Our church leaders tend to fall into two categories professionally: public school teachers or federal government employees. The gift of administration is not lacking in my church! We bring the skills, training and values of our professional careers and seek to build that same level of excellence and accountability in all our ministries, and seek to develop the same in the people we lead.
In your congregation, do you have ministries available that assist individuals (and your church) in the administration of excellence? What do these ministries look like? What are they doing for people and how are they helping them? If you are unable to start your own ministry in a certain area, you could bring in outside ministries, speakers, teaching books or curricula that have similar DNA and use them in your congregation.
Here are a few ways you can build structures of excellence in your church:
1. Find out what people want to know
and offer classes on those topics.
On a personal level, your church could offer adult classes that focus on issues like finances, time management and reaching your destiny. Query the congregation; find out the areas they feel they need to grow in and then make those classes available. Be sure each class includes enough time at the end for questions and answers.
Along with this, send church leaders and overseers into the congregation just to ask people how they are. Build relationships on purpose, asking, “How can I serve you? What can I do to help you grow? Do you want to meet about this on a regular basis so I can support you?” These are good questions that need to be raised in our relationships with one another.
2. Seek to sow excellence into your structures.
On a corporate level, build the spirit of excellence into the structures that support your church. The church should be state-of-the-art in terms of media, music, sound systems, lighting, computer programs, applications, etc. Have the best programs in place with the most efficient use of resources, which produces the highest yield of quality, effectiveness and impact.
3. Raise up administrators.
Try to have a system in place for raising up new expressions of administrative strength. One way to do this is by addressing administration, both its importance and its calling, from the pulpit and seeing who responds. Who in your congregation has a heart for administration? Who is already moving in the spirit of excellence? Identify who they are, pray over them, develop and train them.
Create a developmental ladder in your church so administrative people can move into higher levels of leadership, administrative authority and oversight. This looks like creating entry-level admin roles, where people can demonstrate faithfulness without a tremendous amount of expertise, and midlevel administrative roles, which help people grow. Ultimately, these leaders-in-training are your candidates for deacons (workers or helpers) in your church.
Equip those who are uniquely called to administration, and help them raise up administrative sons and daughters. This will promote incredible expressions of excellence in your church.
