“Eat your vegetables, they’re good for you.” My mom said those words to me countless times as a kid. But I didn’t care how good vegetables were for me, I didn’t like them, and brussels sprouts were the worst!
Mom was right. Veggies are good for me, and I should have eaten more. The nutritional benefits would have been fantastic.
All leaders face “brussels sprouts” kinds of tasks, truths and responsibilities. You know they’re good for you, and need to be adhered to, but you don’t want to just the same.
My advice. Eat your “leadership veggies” anyway. The benefits are obvious.
The following are six of the most common things leaders hate to do, but smart leadersdo them anyway.
6 Things Leaders Hate To Do:
1) Get honest about your limitations.
I can do all things in Christ. Right?! Well, yes, but I still can’t slam dunk a basketball. Leaders have to know and embrace their limitations.
Embracing your limitations is not the same as giving up, deciding not to work hard or continuing to grow as a leader.
I play the guitar, but no matter what I do, I’ll never play like Jimmy Hendricks, Eric Clapton or Carlos Santana. In the same way, I’ll never preach like Andy Stanley, Matt Chandler or Louie Giglio. It can be tough to own that, but the sooner you do, the sooner you can be set free to become all that God has intended for you.
So, how about you? What are your greatest strengths as a leader? Do you know your limitations? From your energy level to your unique skills and abilities, how has God wired you to succeed?
2) Allow God to determine the definition of church growth success.
I would love to be able to decide how large the church I serve becomes. But God doesn’t allow that.
The New Testament makes it clear that the church is intended to grow, but there is no indication that we get to determine the size. I think God knows us too well to allow that.
Yet, we strive and get frustrated if our church doesn’t grow as fast as the superstar church across town. Don’t misunderstand, this isn’t a platform for excuses, or suggesting that lack of progress is OK.
But God doesn’t set His Kingdom standards based on how many are sitting in the pews, in fact, we are all wise to do our best to teach and lead according to our best understanding of how God defines success.
Success for your church is best determined by seeking God through prayer, and aligning yourself and your work to His vision for your church. Then stay focused right there. That’s my prayer for us at 12Stone.
3) Focus on execution as much as ideas.
Ideas are fun! Cultivating ideas like titles for a blog post is a blast, but actually writing the post, well, that’s more like work.
I’m not suggesting that generating good ideas is easy, but an idea that the Holy Spirit can give you in a moment can take a thousand hours to see it to completion.
In fact, a “B” idea that gets completed is better than an “A” idea that never gets done.
Learning to develop good ideas and connecting that to equally outstanding execution is essential, but it’s surprising how often that fails in the local church.
I think it’s natural for us to like the vision, the idea, and what’s new and shiny best. Like launching a new campus, or the start of a new sermon series. But when the balloons have faded there is much work to do.
The best leaders are ruthlessly intent on execution.
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Source: Church Leaders
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