So You Want to be a Leader?

Everyone wants to be “the leader” don’t they! From the outside looking in, the gig looks cool. Leaders usually get a bigger office, bigger pay, more notoriety, more influence, and heck, maybe even some prestige!  The problem is, when you actually get that job, you begin to realize it’s not exactly the walk in the park you pictured it to be. Here’s why being the leader in your church is a tougher job than most people think it is.

1. When people are angry at the church, that anger is vented on leaders.

2. When people are angry at each other, its leaders that usually get the fun job of being the referee!

3. One side or the other in that fight, often ends up mad at, you guessed it, the leader. Sometimes both sides.

4. Guess who gets to say “no” to a lot of things, yep its the leader. That means the leader often has to say no to good ideas from good people who they actually love and respect, even though you know it’s going to hurt them. It also means saying no to not so nice people with bad ideas, and thats a ton of fun too because instead of being hurt, they usually accuse or criticize.

5. If you have people in your church, you have problems. Guess who’s held accountable for all those problems, and the consequences caused by them? Once again, the leader! A lot of the time they’re held accountable for decisions they actually knew nothing about. Try that one on for size sometime

6. When staff aren’t performing at the level they need to be, guess who gets to have the hard talks that sometimes ends in someone being let go? It’s the leader, and it’s a really tough thing to do! On occasions those decisions hurt good people who you love and respect.

7. When it’s time to do yearly performance evaluations, guess who gets to tell people about their weaknesses. Yep you guessed it, the leader! Again not the funnest thing to do!

8. Churches like other business’s, have budgets. Guess who gets to manage the spending and tell good leaders with amazing ideas no because it won’t fit in the budget? Need I answer it at this point?

9. Leaders get criticized to their faces, behind their backs, by people they thought were their friends, by people who have never met them, publicly on blogs and the internet, and often for things they didn’t even have anything to do with.

10. When you’re a leader, especially in the church, you are scrutinized for everything you do or say. What movie you’re seeing, what movie you’re renting, what you say in public pretty much anywhere you go, how you dress, and pretty much everything else. Ask a pastors wife if she is scrutinized for how she dresses in public and see what she says.

Are there benefits that go with a leadership role, absolutely. Are these complaints designed to make you feel sorry for your leaders, absolutely not. What I hope you’ll take from  this is three things…

1. Leadership is difficult, and your pastors work hard and put up with a lot to follow Gods call in their lives.

2. Think long and hard before you start praying about a leadership role in your church, because if you can’t deal with the hard stuff I just talked about, a leadership role will destroy you.

3. Love on the leaders in your churches, their job is a heck of a lot harder than you think it is, and there is more people criticizing them than telling them thank you!

Ask this question before taking on a high level leadership role; am I called to lead at this level, or do I just want the title, notoriety, bigger pay, influence, and prestige? Because none of those things will matter when the pressures of leadership show up, and they will show up!

But hey, if for you the answer is yes, go for it, the Kingdom needs great leaders!

John