Leadership and Team Ministry
Leadership principles
Whether you are an experienced leader or very new to congregational leadership, these principles may be useful in your leadership role or as you mentor and disciple others into leadership.
Team ministry
'In Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us' (Romans 12:5,6).
Teamwork is a part of God's plan for ministry. We are designed to work together in ministry. We were never meant to serve alone and try to do it all on our own.
Some blessings of working in a team:
- We can get more done.
- We can support each other, allowing members to take a break when needed.
- Each person can bring their God-given gifts and talents to the task.
- We can learn and grow through our interaction. Iron sharpens iron!
- We can keep each other accountable.
- We can encourage each other.
- We can pray together, seeking God's guidance.
Building effective teams
Good team ministry requires that the team members:
- Recognise that there is ONE MINISTRY with multiple workers. There may be different roles, responsibilities and levels of authority, but we are all one in Christ. This is the bedrock and starting point for any Christian team ministry.
- Develop a clear and agreed ministry mission and vision that everyone on your team is working towards. It should flow from the overall mission and vision of your congregation or organisation. This becomes the basis on which all ministry is evaluated, rather than personal agendas or expectations. It is the touchstone that you keep referring to and returning to when there are choices and decisions to be made or when you start to lose your way. Develop a ministry plan based on your mission and vision.
- Define the roles or tasks for each person on the team. Clear, current position descriptions or duty lists are a real asset in determining who does what and avoiding oversights or duplication. Defining the roles or tasks is useful and brings greater clarity.
- Know the people on your team and what they bring to the group. Identify, value, affirm and integrate their different spiritual gifts, personalities and teamwork styles. This will help you to work together more effectively, and you will be able to utilise each person’s strengths and abilities.
Remember to celebrate together! This may happen during your regular meeting, or you might plan something special, for example, a special supper, a meal together, or cake and drinks after the meeting. Share the stories. Nothing impacts a team more than stories and testimonies about what God is doing in people’s lives. Your team will be inspired and get behind the ministry if they hear and see what God is doing through it.
Team meetings
Regular, ongoing team meetings should be scheduled to pray, share, review and plan to further the ministry and mission. These meetings are essential for growing the team and relationships within the team. Team building should be part of everything you do, including staff team meetings!
A simple team ministry meeting outline
- Begin with prayer and/or devotion – Immerse the meeting in prayer from the beginning. This will bring you back to what you’re really doing and who you are serving. Don’t be afraid to stop and pray during the meeting if you get bogged down or differences of opinion occur.
- Care time – Check how everyone is really doing. Not just in their roles but personally. This need not take forever, but it is vital to being a team. What is happening in people’s lives affects their role and the ministry. This is a real opportunity to care for each other and grow relationships, not just at the meeting but afterwards. Follow up on care needs and concerns between meetings.
- Review previous action points – What progress has been made? What is still needed? Add anything that needs to be done to this meeting’s action points.
- Ministry sharing – Share what has happened since the last meeting and take the time to review it. What went well and what didn’t? Is there any feedback, and what can you do to improve? When there has been a special, big event, you might want to organise a specific meeting to review it.
- Overall ministry planning – Don’t get stuck in the past or stay preoccupied with the present. Day-to-day issues and the running of a ministry can absorb your time and attention if allowed to. Spend time looking to the future and planning for the next steps. You may need to make a special time or meeting for this.
- Action points – Be clear about who will do what. Ensure the action points are recorded and actually acted on! Simple things like adding names to action points and highlighting them on the minutes or the ongoing agenda can help.
- End with prayer – Pray together for each other and the ministry.
Team or staff retreats
Regular team or staff retreats are well worth the energy and effort you will put into organising and getting away. Whether it is for a day or a weekend, nothing builds team relationships faster than getting away together. You will also find that you can achieve things you would never be able to within the timeframe and ongoing agenda restraints of a usual team meeting.
Some elements that you could incorporate into a retreat program include:
- Prayer – In this context, there is time for individual reflection, group prayer and seeking God’s guidance and direction together for the ministry.
- Review – Reflect on the ministry you share and look back over the past months or years. Celebrate the good. Identify areas for growth and development.
- Planning – Do the big-picture thinking you usually don’t have time for. Discuss possibilities and directions for the ministry. Plan for the future.
- Worship – There is a great blessing in worshipping together as a team.
- Teambuilding – Use some of the many teambuilding activities available to develop and grow team relationships. (See the Team Ministry Guide available on the LCA Portal under Church Worker Support for some examples.)
- Fun – Make the time to relax, enjoy each other’s company and have fun together!
Working with volunteers
Volunteers are vital to the life of our church. Volunteers faithfully serve in congregations and agencies of the LCA throughout Australia and New Zealand to make our mission and ministry happen. They are the body, hands and feet of our church. Our congregations and agencies could not function without volunteers.
The LCA is committed to volunteer involvement in our congregations and agencies and to supporting, resourcing and caring for them properly to the best of our ability. In Australia, we seek to comply with the National Standards for Volunteer Involvement, and they will also be helpful for congregations in New Zealand.
LCA Church Worker Support has a comprehensive ‘Volunteer Guide’ resource with accompanying resources, such as templates for role descriptions (see buttons to the left).
See the LCA Volunteer Identification and Selection Policy at www.lca.org.au/polices
The National Standards for Volunteer Involvement are managed by Volunteering Australia and provide a framework for supporting the volunteer sector in Australia. They provide good practice guidelines for organisations to attract, manage and retain volunteers and help improve volunteer experience.
Working with difficult people
'Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful' (Colossians 3:12–15).
In ministry, you are bound to encounter difficult or challenging people. There will be personality clashes, differing points of view and agendas, people who let you down, lone rangers who refuse to work as a team and many other examples we could list.
The LCA Standards of Ethical Behaviour clearly articulate the standard of behaviour we expect from one another in useful and practical terms. Underpinned by Scripture and church policy, these standards apply to all aspects of church life.
Below are a few approaches that work in dealing with difficult or challenging people:
Small group resources
- SmallGroups.com – small group leader training resources, videos and articles
- Church Leadership Resources – a free downloadable Small Group Leaders Training Manual (click on resources and then small groups)
- CRU Beginning And Leading A Small Group
- Homegroups UK – a large range of resources for small group leaders and small groups
Small groups
'Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people’ (Acts 2:46,47).
People need people, and they need community. It is the way God made us. This need for community expresses itself in a person’s search for four basic ‘needs’ of life: to belong, to be valued, to experience the love and care of others, and to be involved with others.
Christian small groups provide a healthy environment for these internal needs to be met. They offer care, connections and intimacy, no matter how large the church community is.
Churches can give their small groups various names, such as life groups, home groups, connect groups, care groups or cell groups. The people who lead these groups can be called leaders, facilitators or hosts. We will be referring to them as small groups and small group leaders.
A small group is an intentional community of people who meet together for the purpose of building relationships. According to Kennon Callahan in Effective Church Leadership, a healthy small group will build relationships on four levels: with each other (building up the group), with God (growing in faith), with people ‘outside’ (reaching beyond the group), and within oneself (strengthening the individual).
A good small group doesn’t just happen. It takes time and intentionality to develop and grow relationships and trust, but the effort is well worthwhile.
There is a whole range of types of small groups, for example, a traditional Bible study group, worship band, golf group, and everything in between. Every group will be different, but there are activities that all small groups should be engaged in, to varying degrees, to ensure a healthy, balanced group life.
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