The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys

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Category: Elders (Page 2 of 2)

Relational Leadership

March 28, 2023 / / 0 Comments

You’ve got to look at this incredible pass from Luka to Hardy during last night’s Mavericks win over the Pacers. Put the video on full screen and let it roll for like three times. It’s just unfathomable what Luka does almost every single night. It’s not enough to keep them from completely blowing the end of the season – was there anybody who thought the Kyrie trade was going to work? But, man, Luka is a special dude. I pray they haven’t totally ruined him with that putrid trade and this monumental late season collapse. Watch this crazy pass.

https://twitter.com/KingJames/status/1640515719896141826?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1640515719896141826%7Ctwgr%5E6ebfd2c2953ebf8be8a2e68bf43222968d1ceb9c%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.sportsdaydfw.com%2Fv1%2F

This Sunday is our deadline at GCR Church for recommending new shepherds to join our existing eldership. And I want to remind us and anybody else who might be reading this in a different context that we are looking for relational leadership, not positional leadership. Too many churches are led by strangers who are not recognized by the sheep. A true shepherd is followed not because God has given him authority, but because the sheep recognize his voice. In the Bible, God doesn’t tell his people to respond to a leader because he has an office or a title. It has to do with relationship. Uphold these men, the Bible says. Recognize them. Follow them. Not because their names are in the bulletin or because they approve the budget. But because of their hard work. Because of their love for the Body. Because of relationships.

“I know my sheep and my sheep know me.” ~John 10:14

Shepherds in Bible times were not day laborers who show up for work in the morning, put in eight hours with a lunch and a couple of 15-minute breaks, and then call it a day and go home. They lived with their sheep. Day and night. Season after season. They fed them, protected them, loved them. The sheep knew their shepherd’s touch, they recognized his voice, and they followed no other shepherd. It’s about relationship.

“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them and they follow me.” ~John 10:27

Picture Jesus with his disciples. Eating with them, walking and talking with them, working with them, teaching them, encouraging them; praying for them, correcting them, loving them; washing their feet and dying for them. Ordaining elders is about acknowledging relationships, not appointing positions. This doesn’t mean elders don’t have a title, but it means their authority comes from their lives and hearts and Jesus in them, not the title. They have the title because people follow them, not the other way around.

It’s one part of the church saying, “This man is a wonderful shepherd to us and we think he’d be a great shepherd for the whole church.” And the rest of the church saying, “Yeah, please shepherd us, too!”

When we’re looking for elders, WHO he is is a lot more important than WHAT he is. Relational, not positional.

Peace,

Allan

With Prayer and Fasting

March 22, 2023 / / 0 Comments

“Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord.” ~Acts 14:23

Today is a congregational day of prayer and fasting for our church at GCR as we focus our energies and attention on the solemn task of selecting additional shepherds. Instead of eating, we are using our mealtimes and snack times today to spend concentrated time in Word and Prayer, in communion with the Lord and one another, as it relates to choosing new elders. I invite you to join us today. If you belong to the GCR Church, use this guide in whatever way you’d like as you go through your day. If you’re not a member of our congregation, would you please pray for us at least once today? Lift up your brothers and sisters in Midland to our Father in the name of Jesus and ask him to bless us with wisdom and clarity and with good men with servant hearts. Then, if you’re in Midland, join us at 5:30 this evening as we break the fast together with a congregational supper. Then at 6:30, we’ll dismiss the kids to children’s worship and Bible class while we adults hang back for some conversation regarding “the lists” in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1.

