ministry and leadership

This week at Regent's has focused on the topic of church leadership. Part of this has been listening to four different baptist ministers talk about their understanding of church leadership. It demonstrated the wide variety - if four other baptist ministers were to explain their understanding I'm sure we'd get another four different perspectives. It left us as a group with much to think and talk about.

At the end of the week we were asked to consider what we had learned. Here are a few things that emerged for me and from others:

* leadership is often messy, difficult and never perfect

* 'leader' is a loaded and often unhelpful term

* the role of the church meeting is crucial : it is the community that confirms and affirms decisions; church meeting is not a rubber stamping exercise

* the minister is an 'interpretative guide' (charles gerkin) who enables the church to theologically narrate its story (how does this or that decision fit into the larger story of the church and more importantly the story of God; how does this or that decision fit into our baptist story); the interpretative guide enables the church community to lead itself

* leadership is not becoming the personality. The image of leader that many liked was that of conductor. It is the sound of the whole orchestra that and not the action of the one conducting (who has a silent role). The conductor enables the orchestra to give shape and depth to its sound; the conductor enables certain members to stand out at different points, but never to the detriment of others. We were aware of the temptation for those who lead to make everything focus on them.

* pastoral visiting is vital to leadership

* the questions what are leading for and where are we going need constantly to be asked

* leadership can often pull those in ministry away from the call to serve, teach and exercise pastoral care; that is, leadership can become an end in itself

* leadership is something shared

Comments

[Lucy Wright]

I like this understanding of leadership, especially putting the emphasis on church meeting. Hope you are enjoying college, are you based with a congregation as well? Lucy

[Geoff Colmer]

This looks fascinating, but I'm not taken with the image of leader as conductor. This is appealing until you look more closely at the role of the conductor. This takes a lot of unpacking and we'll chat sometime, but the conductor only has a silent role in performance and much of the work happens in rehearsal. While the conductor enables, and often brilliantly, he/she only enables the person to carry out his/her will to the best of their ability and artistry. Not so long ago, it was common practice to refer to the conductor as 'maestro' which is a realistic presentation of the power that the conductor has. The conductor metaphor is one of control. Among the great and wonderful conductors, many have been harshly dictatorial, others more benevolent, but whatever their style, they are the interpreter of the music - essentially it is Haitink's Beethoven cycle, Sir Colin Davis' Berlioz, and Rattle's Brahms German Requiem. What might be explored is the image of the leader of a jazz ensemble, cf. Max De Pree, Leadership Jazz. Look forward to seeing you again. Geoff

[andy goodliff]

Thanks for this Geoff - this exposes the weaknesses in any image/metaphor. I felt the week left me with more questions than any real clear way of appropriately leading.