Leadership has its challenges. This reality struck me in a new way with a question asked at a small group I was a part of once. We had just sat down to begin our discussion and interaction. It was typical to begin with an icebreaker or introductory question. This time the question was: “what is the best and worst part of your job?”. An interesting question and one that would truly give us all a bit more insight into what each other did. However, for me I had to debate a bit more on how best to answer.

Being a leader at the church these people are part of, made this questions a potential pitfall. As any leader knows you don’t want to raise an undue cause for alarm for those you lead. However, you don’t want to sugar coat any situation. So as I sat there, thinking what was the best and worst part of my job, it came to me…people! The people are the very best thing about leadership in a church and people are the very worst part about leadership. With almost every challenge known to leadership, they almost all come down to people issues. And people are shaped, often times unbeknownst to themselves, by their experiences.

“being aware of the possibility that we, and our church members, risk being shaped by the last twelve months”

Andrew Wilson

All of us have experienced something unique to our time in history over the last 18 months. Without a war being fought there have been causalities everywhere. Physical lives have been lost, freedoms have been lost, friendships have ended, civil engagement diminished, and social interactions nearly came to a halt. And all of that has affected us, even leaders. Andrew Wilson picks up on this theme and pinpoints potentially “The Great Leadership Challenge of 2021“.

READ THE ARTICLE

I think Andrew may be on to something. I tend to agree with him that the past 18 months has affected us all and in this way more subtly than any other. Yet it doesn’t have to be the greatest challenge. We all have an opportunity to respond to our experience. The question is how will we respond? As always I’d love to hear from you. Leave me a comment and I’ll reply. And don’t forget to be with the Lord’s people on the Lord’s day.

Until Next Time…

Photo by Jukan Tateisi on Unsplash