Change the World?
During a recent interview, a reporter asked if it's reasonable to believe that something as deep and pervasive as worldwide transformation can actually be traced back to a church leader. My answer then, and now, is yes. To seriously consider the alternative - pessimism and a "why-try?" attitude - is unconscionable for a serious-minded Christian.
I have to be able to wake up every day and say, "It is possible for a church to change, and it is possible that a community can change, and the world can change."
I believe it is possible by faith. I believe it is going to take far more than just me and far more than just my lifetime. Mostly what I am trying to do is to set the strategy for something that may take us another 50 years to achieve. But it is possible, and necessary. We are mandated to do it and the alternative - giving up -is unthinkable.
I want to focus my expendable, disposable income, an inordinate amount of my time and my energy toward the first domino in the world-change equation: Pastors. Because we are never going to see the end result unless we trip that first domino.
Now What?
Leaders ask me all the time, "Now that I know who I am and what I was born to do, now what?" And my answer is consistently the same: Take responsibility for your own leadership development. Be the best leader you can possibly be. Read everything on leadership you can possibly read, go to leadership workshops and conferences, find a leader who is ahead of you and get mentored, and continue to lead at the highest level you can lead.
Do all these things not because you'll add numerical growth to your church, earn a higher degree of respect from your peers, or because it might add a few more abbreviations to your title. Do them because the One who redeemed you didn't make a mistake when He entrusted you with the gift of leadership. Do them because the alternative is unthinkable. Do them because it's the single greatest contribution a leader can make toward the equation that can eventually change the world.
Reprinted with permission from WILLOW magazine