Ezekiel 34:11-16, 25-31
Pray for our current shepherds and their wives by name

Psalm 23:1-6
Thank God for the elders who have faithfully gone before us at GCR

John 10:1-10, 11-18
Pray for the one(s) you are recommending as new shepherd(s)

1 Timothy 3:1-7
Pray for men of character who are beyond reproach in our city and church

Titus 1:6-9
Ask the Holy Spirit to guide our church during this process

1 Peter 5:1-11
Pray the new shepherds will fit in well with our current elders and the leadership transitions will be smooth for them and our church

Hebrews 13:7, 17, 20-21
Pray that our church will make the work of our shepherds a joy

Matthew 20:25-28
Ask God to raise up men with servant hearts to lead our church

Ephesians 4:11-16
Pray that the Lord will encourage us, unify us, and grow us through this shepherd selection time

1 Thessalonians 5:12-13
Pray that our whole church will participate in the selection process

May our Lord bless us and guide us together with his grace and peace.
Allan

On Sabbaticals and Continuing Ed

March 21, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Let me explain a bit about the mandatory one-year sabbaticals and the continuing education and elder training for our shepherds at GCR. As we are restructuring our eldership and selecting additional shepherds to serve, I’ve received a couple of questions about these two new pieces.

First, regarding the sabbaticals. Our shepherds are going to begin serving three-year commitments. We are no longer ordaining elders to lifelong appointments. (I’ve already detailed the reasons behind these three-year cycles in earlier posts.) An elder can serve two consecutive three-year cycles, but that seventh year is a mandatory one-year sabbatical. This 12-months is not just a break. It’s not a year in which the elder doesn’t have to attend meetings or read the minutes from those meetings. The sabbatical is an intentional time for development as a shepherd and spiritual renewal.

The way we’re structuring things, the elder about to take his sabbatical must present his sabbatical plan to the rest of the shepherds for their approval. I’m planning to attend this conference or this retreat; I’m going to read these two books on spiritual leadership; I’m going to re-engage this certain ministry; I’m going to attend a new weekly Bible study; I’m traveling to the mountains for a two-week spiritual retreat. Whatever the plan, it should be intentionally designed so that elder can be renewed spiritually and equipped to be a better leader of the flock.

One elder will be assigned to walk with that shepherd during his sabbatical, to pray for him regularly, to check in with him periodically, to meet with him quarterly to get updates. Then, when the sabbatical is over, that elder will give a report to the rest of the shepherds. This is what I did. This is what I heard from the Lord. This is what I’m thinking now. This is what I see more clearly now. This is what convicted me during my time away. If that elder wants to step down after his sabbatical, he’s good to go – he served two three-year cycles, he did what he said he would do, he did what the church asked him to do. He leaves with our gratitude and appreciation. If he wants to continue serving as a shepherd, he must be approved by the rest of the elders to come back.

Again, this mandatory sabbatical allows an elder to get away from the urgency of the position to evaluate their continued calling in a healthy way.

Second, we are placing an expectation on our shepherds that they will continually seek training in spiritual leadership. They will attend ElderLink conferences and seminars on church governance. They will go to ACU Summit and/or Pepperdine Harbor. They will participate in spiritual leadership training at GCR, the details of  which are still being worked out, and work outside our GCR bubble to experience other settings and different churches to become better equipped to shepherd our flock.

We expect our ministers to be engaged in continuing education. We expect our ministers to stay professionally sharp, to get outside our box, to seek new and better ideas ways to proclaim the Gospel and minister to our people and serve the community. We expect our ministers to pay close attention to their own relationships with the Lord. Shouldn’t we have those same expectations of our elders?

Someone pushed back a bit on that with me Sunday: “Well, the ministers are full-time paid staff. That’s part of their paid job.” My response was, “In our system, the elders are the ones who make all the big decisions for the church. We should probably be more concerned about their continuing education and spiritual development than that of the ministers.”

Bear with me as I keep processing our restructuring and shepherd selection at GCR Church in this space. If this is helpful to you in your setting, praise God. If you come here looking for occasional updates on my family or daring sports opinions, you might be out of luck for a few days. My youngest daughter and my older son-in-law flew to Arizona last weekend to take in a Taylor Swift concert to which I cannot relate and about which I have nothing to say. And the whole left side of my brackets is demolished. Completely trashed. I’m in last place in our family contest and, if not for Kim O’Connor, would be in last place in our church contest. I’ll stick to writing about shepherd selection for a while.

