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Leading Ideas
Delivered every Wednesday, our free e-newsletter Leading Ideas offers articles by thoughtful, cutting-edge leaders on subjects you care about — navigating change, reaching younger people, financing your ministry, communicating effectively — to help you be the leader God is calling you to be.

The Lewis Center is committed to helping congregations and denominations thrive and grow by providing ideas, research, resources, and training for vital and fruitful leadership. Through Leading Ideas, we share vignettes of leaders and congregations, book reviews, leadership quotes, and helpful “right questions” built around the premise that leaders don’t need answers — they need to know the right questions.

Leading Ideas
0 Reintroducing the Language of Sacrifice

I have never been an enthusiastic fan of the word “sacrifice” because so few church members in this culture understand or appreciate the term or its implications. In the early 1990s, a consultant in a capital funds campaign urged the use of the slogan, “Not equal gifts, but equal sacrifice.” While I understood the intent, I resisted the highly visible…

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Leading Ideas
0 Affirming and Improving Clergy Effectiveness

Clergy effectiveness is on the mind of virtually every denominational leader today. Indeed, many judicatories have initiatives underway to define, assess, and improve clergy effectiveness. Effectiveness is not a new issue, but it certainly has an intensity about it today that is different from some times in the past. Good pastors can become better leaders if they have a way…

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Leading Ideas
0 New Tool to Help Clergy Get Feedback

The Lewis Center has worked with hundreds of clergy, and we know that clergy want to improve. But often they do not feel they have the necessary information or tools. Many understand that the challenges of the church and the world have changed since they finished seminary, but they do not always get the most helpful feedback in order to…

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Leading Ideas
0 Discerning Clues for the Future

What do leaders do? Pastors are leaders, and one of the important tasks of leaders is discerning clues for the future to which God is calling our congregations. Leaders look for clues that help define reality and identify God’s vision. A pastoral leader helps the church come to an honest and truthful realization of the congregation’s situation, while at the…

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Leading Ideas
0 Spiritual Hardening of the Arteries

“Where your treasure is so will your heart be also,” Jesus tells us in Matthew 6:21. We live in a country and culture where heart disease is prevalent. We are all aware of the tremendous toll it takes on the physical wellbeing of individuals, often leading to death. Spiritual heart disease is just as common. And as Jesus suggested, the…

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Leading Ideas
0 The Importance of Clergy Mentoring

The early years of ministry are often beset with predictable anxieties and questions. Even with the best of seminary training, new pastors quickly discover that their formal education did not prepare them fully for the challenges and responsibilities they encounter in the practice of ministry. It is not hard to appreciate why a wise and trusted mentor can be a…

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Leading Ideas
0 Making Your Church Kid and Family Friendly

The start of the school year is a great time to roll out the welcome mat for families and children. The following tips come from the Lewis Center’s 50 Ways to Strengthen Ministry with Children. This is part of the 50 Ways series of ten lists, which can be found at churchleadership.com/50Ways. Make your space child friendly. Nursery and classrooms should…

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Leading Ideas
0 Clergy Mentor Resources Available

Research and experience both point to the importance of clergy mentoring, particularly in helping those in the early years of ministry. But clergy mentors indicate overwhelmingly that they need more training for their task. And while mentees value the mentoring they receive, they also indicate that their mentors need more resourcing for this important responsibility. Research and experience both point…

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Leading Ideas
0 What to Expect from a Coach

1. Coaching is not counseling or consulting. There is a time for counseling about life issues you are facing. There is also a time for specific consulting help. Coaching is different but complementary with the other two. Coaching is focused on possibilities you have and is not dependent on the coach’s wisdom and experience. The coach seeks to bring forth…

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Leading Ideas
0 The Coach Approach to Ministry

A seismic shift is coming in the way pastors lead congregations — toward a way of leading that is highly relational, deeply intentional, and always contextual. It is called the “coach approach” to ministry. Increasingly, effective pastors will draw on the skills of professional life coaching in working with lay persons in their congregations. A coach is someone who helps…

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Leading Ideas
0 Moving Beyond Geographic Boundaries

Where is your church called to serve? Many churches think of their outreach area in limited geographical terms. By this measure, the growth potential in First Sedalia United Methodist Church (UMC) might not seem promising. Sedalia, Missouri, a town of 21,000, has been the same size for nearly 50 years. It is stable but not growing. Established by a circuit…

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Leading Ideas
0 What You Told Us About Your Summer Worship

