership. Most pastors think of themselves as teachers or shepherds, not leaders. Churches are recognizing this and beginning to hire a second pastor who is a talented leader. This pastor tends to the business side of the church, freeing the teaching pastor to focus on ministry of the Word. Sounds like Acts 6, the passage we read last month.
The disciples went out two by two. Moses had Aaron. Paul had Barnabas. If your church is serious about reaching men, consider a one-two pastoral combination, as finances allow. You'll probably emerge with stronger leadership and better teaching.
Look for Leaders in Corporate America, Not Necessarily the Seminary
Seminaries teach people to teach. Corporations teach people to lead. Methodist pastor Adam Hamilton has recruited some of his finest staff and lay leaders from the business world: "They will be people who are deeply committed to Christ and exhibit a genuine calling, yet who might never leave corporate America to go to seminary, and who may not have a calling to pulpit ministry, but rather to managing or leading ministries." Pastor James Meeks of Salem Baptist Church in Chicago found his church administrator, Veronica Abney, at IBM. Laymen may respect such leaders all the more because they possess real-world experience.
Develop Great Lay Leadership
Churches need dynamic leaders at every level. The pastor can't do it all, nor should he. A church that wants to reach men will have an intentional system for identifying and training leaders within the congregation. Two years ago my church hired a leadership pastor from corporate America. His only job is to raise up leaders who serve as life coaches to anyone who wants discipleship. Our church now has more than three hundred life coaches who are personally discipling hundreds of young believers. The tales of life change are staggering! Hundreds of women and men are being challenged into a deeper walk with God. None of this would be happening of our church hadn't made leadership development a top priority.
Does this seem like an impossible scenario for your church? You don't need a hotshot corporate executive to begin developing leadership. Try these ideas:
- Identify the leaders in your congregation through personality tests and spiritual gift inventories. Train them well, and let them lead courageously.
- Banish the word facilitator from your vocabulary. Men follow leaders, not facilitators. Jesus led, and so must we.
- Support your ministry leaders at every level. Many Christians grew up in a church where the pastor was the only leader, so they submit to pastoral leadership, but rebel against lay leadership. Don't do this.
- Support leadership development and training in your church. It's scriptural, and it's one of the keys to bringing men back.
- Above all, don't shoot at your leaders. Don't sic the humility police on them. Believe the best about their motives.
Men Need Male Leadership
Whenever possible, put men in leadership positions. It's good for your church. Men's natural bent toward risk taking and challenge can change the atmosphere in your church, making it more attractive to men.
You may object to this strategy because it would appear to discriminate against women. Laying aside the biblical assumption of male leadership for a momen, look at the practical side. If men see men in leadership, they think, This is something I could get involved with. My gifts are needed. If they see women in leadership, they tend to think the opposite.
The fact is, women will follow a man, but few men will follow a woman unless they are forced. For instance, there are many men who coach women's basketball teams, but it's very rare for a woman to coach a men's team. men follow female bosses, teachers, and commanding officers only because they can be fired, flunked, or court-martialed. But given a choice, men rarely follow female leadership. One church I know experimented with all-female youth leadership, within six months 75 percent of the boys had disappeared. Pastor Dan Jarrell puts it this way, "When women lead, men leave." (I know, men are sexist pigs. They shouldn't be this way. but remember, we're talking about men as they are, not as they ought to be.)
Maybe this is one reason the Scriptures presuppose male leadership in the church. Perhaps these commands rise not from first-century sexism but from the realization that both genders respond well to competent male leadership. If you want men to come to your church, give high-profile positions to Spirit-led men. Sounds chauvinistic until you consider that men are heavily outnumbered at church. Think of it as an affirmative action program for Christianity's largest minority group.
Men and Female Lay Leadership
Female leadership is a fact of life in the local church. George Barna found that women are 56 percent more likely than men to have held a leadership position (other than pastor) in a local church. Women are more likely than men to head up committees and to organize the various ministries of the church, especially those concerning children, where they have a virtual leadership monopoly.
I'm no theologian, so I will not presume to speak for God on the matter of women in formal leadership posts. However, statistics indicate that denominations that have opened their doors widest to female leadership are generally declining in membership. (Statistics from the Presbyterian church show a peak in attendance in the mid-1960s, and a gradual decline since then. Other mainline churches have followed a similar pattern. The declines began about the time these churches admitted women to leadership.) While 60 percent of churches with a male senior pastor suffer a gender gap, 80 percent of congregations with a female senior pastor do.
On the other hand, some of the most gifted Christian leaders I've ever met are women. Christian women do a magnificent job of leading in many churches. Women led in the bible. To say women are never called by God to lead in church or to say they lack the capacity for leadership is quite a stretch. We need great leaders of both genders in the church today.
To women who are in leadership positions, I'd offer this advice:
- Consider men's needs and expectations when making decisions.
- Don't be quick to take leadership away from men. Once a particular area of ministry gets a reputation as female dominated, it's hard to get men involved.
- Don't focus the whole church on the needs of women and children. Make developing mena top priority.
- Lead courageously. You can't lead effectively without angering people. Jesus made people mad all the time.
- Be willing to be tougher. Just as men need to be softer and more nurturing, you may need to be more hard-nosed and goal oriented. God calls all of us - not just men - to transformation.
Read the other articles in this issue:
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