Designed to Lead: The Church and Leadership Development

by Eric Geiger

Sadly many churches do not recognize or act on the assignment God has given pastors. For example, peruse the typical job descriptions churches give for their pastors. In many churches, you will likely find little emphasis on equipping people for ministry. According to the job descriptions, programs will be run and budgets will be managed but people may or may not be developed. As another example, notice the list of responsibilities a church that is looking for a pastor will offer potential pastors. You can understand how the lengthy list is developed. A team tasked with the responsibility of finding the new pastor surveys the congregation for insights into what qualities the people feel are most important. When the responses are combined, you will find the church desires someone who is a great preacher, excellent with young families, wise in administration, a strong mentor for the staff, passionate for global missions, deeply connected in the local community, skilled in counseling, eager to visit the hospitals, innovative but not wanting to change things, and evangelistic of the kinds of people who are just like us. Oh yeah—and the pastor should be married with kids and fall squarely into the age range of the median household in the community. When you read one of those lists you may think, Wow. This church is actually looking for Jesus to be the pastor. Except Jesus was not married with kids, so Jesus would not meet the qualifications some churches list when looking for a...