Last month, the Lewis Center administered a survey about whether and in what ways churches change worship practices during the summer. While this was not a scientific survey, the responses do give some clues for church leaders. Some initial observations from the first 132 churches responding are: Forty-five percent report making changes, with 55 percent not doing so. Among those…

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Leading Ideas
0 Know Your Purpose

When Rabbi Noah, Rabbi Mordecai’s son, assumed the succession after his father’s death, his disciples noticed that there were a number of ways in which he conducted himself differently than his father, and asked him about this. “I do just as my father did,” Rabbi Noah replied. “He did not imitate, and I do not imitate.” (Kurtz and Ketcham, The…

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Leading Ideas
0 Helping a Congregation Connect to Mission

My congregation has been in an ongoing mission partnership with the Child Rescue Center and Mercy Hospital in Sierra Leone, Africa, since 2000. However, there is always a need to find fresh, new ways to help the congregation feel connected with this project. During a recent mission trip, we did two things that made this mission connection come alive for…

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Leading Ideas
0 Moving Beyond Personal Preferences into Missional Thinking

Being missional does not mean doing things the way we like them. It means to take the gospel into the context where we have been called … and, to some degree, to let the church take the best shape that it can in order to reach a specific culture. However, the problem is our preferences. You can’t be missional and…

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Leading Ideas
0 Preaching in the Small Membership Church

Lew Parks’s newest book is ostensibly a preaching primer with good, solid advice on some of the basics, such as selecting a good biblical translation and commentary, research and preparation, and effective delivery. But at a deeper level, his discussion of the preaching task provides a conceptual framework for exploring the contextual dynamics and leadership imperatives unique to smaller congregations.…

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Leading Ideas
0 Do Male and Female Pastors Lead Differently?

What do we know about the differences between men and women serving as lead pastors of large congregations? Not enough. But we do know more now from the United Methodist context because of a project undertaken by the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry. Although there may be differences between how male and female lead pastors see themselves and…

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Leading Ideas
0 Leading a Ministry with Homeless People

When Jesus walked on earth, he taught about the kingdom while he healed the sick, restored sight to the blind, and fed the hungry. Today, we are called to meet the physical as well as the spiritual needs of people — all people — in our communities. In fact, hurting and hungry people won’t believe we care if they only…

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Leading Ideas
0 Authenticity in Leadership

When I walk into a church, I can tell almost immediately if the leader is authentic, transparent, and warm. If so, the entire congregation exudes these qualities. It is almost palpable. People greet me warmly, and there is a vibrant sense of life in the air. If, though, the leader values safety over spontaneity, I sense that people don’t really…

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Leading Ideas
0 Helping Families Cope during Pastoral Transitions

We are often unaware of the grieving that goes on in our families and our congregations around times of transition. Spouses, for example, may feel resentment about not having more say in the move. Remember that transitions can be stressful times for relationships. Sharing feelings and permitting others to do so is emotionally freeing for everyone. Other common concerns for…

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Leading Ideas
0 All Things New

As I was driving back to my office after taking my husband to the airport, I was a little worried because he was flying on an airline that had had a plane crash the day before. My concern prompted me to reflect on my life as I sped along. “I love my life!” I thought to myself. As a society,…

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Leading Ideas
0 Leading the Small Membership Church

Small membership churches have a history of making do without a lot of leadership from persons outside. Many were started by laypersons gathered in homes, sometimes in response to some traveling evangelist’s preaching, but often by their own initiative. Through the years, most small membership churches have been subject to frequent turnover of clergy leadership. Is it any wonder that…

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Leading Ideas
0 Palms in the Park on Palm Sunday

During the Easter Season, the First United Methodist Church in New Braunfels, Texas, launched an outreach event in the heart of our city. Our goal was to take our worship service to the people instead of asking them to come to us. With that in mind, we rented space in Landa Park, a natural area at the heart of our…

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Leading Ideas
0 Your Church’s Creation Story

In The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership, University of Southern California president Steven Sample makes the case that all leaders should discern the creation story for their organization. A creation story is a brief overview of the organization’s history that recounts how the organization got started, what motivated its founders, notable accomplishments over the years, and why it is important today. Articulating…

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Leading Ideas
0 Congregational Integrity

We rightfully expect personal integrity in our leaders. Should we not also ask whether our congregation has integrity? The behavior of organizations is as important as that of individual leaders. What a church is as an institution may very well have more impact on people than what it says to them. This may be all the more critical as we…

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This article is reprinted by permission from Leading Ideas, a free e-newsletter from the Lewis Center for Church Leadership of Wesley Theological Seminary available at churchleadership.com.