Peace,

Allan

Servants FOR the Church

March 15, 2023 / / 0 Comments

I have completed my March Madness bracket in preparation for the most glorious two-and-a-half weeks in sports. I’ve got NC State upsetting Baylor in the second round and Penn State doing the same thing to A&M. I’ve got Texas losing to Houston in the Midwest Regional Final and TCU going all the way to the West Regional Final and losing to UConn. I’m picking Arizona and Duke to join Houston and UConn in the Final Four with Cougar High beating Zona for the championship. Those are my picks. And I am less confident in them as I have ever been.

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As we prepare to select additional shepherds at our church at GCR, let’s discuss some of our expectations as church members. Deep inside our bones, all of us are free-enterprise, open-market, individualistic consumers. All of us drink deeply from the wells of retail and marketing. The customer is always right. Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back. 30 days free trial. Sometimes, if we’re not careful, we sell Christianity or the Church by trying to make it low cost and high value. We have to continuously guard against those cultural tendencies.

We can also treat our elders as if they are “goods and services” we’re owed as faithful church members.

I do believe our shepherds should be a front line support for our families and our marriages. They should be present during times of illness and death. I think all that is in the job description. But is that the ultimate end of eldering? Is the goal for a shepherd to provide encouragement and comfort to the members? When the elders get to heaven, will Jesus’ first question be, “Did you provide enough emotional support for my sheep?” I think that question will be on his list, but I don’t think it’ll be in the top ten.

If we’re not careful, the care and support of an elder could become another of the consumer goods to which church members feel entitled. We might read our elders through consumer eyes. And consumers either get what they want or they go shopping elsewhere.

Shepherding is not a free counseling service that provides comfort in the hospitals and prayers at the funerals. Shepherding is a mentoring program designed to call every member of the church into Christ-like living. Elders are to teach and model and lead others toward more selfless service, submission, sacrifice, and, yes, even suffering. And that’s a lot harder than just being a comfort during times of trial.

Sometimes we get the idea that the church owes me counseling and comforting and the top guys showing up to anoint me with oil and pray with my family whenever I call. Or my friend’s family. Or the funeral of somebody who sat on the west side. Sometimes it’s not the natural result of loving relationships and community in Christ, it’s an entitlement, something bought and demanded. So, the elders, instead of being viewed as our spiritual leaders who call us and lead us to faithful service, are seen as our servants to sacrifice and serve for us so we don’t have to.

When a visit or a prayer by an elder becomes something that’s demanded by people who wouldn’t go to the funeral of that elder’s mother, we’ve turned Christianity into a commodity instead of a community. We’ve completely forgotten we are members of this faith community to learn to become like Christ, not to have our egos stroked or our consumer demands met.

So, yes, it is right and necessary that our shepherds visit the hospitals and attend the funerals. But only if the members see that as an example to be followed, not as a service to be expected or demanded.

True shepherding is leading God’s people to do what the elders do. To be visited and served by church members trained by their elders to visit and serve on their own would be the sign of a deeply healthy congregation – a richly blessed body shaped in the image of our Lord.

Peace,

Allan

Restructuring the Eldership

March 13, 2023 / / 0 Comments

We conducted our second GCR Breakthrough Retreat this past weekend at The Way Retreat Center here in Midland, 18 of us together for a concentrated time in the ancient Christian practices. Dwelling in the Word, praying Scripture, borrowed prayers, worship, communion meals, imaginative reading – we cram a lot into 22 hours. And it blesses me beyond my ability to articulate.

We tell people all the time to read their Bibles and pray. How do I become a better Christian? How do I grow in my faith? How do I feel closer to God? The answer is always to read your Bible and pray. But we rarely give Christ-followers the tools to truly engage our God through Word and Prayer. We don’t train our people on how to listen for the voice of God, how to hear his voice, how to discern his will, how to commune with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Well, these time-tested, Church-proven practices are a God-send for those who are truly wanting to deepen their relationship with the Lord. And I love experiencing these times with other Christians.

You really get to know people in a hurry when you listen to them read Scripture and pray. You see so clearly what’s in their heart, you understand their souls, when you hear them read the ancient words and recite them back to God. Their stories just come out – their heartaches, their desires, their joys, their past, their hopes. I see God differently when I hear my sisters  read the Word and pray out loud. I understand different facets of his love and mercy that I would never get on my own without their unique sensibilities. I praise God for my sisters in Christ who share their faith with me and with others in these powerful ways.

We want everybody at GCR Church to experience one of these retreats over these two years. The next two are  set for June 9-10 and September 15-16.

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We are in the beginning stages of a shepherd selection process at GCR and, in some ways, a restructuring of our church eldership. We laid out the process yesterday for adding additional elders to our church family, along with some explanation for the three major changes to our church leadership structures. Allow me to walk through the highlights here.

The three main changes which will take place during this selection process are these:

1) Shepherds will be ordained for three-year commitments
2) Shepherds will take a mandatory one-year sabbatical after serving two three-year cycles
3) There will be no congregational vote at the end of the selection process

There are two main reasons for these changes. One, we want to make the on-ramps and off-ramps to the eldership wider and smoother. Typically, in Churches of Christ, there are only two ways to leave the eldership: mad or feet first. A Church of Christ elder has usually understood his role as a lifetime appointment. We believe a commitment to a three-year cycle is a lot less daunting than signing up for the rest of one’s life. The three-year stint provides a way out, too. If a shepherd decides, for good reasons, that it’s best for him to step away, he can do that after three years. It’s built into the system. Nobody’s upset, nothing’s wrong, nobody did anything – he completed his commitment, he did what he said he would do, he did everything we asked him to do. Seeing a clear way in and out makes it more likely that our gifted men will answer the call. And it also prevents against shepherds serving in this important role out of a sense of duty or expectation after they’ve run out of energy or effectiveness.

Two, healthier shepherds will result in a healthier church. We are adding expectations that our elders will undergo continuous education by attending ElderLink conferences and other such seminars. All shepherds will be expected to participate in spiritual leadership training at GCR, the details of which are being worked out now. The mandatory sabbaticals will allow our shepherds to pay closer attention to their own relationships with the Lord, to reconnect with the life of the congregation, to re-engage a favorite ministry, to read a book or two, and to attend to servant leadership development and spiritual renewal. It gives them an opportunity, away from the urgency of the position, to evaluate their continued calling in a healthy way.

Regarding the confirmation vote at the end, we’re doing away with it. The words “vote,” “election,” “counting votes,” and calculating “percentages” form us much more according to our culture than to the Gospel. We’re not using words like that anymore. We’re also staying away from words like “nominate,” “nominee,” “ballot,” and “candidate.” In a nod to the past, it seems preferable to use Bible names for Bible things. The church will recommend shepherds at the front end of the process and we will trust God’s Spirit to speak through his people to reveal to us our new elders.

Once the prospective elders are presented to the congregation, there will be three weeks of biblical accountability for the congregation to voice any concerns. But there will be no vote. If there are any issues between folks, we want those resolved in community. We want accountability to be handled in relationship, not with a check mark on a piece of paper. If someone feels strongly that one of the men selected should not be one of our shepherds, that person should go to that guy and work things out. If they can’t work it out and the person is still convicted that for biblical and theological reasons this man cannot serve as a shepherd, then it needs to be brought up with the current elders. But don’t go to the elders first. Go to the guy you have the issue with.

We detailed all the changes in last week’s GCR Family Update which you can access here. I also preached on this yesterday in a sermon you can watch here.

I’ll be spending a lot of time on elders and shepherd selection in this space for the next several weeks as we engage the process here at GCR. May our Lord bless us with wisdom and guidance.

Peace,

Allan

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